More Surprises Promised As Top Meets Bottom In Penultimate Round

The composition of the four Jubilee Cup semi-finalists should become a whole lot clearer after this weekends penultimate round of matches, with the top four positioned teams playing the bottom four. But that's not taking into account any more surprise results, with most pundits not expecting the playoff contenders to be decided until after the final whistle next week.

Round five games were all closely fought, with Avalon's three tries scored and nine point winning margin over Petone comparatively comfortable compared to the other three encounters, which produced a draw and two low scoring contests. Atrocious weather conditions, heavy grounds and a tough competition between eight well-matched teams have so far combined to make this year's Jubilee Cup one of the tightest in several years. Accordingly, all teams to varying degrees head into the final fortnight's play still in the hunt to make the top four.

Round six games see Northern United (1st) play Petone (5th) at the Petone Recreation Ground, Poneke (2nd) up against Marist St. Pats (7th) at Evans Bay Park, Old Boys-University (3rd) versus Avalon (6th) at Fraser Park and Hutt Old Boys Marist (4th) take on Tawa (8th) at Lyndhurst Park. More surprises won't be unexpected though, especially given that home advantage is with the lower positioned sides in all four games and they will all also be pushing for bonus point wins to increase their chances.

Norths (now on 17 points) and Poneke (15 points), who drew 13-13 when they played each other last week, look likely to be two of the semi-finalists, but there's still only six points separating third placed OBU (14 points) and seventh placed MSP (8 points), meaning something will have to give in round six. Once again Norths and Poneke could be the key protagonists this week, if they prevail over Petone and MSP then the latter pair could be gone. Avalon are also in a similar position, needing to find a way past OBU to keep their chances alive, while a bonus point win is Tawa's only hope of remaining in slim contention. However their opponents HOBM won't want to do them any favours as they have a date with Norths in the last round.

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