Wellington v Counties Manukau Stat Attack

With four tries in this match – all off the bench – Asafo Aumua has now scored 24 tries in 56 matches and has drawn level with fellow forward Murray Mexted who also scored 24 tries, in 111 matches. He still has a way to go though to reach the late Graham Williams’ record for most tries by a forward: 54, in a Wellington record 173 appearances.

The Wellington Lions beat the Counties Manukau Steeler 64-31 in their National Provincial Championship ninth round meeting at Pukekohe on Sunday. Some facts and figures from the game below by Peter Marriott.

Round 9 v Counties Manukau: Won 64-31

The two sides have now met 36 times in National Provincial Matches (NPC). Wellington has won
22 of those matches and Counties Manukau 12. There have been two draws.

They did not meet last year.

Wellington scored 64 points in a match for the second time: on both occasions Counties Manukau
has been on the receiving end. At Wellington in August 2008, the home side won 64-7.

Wellington has exceeded 64 points on just four occasions: 74-20 against Bay of Plenty at Tauranga
in 2002, 73-28 against Taranaki at Wellington in 2004, 68-7 against Otago at Wellington in 2007 and
65-12 against Northland at Wellington in 2004.

Wellington has now passed 50 points on 31 occasions and have never lost a match when scoring
that many points.

Wellington has conceded 31 points on 14 occasions but this is just their second win when that many
points have been scored against them.

Wellington’s score against Counties Manukau is their highest total against any side since beating
Otago 68-7 at Wellington in July 2007.

Wellington has won their last five matches in a row against Counties Manukau and that sequence
includes a record-equalling four wins on the trot in Pukekohe.

During the match, Wellington brought up 1,000 points against Counties Manukau. They are the ninth
union to concede this number of points and the total now stands at 1,026.

The match aggregate of 95 points is the highest ever between the two sides surpassing the 81 points
accumulated when Wellington won 62-19 at Pukekohe in 2009. Amazingly, the aggregate in 17 of
the last 18 matches has topped 50 points, including the last 12 matches in succession.

Wellington’s margin of victory in their last two matches against Counties Manukau has been 33 points.

Wellington has passed 50 points in their last three matches in Pukekohe.

Against Counties Manukau Wellington brought up 13,000 points in all NPC matches. The total now
stands at 13,020, which means after 485 competition matches, Wellington averages 26.8 points a
match.

Wellington has won their last seven matches this year in succession. This last happened in 2017
when they actually won the last seven matches which included the Championship Final against Bay
of Plenty at Wellington in October of that year.

Wellington’s 38 points (to 7) at halftime are the most they have scored against any side before the
break since they led Southland 40-0 at Wellington in 2018.

Wellington scored 10 tries in a match for the third time. The previous two occasions were against
Bay of Plenty at Tauranga in 2002 and against Taranaki at Wellington in 2004. The record for most
tries scored in a match is, however, 11 which Wellington has achieved twice: against Bay of Plenty
at Rotorua in 1977 and against North Auckland (now known as Northland) at Wellington in 1984.

Wellington has now conceded a total of 601 tries in all of their away (242) matches. In 243 home
matches they have conceded 588 tries.

The Lions players wore white socks in support of the Breast Cancer Foundation of NZ. All the home
sides during Round 9 wore pink socks.

Wellington retained the Jonah Tali Memorial Trophy.

Du’Plessis Kirifi appeared in his 50th match for Wellington and marked the occasion with his 11th
try. Kirifi made his debut against Manawatu at Palmerston North on 20 August 2017.

Asafo Aumua became just the fourth Wellington player to score four tries in a NPC match. Those
before him were Bernie Fraser against Canterbury at Wellington in 1978, Mike Clamp against
Manawatu at Palmerston North in 1984 and Hosea Gear against Counties Manukau at Pukekohe
in 2009.

Aumua is the only forward amongst those four players and it is the fifth time he has scored two or
more tries in a match. The other occasions were three against Northland at Whangarei in 2016, two
against Taranaki at Wellington in 2017, two against Northland at Wellington in 2017 and two against
Waikato at Wellington in 2019.

For the record Aumua is one of 97 different players who have scored two tries or more in a match.
However, his five examples have only been exceeded by six other players namely Bernie Fraser
(12 occasions), Mike Clamp (eight), Lome Fa’atau (seven), and Hosea Gear, Alapati Leiua and
Tana Umaga (all with six).

Xavier Numia was the only player to start in all 10 matches of regular play. Five others also played
10 times but some of their appearances were off the bench.

Numia was on the field for the most minutes (709) closely followed by Billy Proctor who played for
700 minutes.

Asafo Aumua was the top try scorer with five whilst Jackson Garden-Bachop was top point scorer
with 53, closely followed by Aidan Morgan who racked up 51 points.

Ioane Moananu became the first Counties Manukau forward to score two tries in a NPC match
against Wellington.

Wellington ended the regular season at the top of the Odds Conference table and will meet Hawke’s
Bay, who finished fourth, in the Quarter-final.

Wellington v Counties Manukau Stat Attack