Silverstream roll on, Porirua College beat Aotea College in a thriller

St Pat’s Silverstream continue to set the pace amongst the Wellington First XV schools, Beating St Pat’s Town and winning their eighth straight WelTec Premiership contest, while Porirua College retained the Beard Trophy and qualified for the region’s Co-ed Cup final with a dramatic win over Aotea College in two matches this afternoon.

St Pat’s Silverstream accounted for St Pat’s Town 42-5, while Porirua College beat Premier 2 side Aotea College 17-15, courtesy of a last-gasp converted try.

In the other Co-ed Cup semi-final this afternoon, Tawa College defeated Onslow College 38-0, setting up a Wellington final between Porirua and Tawa.

St Pat’s Silverstream (42) – St Pat’s Town (5)

St. Pats Silverstream have continued their rampant Premiership form, trouncing St. Pats Town at home.

Town was a stubborn and disruptive opponent who lost decisively, despite scoring the first try and controlling 60 percent of possession.

Town started with enthusiasm and stretched the Silverstream defence often, but failed to score until a lineout fumble by the hosts resulted in a try for hooker Gab Meredith.

Silverstream stung by conceding a rare try turned up the heat and scored four unanswered tries before halftime to make it 28-5 at the interval. 

The second-half was an error-ridden affair with Town endeavour going unrewarded and Silverstream punishing inaccuracy. 

The try scorers for Silverstream were: Albert Polu (2), Harrison Boyle (2), Toalima Anae-Laupolo, Todd Sevenson and Swayde Brightwell.

Standouts for Town were loose forwards Keelan Whitman, Xavier English and halfback Devon Olliver-Bell.

For Stream Boyle's boot and occasional running was a highlight and openside Josh Southall continued his top season. 

Silverstream have now scored 514 points and conceded just 26 in eight WelTec Premiership matches.

Porirua College (17) – Aotea College (15)

Porirua College left it the last play of the match to score the match-equalising try against Aotea College through replacement outside back Mau Tealei, and No. 8 Jamie Soapi calmly stepped up to kick the winning conversion to the right of the uprights to give them a thrilling win at home.

If Soapi’s conversion had missed and scores had remained 15-15, then Aotea College would have progressed to the Co-ed Cup final, by virtue of scoring the game’s first try.

Trailing 10-15 and in referee’s time, Aotea College could have kicked the ball out and ended the match, but the home team got their hands on the ball one last time and launched a furious late raid into the setting sun and scored out wide.

In a see-saw match, Aotea - restored to their full complement of players following the back-to-back second half sin-binning's of their first five-eighth TC Robati and their No. 8 Penitito Ifopo - had taken the lead with their third try.

Ifopo and Robati had seemingly atoned for their respective yellow cards when the former made a blockbusting surge from an attacking scrum up to the 22 and the latter grubbered ahead for second five- Ropati Sooalo to collect the bounce and pour through to score off.

Earlier, Sooalo had combined with centre Andrew Vailoa in a try-scoring run up the blindside touch to set up the first try of the game to flyhalf Robati in hot support against the run of play right on the stroke of halftime. Aotea went into the break leading 5-0.

Following two rousing hakas, the match struggled to get going in the first 35 minutes, both sides struggling for momentum and poor discipline on the part of both teams the main pattern of play. As well as Aotea's two players, Porirua’s flanker Miti Miti would also be yellow carded.

Playing into a moderate wind and into the sun, Porirua made a breezy start to the second half, the tighthead prop Zekiel Ioane and No. 8 Soapi featuring prominently in a surge up into Aotea’s 22 and first five-eighth Eli Moata’a ripping it wide to centre Nathaniel Moafanua to score in the corner to make it 5-5.

Aotea’s next kick-off went deep, the Porirua defender made a hash of tidying up the bouncing ball and barnstorming Aotea lock Oiano Afutoto poured through to score to put the visitors up 10-5.

Porirua capitalised on the one-player advantage to score their second try through second five-eighth Junior Time Taotua in the same left-hand corner as the first one to make it 10-10 and setting up a tense final period of play.