More high scoring as Rams and OBU continue to set the pace

Johnsonville race in to score their last try of the day in their 29-26 win over Oriental-Rongotai for the Ash Pointon Cup. PHOTO: Andy McArthur.

By Steven White & Scott MacLean

• Results & Standings (individual scoring to be included once received) HERE 

Another round of high scoring in the Premier Swindale Shield competition on a fine, mild afternoon saw the Upper Hutt Rams and Old Boys University continue to set the pace by each registering their fifth straight wins.

The Rams maintained their perfect start with their fifth consecutive bonus point win by beating last year’s Jubilee Cup champions Northern United 56-29 in a fast and somewhat loose encounter at Porirua Park 2, to win the Terry Farrow Memorial Cup.

The OBU Billygoats defeated Marist St Pat’s 41-26 at home at Rugby League Park to re-gain the Jack Lamason Cup, to sit one point adrift on the table on 24 points.

The Paremata-Plimmerton Hammerheads are a clear third on 21 points after knocking over the Hutt Old Boys Marist Eagles 38-29 at the Hutt Recreation Ground.

Another significant result of the fifth round was the Johnsonville Hawks beating Oriental-Rongotai 29-26 in the battle of the suburban birds at the Polo Ground. With three wins from five each, Ories are on 18 and Johnsonville 17.

Tawa shook off their defeat to Paremata-Plimmerton last week by beating Wainuiomata 76-3 at Lyndhurst Park for the Chris Stirling Cup, inflicting a third straight heavy defeat on the green and blacks. Tawa are also on 18 points.

In another mid-table battle and for the famous Fred Tilyard Trophy, Petone returned home to the Viillage to defeat Poneke 43-28.

The Avalon Wolves grabbed their first win of the season, beating minnows the Wellington Axemen 59-14at Fraser Park.

In a round-up of some of these games, the Rams beat Northern United in an often muddled and messy fixture, keeping themselves in front throughout by maintaining their constant rhythm of attacking rugby to run in seven tries after leading 31-10 at halftime.

The Rams consistently capitalised on Norths’ errors and mistakes, particularly in the backline where they made Norths pay for a disjointed display that they will want to arrest as soon as possible. Particularly as their forwards were generally strong and dominant at scrum time. No.8 Luca Rees scored a hattrick of tries.

On the opposite side, wing Jono Ryan epitomised the Rams’ attacking endeavours by scoring a well-deserved hattrick of tries. The other wing, Fritz Rayasi, was equally dangerous, scoring two tries himself and was a constant threat.

Playing with the breeze in the first half, the Rams quickly built a 17-3 lead through converted tries to Rayasi and flanker Jack Wright. Norths struck back with Rees’ first try, but the Rams crossed in for two more tries before half time through Ryan and flanker Dan Schrijvers.

Norths made a concerted start to the second half and threatened a comeback after hooker Jerome Vaai and Rees scored tries from dominant forwards efforts. The score was closed to 31-22.

The competition’s leading points scorer, Tynan Barrett, then kicked two consecutive penalties. Then the Rams scored the match-clinching try when they spun the ball wide to Rayasi who glided up the touch line, and kicked-and-chased and regathered, to score a classy try.

Rees completed his hattrick, but the Rams had the last say with wing Ryan scoring twice more before full time to conclude the match.

The Rams also won the game without their in-form loose forward Toby Crosby who pulled out through illness overnight, whilst Norths were missing their flanker Callum Watts-Pointer who was also a late scratching.

At Rugby League Park, the OBU Goats got off to a flyer against Marist St Pat’s.

In front of a large crowd, OBU raced to a 15-0 lead inside as many minutes, after first-five Callum Harkin regathered his own chip and chase and sent right wing Jan Lammers way to score and then helped them score again almost straightaway.

It went from bad to worse for MSP When OBU’S left wing Issac Wilson scored to put OBU up 22-0.

MSP closed to 25-12 by halftime when first five Zack Paterson scored his try, but OBU pulled clear after the interval with tries to Harkin himself, prop Samson Koneferenisi and centre Ty Poe. Harkin kicked four penalties, for 21 points for the match.

MSP came away with a bonus point for four tries, with hooker Charlie Hankins, flanker Milan Krilitich and Villame Raresa also scoring tries for them.

At the Polo Ground, Johnsonville won the interclub Ash Pointon Cup for the first time, with their first win over Ories since 2014.

Johnsonville scored first to lead 7-0 early, before going on to lead 21-12 at halftime and later 29-19 during the second half. Ories came back to score a converted try to secure two losing bonus points but the Hawks held on.

For Ories, flanker Sione Halalilo, wing Pose Tuilaepa, halfback Issac Bracewell and loose forward Ronaldo Seumanufagai were their try scorers.

At Lyndhurst Park, Wainuiomata scored five tries inside the first half hour of play to comfortably hold off Wainuiomata’s challenge.

Tawa welcomed back halfback Kemara Hauiti-Parapara, who scored one of these tries and kicked three penalties. A 21^st minute Tyler Tane penalty was all Wainuiomata could reply with.

Tawa maintained the pressure and ran in several more tries in the second half for the highest scoring win of the season by any team to date.

There were plenty of point scored at the Petone Rec. Playing into the dying breeze in the first half the hosts Petone made a fast start with early tries to loose forwards Mason Henry and Peter Lakai, split only by a Sam Howling penalty. Howling would add two more sets of three from the boot as the home side’s discipline let them down, and after TJ Clarke put the hosts further in front some sweeping backline play allowed Poneke centre Issac Moe Jenkins to score NRL-style in the corner.

But what life that gave Poneke was short-lived as Stanley Solomon scored an outstanding individual kick-and-chase try, and then Lakai strolled over for his second in the shadow of half-time.

Fellow Hurricane Riley Higgins got over soon after the resumption before Poneke centurion Nick Robertson picked off an intercept and scampered away.

Higgins would be held up over the line twice, the second of which led to the most comical moment of the day; Poneke took the drop out quickly but it was badly hooked and didn’t cross the 5m line. Robertson was guilty of waiting the ball to come to him but Solomon needed no invitation and stole in to score ahead of him. Robertson would however conclude the scoring with his second in the left-hand corner.

Up at Fraser Park, Avalon crossed for nine tries in their emphatic win over the Wellington Axemen.

For the Wolves, wing Garry Naitini and fullback Ezra Sione-Leota scored twice each, while Nathan Fa’apusa, Semi Uluiviti, Kolini Bower, Victor Misa and Pena Sione-Leota also found the chalk. Site Timu slotted seven of nine conversions.

Women’s

Three one-sided wins and a movie script finish in the fourth round of Women’s Rebecca Liua’ana Trophy games.

In the first match of the day on Porirua Park 2, home team Norths Women and the Avalon She-Wolves drew a dramatic match 39-39.

Avalon would have considered themselves unlucky not to win against the defending champions, after protecting an early two-try lead for much of the game, and then re-taking the lead with just a few minutes to play through a popular long-range intercept try to centre Kayla Faitele and a subsequent try from close range.

Norths kept their composure to the end, scoring a try up the blindside from a late attacking scrum and first five Arene Landon-Lane kicked the conversion from 5 metres inside touch to equalise the score.

Avalon had scored their fourth try right on halftime to lead 24-12 at the break, but Norths had scored two tries through the forwards to come back and lead narrowly midway through the second half. Avalon had then re-taken the lead with a 50-metre breakout try to No 8 Sanna Aumua – one of her three tries for the match – but Norths got their noses in front once more soon after.

Elsewhere, Petone beat Poneke 56-0, MSP beat Ories 57-10 in a surprise big win and Paremata-Plimmerton had a 48-17 victory over the combined HOBM/Wainuiomata side, with four play. Pare-Plim pulled clear after leading 17-12 at halftime. Two of the three of the combined team’s tries were scored by flanker Kiri Grönbeck.

Petone are the competition leaders, with four straight bonus point wins. Norths (18 points), MSP (15) and Avalon (13) round out the top four.

Colts

Two weeks into the Colts Paris Memorial Trophy competition, and the Tawa Colts are setting the pace with two convincing bonus point wins. They beat Norths 36-7 last week and on Friday night they overcame Wainuiomata 76-0 under lights at Lyndhurst Park.

HOBM Green have also won two matches with bonus point wins, defeating Wellington 33-12.

OBU Green and the Upper Hutt Rams both earned their first wins on Friday night, OBU Green defeating Marist St Pat’s 24-22 and the Rams beating Northern United 33-12.

The sole game played today was at the Petone Rec where the home side beat Poneke 26-10. The Villagers led 21-0 at the break, having scored early and then feasted on a pair of Poneke errors in as many minutes.

Front row injuries to the visitors reduced the match to uncontested scrums after 30 minutes but it didn’t detract from the contest. The hosts added a fourth soon after the interval, but Poneke fought back and scored a pair of tries and were perhaps unlucky not to add to that tally.

Ories had the second round bye.

Premier 2

The fifth round results of the Harper Lock Shield have seen a two-tier points table develop, with a group of leading contenders and four winless teams at the other end of the table.

Tawa maintained their unbeaten streak with a 50-22 win over Wainuiomata in the early game at Lyndhurst, while HOBM joined them at the top of the standings on 25 points with a 41-40 victory over Paremata-Plimmerton.

Petone are also unbeaten, a point back on 24, following their 25-22 win over Poneke.

Ories and the Upper Hutt Rams each won their fourth games from five outings, Ories beating Johnsonville 52-17 and the Rams defeating Norths 31-15 after leading 14-0 at halftime.

In other results, OBU beat MSP 31-22 for their second win and Stokes Valley defeated Avalon, also their second win.

U85s

A full round matches in the U85kg JC Bowl this afternoon, with Poneke raising the ton in their 103-12 win over Wellington. Poneke are on a maximum 20 competition points after four weeks, as are the OBU Scallywags who defeated MSP 82-8 in a similar big win.

Stokes Valley are the third team with four wins and on 18 points, following their 13-3 at the other end of the scoring scale over the Johnsonville Terrahawks. The Tawa Ducks beat HOBM 36-23, Petone beat Eastbourne 48-12 and Paremata-Plimmerton beat Wests by default.

College

The opening round of the Tranzit First XV competition was played today at the NZCIS venue at Upper Hutt. There were four matches played.

Of the four Wellington teams involved, there was one win and three losses.

The win was to Wellington College, who defeated Gisborne Boys’ High School 34-19.

St Pat’s Silverstream lost 14-21 to Hastings Boys’ High School, St Pat’s Town missed out 26-57 to Palmerston North Boys’ High School and Rongotai College lost 5-36 to Feilding High School.

For the other Wellington schools, it was the first day of the Premier grading. Wairarapa College beat Mana College 45-5, HIBS took down Upper Hutt Colelge 79-0, St Bernard’s accounted for Bishop Viard College 53-3, Aotea beat Kapiti College 50-12, Naenae College defeated Newlands College 24-14, HVHS beat Tawa College 25-14 and Paraparaumu College beat Porirua College 66-13.  Taita College defaulted to Scots College in the other scheduled match.