Ma’a Nonu flanked by the Savea brothers whilst playing for Oriental-Rongotai. Nonu is set to play his 100th All Blacks Test this coming weekend in the Rugby World Cup, becoming the sixth New Zealand player to reach this milestone and the first from Wellington. It’s the year 2000. Your humble correspondent is a podgy, spotty faced school boy whose squeaky tenor is rapidly turning hoarse. I am at St. Patrick’s College, Silverstream in Wellington crowded on an embankment with similarly delirious and odious smelling lads...More

Watch highlights of Hawke’s Bay’s 1960s Ranfurly Shield era, including footage of two epic matches against Wellington here  As far as New Zealand provincial rivalries go, few top the one between Wellington and Hawke’s Bay. The two unions resume their 13-decade rivalry this Wednesday night at Westpac Stadium, in a top-of-the-table ITM Cup Championship match. Overall, this will be their 97th first-class meeting since their first in 1885. As it stands, Wellington has won 60, Hawke’s Bay 31 and there have been five draws...More

The visiting North Harbour U85kg defeated the Wellington Centurions U85Kg side 18-12 at SPC artificial on Saturday in their one-off fixture. Conditions were not great for running rugby, with the match played in driving cold rain at Evans Bay. North Harbour started well and kicked two penalties in the first 15 minutes after several penalties at the breakdown, which also meant Centurions were on a warning. Second five-eighth LA Moemai made a great break down the wing bumping off one player before running 60 metres and then being tackled over the sideline a couple of metres out...More

Wellington has relinquished its National U19 title, stumbling to a disappointing 29-10 defeat to Taranaki on the first day of the Jock Hobbs Memorial tournament in Taupo on Sunday. Taranaki's victory was built on staunch defence and superior discipline. They hassled Wellington into repeat mistakes and never allowed the defending champions to build consistent pressure. Wellington lost the first half penalty count 9-2. That allowed Taranaki to control territory and accumulate four penalties from the educated right boot of Eli Kneepkens - he slotted two 45-metre kicks...More

The Wellington Pride and the Wellington Development teams both came back from slow starts to win well in their respective representative matches at the Petone Recreation Ground today. In the first match of the afternoon the Wellington Pride defeated Canterbury 32-18 in their Women’s NPC match, in the second game Wellington Development defeated the Hawke’s Bay Saracens 54-26. The Pride came back from 0-8 behind midway through the first half to trail Canterbury 7-8 at halftime and then power past them with a burst of into-the-wind scoring in the second spell...More

It was a Thursday afternoon. I had been at university for a few hours and decided to sit down at my desk and have a wee look over Facebook as any student would do. What do I see? Well, not a lot different from the ordinary: A girl’s new profile picture that had racked up several hundred likes A cringe-worthy status that you’re not sure whether it was their mate taking over their Facebook who posted it as a joke, or if they actually posted it themselves  A classic Veitchy on Sport post with endless entertaining comments  Another post from Veitchy with a link (which has now been deleted as the comments were getting “way out of hand,”) to Shelley Bridgeman’s article from the New Zealand Herald, titled 8 reasons I’m already over the Rugby World Cup This post particularly caught my eye, as would have been the case for the thousands of other rugby fans who stumbled across it on Thursday...More

The Wellington U19s are heading to Taupo this weekend to defend the Graham Mourie Cup that they won at the inaugural National Jock Hobbs Memorial event. Leading up to the 2015 tournament, Club Rugby is profiling some of the young Lions who are likely to feature in the tournament and indeed the future of the game in the capital. Tipping the scales at 93kgs, Kaide McCashin isn’t your traditional ‘little halfback’. The ‘little halfback’ phrase would have been better used to describe the 2012 Kaide McCashin who could have played in the Under 65kgs grade...More

Wellington Development outside backs Isaia Petelo and Paddy Hughes fighting for the ball against Manawatu last week. A fine, cool day is expected tomorrow for their match tomorrow against Hawke’s Bay at Petone tomorrow. The Wellington Pride and the Wellington Development teams play back-to-back matches at Petone Recreation Ground in two leading representative fixtures tomorrow, while there are two matches in town at Evans Bay Park including an U85kg fixture between the Wellington Centurions and North Harbour teams...More

Sixteen teams in two divisions take to Owen Delany Park in Taupo over three days on 27 and 30 September and 3 October to contest the 2015 Jock Hobbs Memorial National U19 Tournament. After the successful inaugural tournament last year, New Zealand Rugby (NZR) is making this a regular on the rugby calendar in order to help develop emerging talent in the Under 19s age group. New Zealand Rugby General Manager of Rugby and former representative halfback, Neil Sorensen, said the tournament provided a pathway for emerging  players and provided them with every reason to stay in the game and aim for higher honours, such as their full Provincial Union side and NZ U20 side...More

Above: In driving rain, Tomasi Palu kicks ahead in last month’s Jubilee Cup final between his Old Boys University side and Marist St Pat’s. Tomasi Palu made his Premier run-on club rugby debut for Old Boys University against Upper Hutt in 2005 at first five-eighth. He scored a try in a 10-62 drubbing to that year’s Swindale Shield champions and Jubilee Cup semi-finalists. Earlier this season, it was OBU’s 38-22 Swindale Shield win over the Upper Hutt Rams that alerted Club Rugby to the very real possibility that the Goats could annex this year’s Jubilee Cup - and a key reason for this was because Palu was back playing for them...More