St Pat's Silvestream looking forward to new season

The 2017, St Patrick’s College, Silverstream First XV was historic for many reasons. Perhaps their most unique distinction was the fact they didn’t attempt a single penalty kick for the entire season.

Joining only nine other teams in the school’s history to have won all six traditional matches, last year’s side also set a school record for scoring, amassing 982 points in 18 games.

Silverstream will start their defence of the First XV Premiership as favourites, but coach Tim Mannix isn’t getting too far ahead of himself.

“Every first fifteen is unique because of the way the school system works, so while last year we had a lot of great achievements, we understand that this year was going to completely different,” he says.

“Our main objective as a coaching group this year is the development of this new team and having them play rugby where they’re maximising their potential,” Mannix continued.

With 10 members of last year’s squad returning, Silverstream has a combination of both experience and youth for the 2018 season.

Openside flanker and 2017 New Zealand Schools representative Josh Southall said he was excited for his final year at school and wants to go out with a bang.

“With a lot of the boys being year 13s this year, we just want to make sure we’ve done all we can so that there are no ‘what ifs’ when it is all said and done

“While we are obviously going to be taking our season one week at a time. I definitely want to see us crack Top 4.”

Silverstream missed out on the National Top Four in 2017 losing to eventual champions Hasting Boys’ High in the Hurricanes playoff Final. They will look to go one better for an opportunity to compete for the national crown.

Silverstream’s commences this Saturday at the annual Tranzit Coachlines 1st XV Festival, where they will play Napier Boys’ High (May 5), Hastings Boys’ High (May 12) and Gisborne Boys’ High (May 19).