Sideline Conversions 9 March (some rugby news and information to start the week)

The first weekend of pre-season is under the hood, here’s much of what is happening this coming Saturday.

• Hutt Old Boys Marist v Pōneke v Napier Pirate (Game of Three Halves), NZCIS
• Petone v Marist St Pat’s, North Park
• Tawa v Oriental-Rongotai, Lyndhurst Park
• Varsity Rams, v Old Boys University Goats, Massey #4
• Feilding Yellows v Paremata-Plimmerton, Johnston Park
• Wainuiomata v Northern United, Mary Crowther Park
• Wellington Axemen v Kia Toa, Venue TBC
• Johnsonville Hawks v Freyberg, Mana College
• Feilding Old Boys Oroua Stags v Havelock North, Victoria Park Feilding
• Hurricanes v Force, Napier, Friday 7.05pm.

As always, check back this website on Friday afternoon for a preview of these and other confirmed fixtures all in one place.

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Club Rugby attended the Norths-MSP games at Porirua Park on Saturday, which were played in six quarters with Colts and mixed Premier/Premier 2 teams in action. Lots of new players! Plenty of guys we didn’t recognise, although some familiar players were on by the end. Lots of ‘cobwebs’ blown out, and a good workout for the referees as well. MSP edged Norths in the Colts and won the main game 8 tries to 2 – but that means little. MSP are in action this coming Saturday against Petone, whilst these two clubs meet in round one on 4 April. This is in the top two grades, it is understood start dates for the other grades like Colts hasn’t been confirmed yet.

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Whilst MSP were at Porirua, Hutt Old Boys Marist attended the annual NZ Marist Spillane Tournament and lost 26-7 t0 the Hamilton Marist Ravens on Saturday and lost 43-31 to Hastings on Sunday. HOBM left several of their first choice players at home, so it was a young side. Napier Old Boys Marist beat Hastings 34-24 in the final.

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The Upper Hutt Rams beat Linton Army (Manawatu) 35-19 in their first pre-season game at Linton Army Camp on Saturday.

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Overall, it is still fairly quiet out there throughout the various club social media pages but this time next month we will be in the second week of the season in Wellington and third in Manawatu. Some Facebook pages like Ories’ and Tawa’s will start to stir soon.

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The Hurricanes Hunters faced the Chiefs Development team at NZCIS on Friday, with the Chiefs side winning 40-26 (this scored is not verified). Sources say the Hurricanes made far too many handling errors to hope to win. Kini Naholo also left the field early injured. Appalling coverage of these games, it is almost like they don’t really want people knowing about them. The day (Friday), kick-off time (11.30am) and venue (the Hurricanes training field) were giveaways of this of course.

The Hunters’ next two and concluding matches of this series are in Dunedin on 20 March and in Wellington on 28 March and both curtain-raisers to Super Rugby games. Again, the 2.00pm match in Wellington in Wellington is also discouraging of the players appearing in front of a crowd because it will be all be all over an hour before the Hurricanes take the field to play the Reds and because of club rugby pre-season in Wellington and club rugby round one in Manawatu that afternoon.

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Oriental-Rongotai’s Roderick Solo made a welcome return to the All Blacks Sevens after missing two years due to a brutal ACL injury. His last major tournament was in the 2023 season, where he was named Player of the Final in Toulouse and scored the winning try against Argentina. In Vancouver, he scored a try in the All Blacks Sevens’ 29-5 group win over Great Britain and combined with Paremata-Plimmerton’s Sam Clarke for another try. Despite these highlights, the All Blacks Sevens had a disappointing day, losing to Spain (12-10) and South Africa (17-12) to miss the semi-finals.

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Former Petone Jubilee Cup winner, Wainuiomata stalwart, Samoan international and Scots College National Top Four winning coach Earl Va’a will bring Barker College (“Inspiring Tomorrow”) from Sydney to Wellington in April for three matches against Premiership champions St Patrick’s College Silverstream, Wellington College and Scots College. Va’a has been based in Australia for some time after a forgettable tenure as Wellington Lions coach. He guided Northern Suburbs to the Shute Shield final in 2020. Barker College is a plush gig. The independent Anglican co-educational school, with eye-watering fees of more than $45,000 annually for its secondary students, is located in Hornsby, not far from the luscious Northern Beaches. Barker has won 21 (CAS) rugby championships. CAS is a group of six independent schools that compete across multiple sporting codes in Sydney. Midnight Oil lead singer Peter Garrett might be their most famous old boy. Wallabies include Cameron Shepherd, Billy Pollard, Luke Reimer and Ben Darwin.

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There are no unbeaten teams after a month of Super Rugby Pacific, with all 11 franchises having won at least a single game. The Brumbies top the table with three wins and 14 points, but would be devastated to lose at home 34-31 to the Reds after leading by 11 points with two minutes to go. Brumbies No. 8 Charlie Cale has been Super Rugby’s best player thus far. The two-time Wallaby tops the tackles and tries count and ranks inside the top 10 for lineout catches and carries.

There wasn’t a bad player on the field for the Hurricanes in their 59-19 slaying of the Waratahs in Sydney. The visitors won the second half 42-7, absorbing an early physical onslaught and then ruthlessly outflanking the locals’ feeble defence, which had more holes than a colander. This secured a ninth consecutive victory against the Waratahs. The Hurricanes also recorded their largest winning margin in Sydney, surpassing the 33-12 win in 2012. All Blacks centre Billy Proctor atoned for his lousy Lautoka performance a week ago with a second-half hat-trick. In 2021, when the Hurricanes beat the Waratahs 64-48 at the Sydney Cricket Ground, Proctor scored two tries in that game. Procter scored four tries for the All Blacks XV in a 41-27 win over Japan on July 15, 2023.

Fellow midfielder Jona Rova ran rampant in the last quarter after replacing Jordie Barrett. The former New Zealand Under-20s midfield back, who played three games in 2024 for the Crusaders and was part of the Canterbury NPC-winning team in 2025, scored a try, set up a try for Ere Enari, and should have passed to the replacement halfback after another slashing run left the Samoan international with the tryline at his mercy. Rova will be relieved to leave the Hurricanes Development side, who have performed poorly, losing to the Crusaders (55-38), the Blues (57-54), and the Chiefs (40-28).

All Blacks halfback Cam Roigard celebrated his 50th match for the Hurricanes while Lucas Cashmore made his debut. Lucas is the nephew of former All Black and two-time Blues Super Rugby winner Adrian Cashmore, now a real estate agent in Tauranga, and appeared fleetingly for the Upper Hutt Rams last year.

All Blacks winger Caleb Clarke made history as the first player from a New Zealand franchise to score a hat-trick against the Crusaders. Mark Gerrard also scored a famous hat-trick for the Brumbies in the 2004 final. Clarke was also yellow-carded in the game. A hat-trick and a yellow card? Duhan van der Merwe also did that in Scotland’s unforgettable 30-21 Calcutta Cup win over England in 2024.

Blues coach Vern Cotter told Sky Sport after the Blues’ often boring 29-13 win over the Crusaders, “catching a high kick is now a linebreak.” With that attitude, the Warriors’ popularity might continue to swell.

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A week of action in Taupo coming up for 100 U20 players, as part of the NZ U20 Development Camp. The players have been split up into four squads called the Barbarians, Centurions, Saracens and Harlequins. These each have an even disbursement of players from around the country, not on regional lines. Some promising players in the mix from the recently completed Hurricanes Academy Series.

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Super Rugby held its ‘Club Round’ this past weekend. Great stuff, although the majority of players wear their socks down so hard to tell during games. Perhaps the Hurricanes could do it all again in a few weeks and hold a club round of their own, coinciding with the actual start of the club competitions season and in a home match. No harm in that?

Although this was stirring stuff:

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As noted last week, Dave Rennie become the first All Blacks coach out of Upper Hutt and the first Wellingtonian of the modern professional era and Cook Islander to coach the All Blacks. Overall, he will be the First Wellingtonian All Blacks Head Coach since Ivan Vodanovich in 1969.

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Six Nations Chat

Since the 2023 Rugby World Cup quarter-final, Wales have won only two of 27 Tests (both against Japan), including a horror 18-match losing streak. Are there signs the tide is turning in the Six Nations? Though Wales have lost all four matches, they led Scotland for 66 minutes of a 26-23 loss in Cardiff. In Dublin, Ireland fought fiercely to secure a 27-17 victory over Wales. Welsh loose forwards Alex Mann (32 tackles) and Liam Botham (26 tackles) were immense, and prop Rhys Carré scored a 35 metre try reminiscent of Richard Bands’ epic against the All Blacks in Dunedin in 2003. Robert Baloucoune from Ulster and the now defunct Irish Sevens looks like a very livley winger. The 42 kicks in the game is a much lower total than the typical number in Super Rugby Pacific 2026. Irish coach Andy Farrell has won 54 of his 69 Tests (78%) in charge and, with victory against Scotland next weekend, will secure a fourth “Triple Crown” for wins against England, Wales and Scotland.

Scotland scored a staggering 50-40 win over France at Murrayfield, Edinburgh, at one stage leading 47-14. Scotland’s previous highest score against France at Murrayfield was 32, achieved in a 6-point victory in 2018. In that game, halfback Greg Laidlaw booted 22 points while Kiwi Sean Matland and classy centre Huw Jones, still influential in 2025, scored tries.

France achieved their highest score in a lost cause. The All Blacks lost 46-40 to South Africa in 2000. The highest score by a losing side in a Test match is 54 points, achieved by Namibia in their 57–54 loss to Madagascar in the 2012 Africa Cup.

The highest-scoring match in Six Nations history is England’s 80–23 victory over Italy in 2001.

French winger Louis Bielle-Biarrey has scored at least one try in his last 9 Six Nations Tests. In total he has scored 24 tries in 25 Tests Tests for France with 20 wins. This includes a span of at least a single try in eight successive Tests. Christian Cullen once scored tries in eight consecutive Tests for the All Blacks.

In 1999, John Leslie from Petone led Scotland to a 36-23 victory over France in Paris during the final round of the Five Nations. This win secured the championship for Scotland, a title they have not won again since. Scotland scored all five of their tries in an impressive 27-minute burst in the first half, with John’s brother Martin Leslie scoring twice. That day’s win was Scotland’s first in Paris since their 6-3 victory in 1969. Jim Telfer, a World Rugby Hall of Fame inductee, scored Scotland’s only try and also coached the 1999 team. Centre Alan Tait also scored two tries in the 1999 games. He told the BBC in 2021: “France had won back-to-back Grand Slams. They put 47 points on us in 1997. I played in that one. Then they put 51 points on us at Murrayfield in 1998. I played in that one as well.”

To win the Six Nations next weekend, Scotland will have to snap an 11-game losing streak against Ireland in Dublin and achieve one more point than leaders France in the championship standings.

Italy shocked England with a 23-18 win in Rome, marking their first victory over England in 32 matches since 1991. England had scored more than 50 points in nine of those previous games. This time, England led 18-10 but imploded in the final quarter after yellow cards to openside Sam Underhill and lock and captain Maro Itoje, who was otherwise a menace with 12 tackles and three turnovers. Italy’s winning try came from replacement Leonardo Marin, who finished off a break by Monty Ioane after a hopeful cross-kick from halfway worked out better than expected. Marin from Benetton has scored three tries in 22 Tests.

Tommaso Menoncello, playing his 37th Test, was named man of the match. He scored the opening try – his 10th for Italy – and made three line breaks, beat eight defenders, and gained 90 metres. In 2022, Menoncello became the youngest try-scorer in Six Nations history at 19 years and 170 days old, when he scored in a 37-10 loss to France in Paris in 2021. Paolo Garbisi added 13 points with his boot, including a penalty that hit the post before going over. Hooker Giacomo Nicotera had an eventful evening. He made 14 tackles but received a yellow card for a penalty that cost three points. Italy’s lineout was strong, winning 19 out of 21 throws. Openside Manuel Zuliani led the tackle count with 15.

England had won a dozen Tests in a row before the Six Nations. If they lose to France next weekend, they will suffer their worst campaign since 1984.

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Jorja Miller scored two tries for the Black Ferns Sevens in their 43-5 pool play win over Japan at the Vancouver Sevens, becoming the 21st SVNS player to reach 100 tries. She brought up her century in emphatic fashion, busting through two Japanese defenders and surging 50 metres. She told the official broadcast afterwards that “it’s an awesome achievement.” The 22-year-old World Rugby Sevens Player of the Year warned, “I haven’t reached my best yet.” The tournament concludes this afternoon. Top Five SVNS Try Scorers: Michaela Brake, 287 (Black Ferns Sevens) Portia Woodman-Wickliffe, 256 (Black Ferns Sevens) Maddison Levi, 244 (Australia) Amee Leigh Costigan, 203 (Ireland) Charlotte Caslick, 187 (Australia) Most SVNS Tries For Black Ferns Sevens: Michaela Brake, 287 Portia Woodman-Wickliffe, 256 Stacey Waaka, 130 Sarah Hirini, 106 Kelly Brazier, 101 Jorja Miller, 100.

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Kiwis turn up to play rugby all over the world, including in the Cayman Islands. Former Old Boys University outside back and John E Kelly Cup Premier Colts winner Trent Harris survived a “disgusting late hit early” to score a try and help Buccaneers RFC win an Alex Alexander Memorial Championship League fixture on the weekend. The Cayman Islands are ranked 46th in the world and once fielded five brothers in an international. The Westin family was represented by Matthew, Paul, Edward, Joseph, and Shane. Harris and his partner, Solita, are both lawyers, and Solita remarkably shares an office with Shane Westin. Trent’s brother Nathan Harris (not to be confused with the All Black of the same name) is an Auckland University centurion and was part of Gallaher Shield-winning teams in 2014 and 2017.

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This Monday column is also a collaborative effort and contributions are welcome. Please get in touch at editor@clubrugby.co.nz

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