Sideline Conversions 25 August (some rugby news and information to start the week)

Action from Saturday’s match between the Manawatu Evergreens and Wellington Samoa at Porirua Park, with the visitors taking the win. Photo: Stewart Baird. Both these sides are scheduled to be playing in Palmerston North against different opposition this coming Saturday.

Monday lunchtime edition. *SCAM* alert. The impersonators are back. Not the ones that ripped off Facebook pages everywhere a year or so back, this time websites that are using our name and logo for livestreams. We do not livestream matches. Trying to work out what to do with these, but being website and social media pages it’s a bit different.

It will look something like this below – do not click on it, do not engage with it, it is not us.

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Yet another big week and weekend of rugby coming up for players, teams and supporters in the wider Wellington region.

College sport Winter Tournament Week comes to Wellington and sees the U14 Boys Festival from Monday-Wednesday and the U15s Boys tournament from Wednesday-Saturday, both featuring select teams from throughout the country. Check guides for more.

The annual Hurricanes U15s Girls tournament is at Playford Park, Levin today and tomorrow.

Top 4 rugby in Palmerston North starts on Friday – draw for this in the content below.

On Saturday, there are a number of representative matches from Wellington to Palmerston and points in between and across to Masterton.

As always, this will all be covered in our preview on Friday afternoon, but some games at a glance to look forward to include (venues and kick-off times not confirmed):

• U19s Men’s Central Region Shield Tournament Round 2: Manawatu v Wellington, Palmerston North
• Manawatu Evergreens v Wellington Centurions Palmerston North.
• Wellington Māori v Wellington Fijians, Ngati Toa Domain
• Wellington Samoa v Hawke’s Bay B, Palmerston North
• Heartland Championship Round 3: Horowhenua-Kapiti v Poverty Bay, Levin Domain and Wairarapa-Bush v Mid Canterbury, Masterton.

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A good start for the life of the Wellington Pasifika U18s represnatative team on Saturday. They beat the Manawatu Māori Colts on Saturday and this Saturday play the Wellington Samoan U18s at Evans Bay Park at 11.30am.

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The National U85kg Knockout Cup resumes this coming weekend. Pōneke head north to face Silverdale in a round three match next Saturday, with Avalon drawn at home against 2023 winners and last year’s runners-up High School Old Boys from Christchurch in what will be the first of the quarter-finals to be played. Details of both matches to come.

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Day One Top 4 draw on Friday:

Hine Pounamu Trophy – Girls’ 1st XV semi-finals

• 10.30am MANUKURA vs Howick College (CETA)
• 11.30am Hamilton Girls’ High School vs Christchurch Girls’ High School (Field 3)

Barbarians’ 1st XV Trophy semi-finals

• 1.15pm Feilding High School vs Westlake Boys’ High School (Field 3)
• 2.45pm Rotorua Boys’ High School vs Southland Boys’ High School (CETA)

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A buoyant win for the Manawatu Turbos over the Wellington Lions yesterday, winning this match and the Coronation Cup for the first time since 2016.

Some terrific tries scores by the Turbos who are playing well. Their backs found the ignition switch yesterday.

Peter Marriott will be feverishly putting together his Stat Attack from the game as we speak, scheduled to be published here tomorrow.

It’s only four rounds in, but a look at the points table shows that the Wellington Lions are 1 from 4 and near the bottom of the table with just the three hapless Auckland region teams below them.

A loss to Auckland this coming Sunday at Porirua Park for the Fred Lucas Cup could be a lights out event as far as their season chances go.

The good news for Wellington supporters is that Auckland are unravelling. After conceding 50 points to Taranaki the week before, they trailed Northland 0-26 at one point on Saturday night before coming back to lose 24-43.

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Stanley Solomon scored his first hat-trick at this level. Hat-tricks for Wellington in losing causes?

Confirmed last week. Stanley Solomon is joining the Highlanders for two years. Himself and Otago players Dylan Pledger (halfback) and Josh Tengblad (lock and out of Auckland) have all signed on. Tengblad is 2.03m and 117kg so could be a player to watch in the future. Could Pledger and Solomon be the future Highlanders halfback-first-five pairing?

“I am buzzing to join the Highlanders, and I can’t wait to rip in, earn respect and represent the South with pride,” Solomon told local media last week.

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Another Wellington College Old Boy made a big play in the NPC this weekend, with Waikato first-five Lima Sopoaga stepping up and kicking a last-gasp penalty to see Waikato beat Taranaki and win the Ranfurly Shield.

Southland are in good form and they have a crack at the Ranfurly Shield this coming Sunday afternoon in the late game. In fact, if Southland Boys’ make the Top 4 final, this Sunday will be a big day in Invercargill.

Another good win for the Stags in the opening match of this NPC round on Thursday, beating Bay of Plenty 23-22 in Rotorua. The fixture came down to a late penalty shootout and they prevailed.

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The Wellington Pride rebounded from their loss to Otago to beat North Harbour 28-10. This Sunday they host Taranaki at Porirua Park in a match they should win well.

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A number of All Black players could play NPC rugby this coming weekend.

Many will need game time, as they have been training but not playing.

This includes Ruben Love, Peter Lakai, Kyle Preston and probably Du Plessis Kirifi for Wellington against Auckland.

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Selica Winiata celebrated her 150th first class game with two tries and 20 points for Manawatu against Hawke’s Bay on Sunday. She also surpassed 400 career points for the Cyclones during the game.

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New Zealand Rugby put out a media release on Friday stating that from next year 93 NPC, Rugby Heartland and Women’s NPC games will be on free to air on TVNZ.  A good result for the sports fan.

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When banter backfires:

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Canterbury look like the team to beat in this year’s NPC. But they are a hard watch for non Cantabrians. The change the channel and come back and check the score in 10 minutes factor is high.

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NZ Herald rugby watch. The country’s biggest newspaper continues to reject the NPC competition. With three teams in its core readership area, North Harbour, Auckland and Counties Manukau, they are ghosting their own teams. This must be a deliberate editorial policy. Why?  Honestly, one article on Sunday about the All Blacks losing is enough, not five.

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Sports talkback host and commentator Mark Watson came off the long run yesterday after the All Blacks’ loss.

Instead of cutting and pasting an insert, the entire piece is well worth a read here: https://sportnation.nz/article/simply-unforgivable-why-new-zealand-must-demand-more-of-the-all-blacks?fbclid=IwY2xjawMXqgVleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHt84w0ybUTDj2916JWBx6usyWL_FQZZ4ZDmx2HXseVLr1DdkR__jj0w1Q4fM_aem_vo2cvKO-_BLpTSTDm9iPpw

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New Zealand’s Portia Woodman-Wickliffe topped the charts for tries (7),metres gained (477), defenders beaten (30) and linebreaks (12) at Rugby World Cup 2021 (played in 2022); she also finished top in each of those categories at the 2017 edition (13 tries, 648m, 41 defenders beaten, 19 breaks).

Update: The Blacks Ferns sacked York overnight, beating Spain 54-8 in their Women’s Rugby World Cup opener.

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As always, a number of current or former Wellington club rugby players featuring for other provinces in the Heartland Championship and some (but not as many as there used to be) in the NPC.

One example spotted on Saturday was Aotea College and Norths flanker Flavius Roberts-Vili debuting for North Otago. He’s currently in Dunedin playing for Zingari-Richmond.

We could just about have enough players to name a 2025 ‘Other Provinces XV’, so that is something we can get on to.

French rugby giants want to make Ardie Savea ‘highest-paid player in rugby history’

“French rugby giants Racing 92 are chasing All Black forward Ardie Savea.

The 31-year-old loose forward is reportedly top of Racing’s shopping list and they’re prepared to pay top dollar.”

Read more: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/sport/570937/french-rugby-giants-want-to-make-ardie-savea-highest-paid-player-in-rugby-history

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This column is a collaborative effort, so if you have news or information please send through to share with the wider audience.

The name of this website is ‘Club Rugby’ so that part of the season is over now, but we still have an organic readership for the next couple of months as we ride 2025 to its finale, and blast throu 500,000 website story reads for the year, which is holding up well in a sea of social media content.

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