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Losi Filipo and teammates celebrate a try when the Lions and Waikato last met in the NPC, in last year’s semi-final win. In 2023 Filipo scored a hat-trick against Waikato. He starts on the right wing and his Petone teammate Tjay Clarke on the left wing in Hamilton on Saturday.
Often on the great plains of Africa the lioness will catch and trap its prey and toy with it for a while before settling down for its meal.
On rare occasions, the said lioness will catch a calf and mother it and lie down for a sleep with it in its paws before later devouring it. Occasionally with the lioness asleep or inattentive the calf will bound away, oblivious to the fate it just escaped from, and re-join its real mother and the herd.
It is only round two of this year’s National Provincial Championship, but the Wellington Lions can’t let that happen this weekend against the Waikato Mooloo in the Serengeti of Hamilton, FMG Stadium.
The Lions fought extremely hard to stay in the fight and be 10-7 up against Canterbury in their season opening Harry Saundercock Trophy match at Porirua Park. Only for Canterbury to get away from them and win 33-15 and deny them a bonus point.
In contrast, Waikato did to Auckland what Canterbury did to Wellington in their first game. The run of play was starker, with former Wellington College and Wellington first-five Lima Sopoaga scoring at the death and Aaron Cruden converting for a 35-34 win. Auckland led 32-12 at one juncture of the match.
The last time that Wellington and Waikato met was three matches back as the NPC timeline flies, with the Lions beating the Mooloo 29-24 in their home semi-final at Wellington Stadium. The rest is history, with Wellington going to beat Bay of Plenty in the final.
This was their only match last year (not meeting in the round-robin), so the two unions have now met on 48 occasions in the NPC. Wellington has won 28 times, and Waikato has won 20 times. There have been no draws.
The Lions have won their last four matches against Waikato to equal their winning sequence first achieved between 1984 and 1988 and then between 2003 and 2005.
Wellington Lions team news
The Wellington Lions have made a handful of changes to the side that missed out to Canterbury in the opening round.
Paremata-Plimmerton halfback and former Wellington sevens captain Esi Komaisavai comes into the reserve halfback position on the bench. He scored 20 tries in Wellington club rugby this year and loves a good celebration to go with it.
Former Waikato halfback Nui Muriwai starts at halfback for Kyle Preston who was called up to the All Blacks this week as injury cover.
Callum Harkin moves off the bench to fullback for Ruben Love, also in the All Blacks. Stanley Solomon joins the bench after wintering with the New Zealand U20 team.
Ories No. 8 Dominic Ropeti starts forBrad Shields, after having a strong season for Oriental-Rongotai who won their first 13 matches with bonus points to capture their maiden Swindale Shield title. Shields left the field in the first half last week after taking a head knock. Matolu Petaia comes on to the bench.
Caleb Delany lines up at blindside flanker to start his 50th match for Wellington, the former Wellington U19 captain and Tasman native having debuted for Wellington against Auckland in 2020.
Siale Lauaki was a try-scorer against Waikato last year and he comes on to the bench for HOBM tighthead prop Vili Tauofaga who made his debut in the opening round.
In other personal milestone news, first five Jackson Garden-Bachop starts his 102nd match for Wellington sitting on 788 points for the side. He is now only 10 points short of passing John Gallagher who is in second place on Wellington’s all-time point-scoring list with 797 points.
The team is:
- Xavier Numia (Oriental-Rongotai)
- James O’Reilly (HOBM)
- PJ Sheck (Tawa)
- Hugo Plummer (Tawa)
- Akira Ieremia (Tawa)
- Caleb Delany (Old Boys University)
- Peter Lakai (Petone)
- Dominic Ropeti (Oriental-Rongotai)
- Nui Muriwai (Hutt Old Boys Marist)
- Jackson Garden-Bachop (Northern United)
- Tjay Clarke (Petone)
- Julian Savea (Oriental-Rongotai)
- Matt Proctor (Oriental-Rongotai)
- Losi Filipo (Petone)
- Callum Harkin (Old Boys University)
RESERVES
- Penieli Poasa (Oriental-Rongotai)
- Siale Lauaki (Northern United)
- Kenshi Yamamoto (Japan)
- Matolu Petaia (Tawa)
- Sione Halalilo (Oriental-Rongotai)
- 21.Esi Komaisavai (Paremata-Plimmerton)
- Tom Maiava (Oriental-Rongotai)
- Stanley Solomon (Petone)
Wellington v Waikato some history
The Lions’ highest score over Waikato was the 55-18 win in 1988, fullback John Gallagher kicking six conversions and 27 points in the 37-point win.
six Wellington players have scored hat tricks of tries against Waikato. These are: Keith Hawea (1973), William Proctor (1976), Emosi Koloto (1988), Tana Umaga (1995), Hosea Gear (2006) and Losi Filipo (2023).
Wellington and Waikato met for the first time in 1923, again in 1929 and they then didn’t play each other again until meeting annually between 1952-1975, and again at least once every year from 1981 except in 1986.
The two sides met in the 2006 NPC Final in Hamilton, with Waikato winning 37-31. This final in 2006 was 20 meetings ago between them.
Their head to head record over these past 20 meetings going back to the 2006 final has seen Wellington win 12 and Waikato 8. Half of these games (10) have been decided by a margin inside a converted try.
In these last 20 matches, the Lions have scored 611 points and Waikato 522, for an average winning score to Wellington of 31-26.
In 78 meetings overall, Wellington has won 43, Waikato 34 and there has been one draw.
Read our previous story about the 1953 Ranfurly Shield win over Waikato and the heady seven weeks that followed:
When Wellington won the Ranfurly Shield off Waikato, ushering in 50 days of fanfare
Read our previous story about the 1981 Ranfurly Shield win over Waikato:
40th anniversary of Wellington’s Ranfurly Shield win over Waikato coming up
