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Seasons Greetings with Club Rugby

Club Rugby wishes the rugby community a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Club Rugby’s team of regular contributors wishes to thank all readers and viewers of our content for their ongoing support to ensure that we can continue to cover rugby from the ground up from a neutral/overview perspective and document and preserve its history along the way.

In particular our sponsors. Rob Law Max, The Bond, Geeks on Wheels and the Call Centre.

Supporting or engaging with these businesses and services means you are directly helping rugby in Wellington.

Rob Law Max has been supporting Club Rugby for a decade now, and without their ongoing help in the background helping to power our website we wouldn’t still be here.

The Bond has now ended their association with Club Rugby after several years and we thank them for their tremendous support, in particular over Covid when they helped keep us going despite their own closure over this time. We are on the lookout for a replacement sponsor/partner, so please get in touch if that is you or know someone.

In regards to this website and platform, lookout for a couple of tweaks or refreshers over the next short while. A golden rule we adhere to here though is ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’ That has been especially true of the ‘old’ website, the Draws & Results section, but which is now in all sorts of desperate need of an upgrade. Listeners of the old 12th man cricket tapes will relate to the part where the then 1980s Australian fast bowler Bruce Reid breaks down and they call for the sticky tape to keep him going. This section of our website is very similar. And that is before the server chimes in and throws up 503 and 504 errors every so often.

On the subject of cricket, is Kane Williamson the GOAT of New Zealand batsmen? Despite his numbers, we say not quite yet. One statistic that is interesting is that every 2.72 times Martin Crowe batted in first class cricket he scored 50 or more runs. Williamson’s stats for the same marker is 2.78, the same as Jesse Ryder (super talented). Don Bradman is the benchmark at 1.8. It would be an interesting article for another website  to compare this with other great players, historically and now.

But this is a rugby website, so back to the rugby. Who would be the GOAT of rugby players from Wellington? Historically, Billy Wallace, Mark Nicholls, Ranji Wilson, Ron Jarden and Ken Gray spring to mind.

Returning to this timeline, we will usher in the New Year with a couple of articles (split between grassroots and professional rugby) looking at some questions and themes for 2025.

On the field, lookout for some sevens tournaments as soon as January and then heading into February and March some pre-season and competition-proper Hurricanes and Super Rugby action.

The Hurricanes announced that they are hosting the Blues at William Jones Park, Wainuiomata, on 7 February, so that will be a date marker to look forward to.

By the start of March the spotlight will be on the main event of the year – club rugby competitions.

As always, we are busy this off-season researching and writing a load of content for next year, continuing our history profile series this is mostly up to the ‘1950s’ which means leaving our basement. Two trips in December have already been made to the Rugby Museum in Palmerston North.

Two new social media series for 2025, ‘Club Rugby Unearthed’ and ‘Champion Team Spotlight’ – more soon.

We will have our annual two-part article series looking at the rugby season 100 years ago (spotlight on the 1925 season).

Our Monday column ‘Sideline Conversions’ to resume at some point early in the year – when the content starts flowing.

Plus all our usual pre-season articles, such as the Club Rugby A-Z, Gains and Losses, School Leavers to Watch, pre-season interview stories and more.

As always, if you have news or information for a wider audience or want to contribute please do so.

In the meantime, drink and be merry for a few days or weeks and we will see you in the New Year.

Yours in Rugby.

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A few of end of year news in briefs and recommended listening:

Daniel Sinkinson won this year’s annual pre-season Hurricanes Surf to Peak race on Saturday.

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An OBU takeover of Wairarapa-Bush!

Jamie Williams has been appointed head coach for next year, with Paddy Gough and James Goodger as assistants, and talk of Hayden Smith also being involved.

New Copthorne Wairarapa Bush Coaching Team announced.

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This is one to watch – as the links and pathways between college and club rugby and ways to keep players ‘in the game’ post-school has been an ongoing discussion topic over recent years.

Nelson College is seeking intervention from New Zealand Rugby after an “unjust, discriminatory, and inconsistent” decision by Tasman Rugby will mean it will be the only boys’ school in the country excluded from playing age group rugby. The school has sent an urgent request to NZR asking it to establish a new, fairer, independent club status application process. It is in response to a proposal from the Tasman Rugby Union to no longer permit Nelson College to participate in Saturday rugby, because it is not a club. Instead, the TRU asks that U14, U15, U16 college players play exclusively for local rugby clubs.

Read more HERE (link to local media article)

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A couple of recent rugby long-form interviews we recommend listening to over the break:

Josh Kronfeld:

Zac Guildford:

Tana Umaga (in two parts):

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