Sideline Conversions 14 July (some rugby news and information to start the week)

Mudtastic! Paremata-Plimmerton fullback Sione Baker and teammates celebrate their late win over Petone on Saturday. Photo: Stewart Baird.

UPDATED: Two weeks remaining in Wellington Premier club rugby and it’s anyone’s guess who is going to win both the Jubilee Cup and Hardham Cup title this year.

This coming weekend’s semi-finals are:

• Jubilee Cup: Hutt Old Boys Marist v Paremata-Plimmerton at the Hutt Rec and Tawa v Johnsonville at Lyndhurst Park
• Hardham Cup: Pōneke v Old Boys University at Kilbirnie Park and Upper Hutt Rams v Marist St Pat’s at Maidstone Park

One thing is known is that there will be no town teams in the Jubilee Cup decider. The Hardham Cup could be both town teams.

Full preview from our end about this – and all other grades – this coming Friday.

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College midweek rugby this coming Wednesday, with St Pat’s Silverstream hosting St Pat’s Town for the Old Boys Cup and to conclude the sixth round of Premiership matches. The First XV match at Silverstream is marked down as a 1.00pm kick-off.

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Two players scored hattricks for Pōneke on Saturday – Jimmy Lee Hongara scored three tries off the bench but if you watch the highlights he would have traveled less than a metre in all three!

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Four tries to Ieti Campbell for the Upper Hutt Rams on Saturday. Putting some injury concerns behind him, the second year senior player is pivoting to become a key player over the next two weekends should the Rams reach the Hardham final.

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It’s frustrating and slack that Premier teams still fail to provide commentators and reporters with accurate player numbers, even this late in the season. Identifying 44 players correctly is already a challenge without misinformation complicating things. Petone and OBU stand out as notable exceptions in this regard.

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The new Wellington club rugby format as it is with a 13-week Swindale Shield round-robin and a four-week shootout for the Jubilee and Hardham Cups is generally accepted as a good one. But is 15 games for losing teams at this stage of the season one or two matches too few? It seems a bit ligh. It is not even mid-July and it is season over for many teams already.

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While larger forwards typically dominate the Jubilee Cup during the critical stages of the season, who have been some of the standout smaller players in the past? MSP’s Peter Sciascia comes to mind, and Buxton Popoali’i was magnificent as well. Can players like Dom Ernst from Hutt Old Boys’ Marist leave their mark in the postseason?

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Sideline Conversions understands that the Wellington Lions squad naming is happening now.

But they are not announcing this squad in a list, rather releasing the names in a slow drip over several days in batches of a few at a time on their social media channels. We will attempt to add some supporting substance to this, but it’s not easy so we may need to move on to something else and not bother if its all too hard.

We do know that Hibiki Yamada, who played nine matches, and Kenshi Yamamoto, who participated in 15 matches, will be joining the Wellington Lions from Kubota Spears, continuing the recent trend of Japanese players being part of the Lions.

There are a few spots and positions where surely they will need to go to the club rugby pool, especially for some young talent.

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Another significant milestone in Wellington club rugby on Saturday.

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A post shared by Johnsonville Terrahawks (@johnsonville_terrahawks85s)

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Club Rugby Tipping Competition – top 10 after this weekend. Just two weeks to go.

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For at least the fourth time this season, the Scots College First XV scrum was reduced to uncontested pushes during their embarrassing 75-14 loss to Rathkeale College. Scots had just 18 players available, including only three front rowers, one of whom was injured within the first five minutes of the match. Will Scots be able to front against unbeaten St Patrick’s College, Silverstream this Saturday bearing in mind they defaulted to Wellington College earlier this year.

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Isaia Petelo became the third player in Wellington club rugby to reach the milestone of 200 Premier caps this season, against the Axemen on Saturday.

Petelo was second five when MSP beat Ories 14-8 to win their last Jubilee Cup final in 2012. He was also in Jubilee Cup and Swindale Shield winning squads in 2008 and in 2014 and 2020 Swindale winning teams.

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A post shared by Marist St Pats RFC (@msprugby)

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Some odd things happen at this time of year, and one of those happened Saturday at Maidstone Park when one of our favourite people, “40-something” Damian Collins, answered the call to take a place on the bench of his beloved Avalon clubs’ Premier side. That earned him his 91st cap, so is it really beyond hope he might become the oldest player we know of to chalk up 100 games at Premier-level?

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There were 13 tries scored in the Hawke’s Bay Maddison Trophy final on Saturday. Taradale beat Napier 47-40 at McLean Park.

While Napier Old Boys Marist’s Will Tremain was the competition’s top try scorer this year with 17, Taradale’s Trinity Spooner-Neera came just short of a points scoring mark. The leading scorer  finished the season on 199 points!

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It’s difficult to determine whether ANZAC XV captain David Havili was sincere or contrived in his post-match comments following his team’s 48-0 hiding at the hands of the British & Irish Lions. Although he expressed disappointment with the outcome, Havili mentioned “special connections” had formed among the team off the field. Where were those connections in the match?. With eight former All Blacks, this first Lions-ANZAC fixture since 1989 was nothing short of embarrassing – a complete flop.

The last time the British & Irish Lions held an opponent scoreless was during a 64-0 rout of Combined New South Wales-Queensland Country on June 11, 2013.

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Wellington club rugby top try scorers after 15 weeks, after Round 2 of the Jubilee and Hardham Cups.

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One of the ugly parts of the end of season is the eligibility game. As currently written, there’s effectively three requirements for playoff eligibility:

• Must have played three matches at any level during the season
  • unless an exemption obtained from WRFU or,
  • are signed to a WRFU contract
• Must not have started three matches or more at a higher level from the weeks of round 11 of the Swindale Shield onwards, and
• Players from teams who have been eliminated will not be able to obtain a regrading.

Club Rugby is already aware of one instance of a player – who was eligible to do so under the rules above – playing down grades on Saturday as their normal team had a bye, and expect there will be more this week as the B-teams of some clubs who’s Premier sides were eliminated on Saturday scour their records for players who can bolster their ranks.

Our view is that this needs tightening up further. The integrity of the Premier 2 and Colts competitions get adversely affected by players being parachuted in at this point and our reference is an HD Morgan final are few short years ago where the victors had 12 players in their 22 who had played in more than 10 Premier matches that year. Those competitions deserve to be decided on who have played for them during the year, not who suddenly becomes available at the end of it.

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While Scott Robertson is the front man, is the head coach, the best coach in the All Blacks? There were some outstanding lineout moves executed in the second Test against France while the scrum has blossomed under forwards coach Jason Ryan, who last year surprised everybody with the audacious selection of Pasilio Tosi and has inspired huge improvement from Tyrel Lomax, Tamati Williams, Fletcher Newell, and even evergreen Codie Taylor. By contrast Roberston has struggled to find the right balance for the loose forward trio, though there is no shortage of talent in this area. The backline remains somewhat muddled.

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A compelling Whanganui club rugby final on Saturday, with Taihape beating Kaierau 15-14. The game finished in sunshine but there was heavy rain for a time around the middle of the game making it an arm-wrestle for long periods.

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Just five Wellington teams have entered the National Under 85kg Club Cup this season. Competition regulars OBU, Wellington, Avalon, and HOBM are in, joined by Poneke who withdrew from the club season but always intended to enter this, while Upper Hutt entered but subsequently withdrew. Club Rugby has reached out to the balance of the other local clubs, with the prevailing view being a lack of interest in going further. The competition – with Sir Graham Henry as its Patron – was launched with much fanfare a few years ago, but is interest already waning in it?

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Wellington club rugby top points scorers after 15 weeks, after Round 2 of the Jubilee and Hardham Cups.

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The midfield lineout!

This one below not good though, going for the scrum on halfway from the kick-off – should be a yellow card for one of these

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Petone’s Stanley Solomon starts at fullback and HOBM’s Israel Time comes off the bench for the New Zealand U20s in their World Rugby U20 Championship semi-final against France tomorrow morning  (Tuesday) at 4:00am NZT.

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For the Legends of Club Rugby files

Jason Rutledge has just been part of his 11th Southland premier club rugby title after turning in an 80-minute performance in the front row at 47 years old.

Just let that sentence sink in for a bit.

Twenty-five years after Rutledge won his first Galbraith Shield title with Woodlands in 2000, he got his hands on it again for the 11th time on Saturday. On those titles in 2008 he was unable to play in the final because of Stags commitments.

The latest came via a 40-30 victory over Pirates-Old Boys in the 2025 decider at Rugby Park.

Many of his teammates on Saturday weren’t alive when he stepped onto the field for his first senior game for Woodlands in 1999.

Read more at: https://southlandtribune.substack.com/p/the-legend-continues-rutledges-11th

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This column is a a collaborative effort – if you have news or information or want to promote something (not direct advertising) please get in touch.