Above: The Wellington Samoans threw their final pass for the year on Saturday, losing to the Hawke's Bay Development who are all but assured of retaining their Hurricanes Shield this coming weekend. Read more below. Off the Ball is in association with Rob Law Max, Lovelocks Sports Bar,  Motor Doctors and Sarah Kilner Real Estate  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. Another promising weekend for the Wellington men’s and women’s senior teams, the Lions and Pride both earning bonus point wins...More

Bay of Plenty with the Graham Mourie Cup. PHOTO: https://www.facebook.com/NationalUnder19s/ Bay of Plenty have become the fifth different winner of the Graham Mourie Cup in as many years, dramatically defeating Canterbury 35-30 in the Premiership final of the Jock Hobbs Memorial U19 tournament on Saturday. The dying stages of the match categorially illustrated how sought after this title has become. Bay of Plenty was ahead 27-23 with eight minutes remaining. The Junior Steamers put together 17 phases and earned a penalty which fullback Kaleb Trask failed to kick...More

UPDATED SUNDAY: The Wellington Pride and two of the three Centurions teams won convincingly in representative matches around the region and further afield today. The Wellington Pride beat the Otago Spirit 38-10 to take their second consecutive bonus point in the Farah Palmer Cup NPC competition (more below). The Centurions Development side flew to an 81-17 win over the Manawatu Development at the Hutt Recreation Ground and the Centurions U18s defeated the Wellington Community U18s 40-22 at Porirua Park (more below)...More

Mid-September means rugby. There are four home games tomorrow involving Wellington representative teams, evenly split between two different venues. If you are on the road, there are several other teams playing away. If you have Sky you can record the Wellington Lions who are playing Counties Manukau in Pukekohe at 2.05pm and watch when you get in. As a nightcap, the All Blacks are playing South Africa at Westpac Stadium at 7.35pm. In two matches at Porirua Park on Jerry Collins Stadium, the Wellington Pride host Otago in the Women’s NPC at 11...More

I really wish I was back in Wellington this weekend. Catch a bus, if you still have them, and head to the Stadium. Because there’s nothing more fun that watching All Blacks v Boks. Or at least that’s how the world used to turn. Now you look at the Boks with something approaching pity, and that’s just wrong. They’re talking damage control and that may be written off as a ploy, but they seem to be deadly serious about it. The puzzle is how the pretty competitive Bok side the lost 24-25 at Newlands at the tail end of the championship last year is now looking as likely as the side which shipped 57 points to NIL at Albany three weeks earlier...More

The Wellington U85kg Centurions representative side is in action in Nelson this weekend in the first of two away matches to come to complete their post club rugby campaign. The U85kg side are playing the Tasman U18s at Trafalgar Park Nelson, building up to their big match in a fortnight in Palmertson North against the Waikato U85kgs. The side has been brought back this year after a season in abeyance, owing to other U85kg representative teams playing in a northern tournament that excluded the Centurions...More

Action from the Wellington v Canterbury semi-final. PHOTO CREDIT: https://www.facebook.com/NationalUnder19s/ Either Bay of Plenty or Canterbury will be crowned the best Under-19 team in New Zealand on Saturday. On day two of the Jock Hobbs Memorial tournament at Owen Delany Park in Taupo, both unions enjoyed commanding victories in their respective Graham Mourie Cup semi-finals. Meanwhile in the Michael Jones Trophy a new champion will be anointed after Otago edged Counties 27-25. Counties was down 24-22 with five minutes remaining, but an angled 35-meter penalty by Tala Potifara regained the lead for the defending champions...More

Wellington’s Premier rugby competitions are set for a shake-up, to take effect from next season. Club Rugby has obtained a copy of the WRFU’s proposals that has been sent out to the clubs which details two possible formats that will shorten the length of the competitions. The rationale for the changes comes from two fronts. On one hand there is next year’s Rugby World Cup in Japan which sees something of a shuffle to make everything fit, followed after that by the introduction of the new global calendar...More

Above: Kienan Higgins makes a break for it for Wellington against Taranaki on Sunday. PHOTO CREDIT: https://www.facebook.com/NationalUnder19s/  The top four has been resolved at the Jock Hobbs Memorial National Under-19 tournament in Taupo. Bay of Plenty are the favourites to win the Graham Mourie Premiership after crushing Hawke’s Bay by a record score of 90-0. Two weeks earlier Bay of Plenty thrashed Taranaki 94-0 in the seeding rounds and are so far unbeaten in 2018. Bay of Plenty will tackle North Harbour in the first semi-final after they edged Tasman 28-25...More

For the first time in the history of New Zealand sport, a survey is being undertaken on the current state of Amateur Sports Clubs across the country. The survey is being undertaken by the New Zealand Amateur Sport Association (NZ ASA) in partnership with the Sport Leadership & Management Department at Auckland University of Technology (AUT). The Association is inviting 1,000 Amateur Sports Clubs currently registered as Incorporated Societies across 16 different sporting codes to participate in the on-line survey which will be undertaken during September...More