Off the Ball for 10 July

Above: Northern United prop Gerard Faitotoa running strongly in his 50th Premier match on Saturday. No. 8 Mike Ioapo also played his 35th Blazer game in the 48-29 win over Hutt Old Boys Marist. 

Off the Ball is in association with Rob Law Max , Lovelocks Sports Bar  and Harcourts Johnsonville 

Looking at some of the news in briefs, milestones, happenings, statistics and observations from the weekend of rugby just gone and what’s coming up this week.

+++++

Just two weeks to play before the Wellington club rugby Premier semi-finals and just one of the eight teams (Petone) is out of contention to win this year’s Jubilee Cup.

Recent history shows that a lot can happen in the last two rounds, so there’s more twists and turns to come before this round-robin season wraps up.

How important could MSP’s late penalty to draw the game against Wainuiomata be to the playoff aspirations of both sides? And others around them on the table? If Wainuiomata had held on and won that match, the points table would read: OBU 20, MSP 15, Wainuiomata 15, HOBM 13, Tawa 13, Norths 11, Ories 11, Petone 3.

This year’s Hardham Cup is a straight 10-week round-robin series. At the halfway mark, Johnsonville are the only unbeaten side and hold a one-point buffer over the second placed Upper Hutt Rams after beating them on Saturday, with third placed Poneke a further eight points back. If Johnsonville beats Avalon, the Rams beat Paremata-Plimmerton and Poneke fall to Wellington this coming Saturday then it will be a two-horse race to the end. If two teams are tied at the end of the season, then the Hardham Cup winner is decided on who beat who, but if the series is locked at 1-1 then the countback is points differential.

+++++

The Petone Colts suffered their first loss of the season on Saturday to Tawa, picked apart in the engine room by Tawa who beat them 31-27. By our reckoning that leaves just the Oriental-Rongotai women as the sole unbeaten team in the competitive grades this year. Plus St Pat’s Silverstream in the WelTec Premiership First XV competition.

Carlos Price is due to make his comeback this coming weekend for the Petone Colts. He suffered a foot injury for the NZ U20s in their Test against Samoa eight weeks ago and he hadn’t responded to the treatment as well as hoped.

+++++

It’s bonjour to former Petone, Wellington and Hurricanes first five-eighth Dan Kirkpatrick, who is back in the country after several seasons in France playing professionally. Petone are hoping to have him involved this coming weekend against the Eagles out at the Hutt Rec.

+++++

It’s the first day of school holidays, so there’s no First XV rugby for the next fortnight. The next matches are on 22 July, with Wairarapa College hosting Wellington College in a WelTec Premiership catch-up match and Aotea and Porirua Colleges meeting in the Co-ed Cup and for the Beard Trophy.

+++++

The U12 and U13 Zone tournament is on at Maidstone Park (artificial) Friday through Sunday, with teams from the three Wellington zones - City, Hutt Valley, and Western Bays - plus Horowhenua-Kapiti, in each grade.

+++++

The Hurricanes U18 wider squad is in camp in the Wairarapa this week, from which a team gets selected to play their Crusaders counterparts at Westpac Stadium on Saturday evening. Kick-off between the Gusts and the Page Boys is at 5.10pm and live on Sky Sport, ahead of the Hurricanes-Crusaders Super Rugby fixture.

+++++

The Hurricanes U18s have won their last two fixtures against the Crusaders U18s convincingly, prevailing 58-17 in Blenheim in 2015 and 64-20 last year in Christchurch.

+++++

Hurricanes coach John Plumtree was Wellington College’s water boy last week in Nelson at the Quadrangular tournament. Wellington College finished third, behind winners Nelson College.

+++++

In The Premier game at Lyndhurst Park, Tawa Prop  James “Mountain Man” Coburn (not the Hollywood actor) played the first half against Petone. At the halftime whistle, he ran from the field into a waiting car and headed to the airport to take a flight to Auckland to watch the All Blacks - Lions deciding Test at Eden Park.

In the same game, in the 79 minute, both Tawa props Taniela Koroi and Sitiveni Paongo where sin binned together. The scrums were already being uncontested as Petone had previously been forced to request this with no available replacement props after injuries to front row forwards.

+++++

Three of the region’s leading hookers were all in action in club rugby on Saturday, and two opposed each other. Northern United’s Leni Apisai went head-to-head with Hutt Old Boys Marist’s James O’Reilly, with Apisai’s Norths winning 48-29. Asafo Aumua scored two tries for Avalon against Poneke but couldn’t prevent his side being over-run 53-31 after they led 19-3 early.

+++++

After a few weeks sidelined by injury, mercurial Marist St Pat’s first five-eighth Fa'atonu Fili has returned to the field with renewed vigour and a few more tricks up his sleeve. He's been seen running at the line more regularly, combining with fullback Andrew Wells in last week’s win over HOBM and setting up one try on Saturday against Wainuiomata for Willie Schultz and scoring another of his own.

+++++

St Mary’s College and Black Ferns Sevens apprentice player Lyric Faleafaga scored two of her side’s three tries in Northern United’s 17-57 loss to Oriental-Rongotai on Saturday in the women’s Victoria Tavern Trophy. Lyric has now scored 11 tries in her first six games for Norths. Ories left wing Ayesha Leti-l’iga scored a try in this same match to take her season tally to 19 tries in eight games.

+++++

The Best and Fairest competition has closed up after the weekend with Lester Maulolo and Parekura Lalaga earning points on Saturday. Also a good day for the big rigs, with Peniasi Tokakece (Tawa) and Johnathan Fuimaono scoring three points. Of the 12 players that were awarded points seven were for the first time this year.

+++++

In an age when team numbers across Wellington continue to decrease it is becoming less common for teams from the same club to find themselves competing against each other. But on Saturday the Marist St Pats Under 85kg Reds played the MSP Greens. In match played in great spirit is was the Reds that came out on top winning 54-17.

+++++

Over the past 5 years (2012-2017), the number of boys' teams participating in the Wellington Secondary School Rugby Union competition has fallen by 26%, from 121 to 90. In total, this represents nearly 700 fewer secondary school age boys playing rugby this year, compared to 5 years ago.

The decline has been uniform (in percentage terms) across all three regions: both the Western Suburbs and Hutt Valley region secondary schools have seen a 28% decrease in the number of teams, with a slightly lower 22% fall within the Wellington City area.

Looking across the various grades, there are 24% fewer open-weight Premier teams, only half the number teams in the open-weight under 15 age-group compared to five years ago (noting that in 2012, there was an under 14 grade), while the number of under 55 kg teams is down by nearly one third (31%). The number of teams in the under 80 kg and under 65 kg groups combined are about the same.

In summary, there are two major trends which appear to have emerged over the past five years: firstly, fewer boys wish to play open-weight grade rugby at secondary school; and secondly, fewer smaller boys are playing rugby once they arrive at secondary school.

The two trends may be linked and if so, should sound a warning to rugby's administrators, if they continue. There is no doubt that the ongoing attention given to player safety, particularly head injuries, will be an influencing factor, as will the resources available to coach teams in the secondary school environment.

By way of national comparison, over the five years 2011 to 2016, the number of registered secondary school Rugby Union players nationally has fallen by 13% (minus 3,942 players), the largest fall in participation numbers of any of the 90 sports surveyed by the New Zealand Secondary Schools Sports Council.

++++

This coming Saturday's sixth round of the Jubilee Cup and Hardham Cup will see all Premier teams and referees wear Purple Socks in support of RUCK CANCER – an initiative promoting the awareness of cancer and men’s health within our Wellington Rugby Community.

Contributions to Off the Ball to editor@clubrugby.co.nz