Bay of Plenty and Wellington, the most successful golf districts in recent times, forged to the front on another wet day in the national men's interprovincial teams event in Palmerston North yesterday.
Bay of Plenty, which has won the titles five times in the past seven years, had to work hard to beat Aorangi South Canterbury 3-2 and Otago 4-1 to join Canterbury at the top of division one with three wins.
Canterbury edged out Southland in the morning and Aorangi South Canterbury in the afternoon, both by 3-2 margins, to remain in contention for the semifinals.
Wellington, which was beaten by Bay of Plenty in the last two finals, scored two well-earned wins as players struggled with rain delays at the Manawatu Golf Club.
Wellington produced an outstanding effort to dispose of Auckland 3-2, meaning the powerful northern team will have to win all its remaining matches and likely need other results to go its way if it is to advance to the play-offs.
The team from the capital backed up with a 4 to victory over Tasman to move to a share of the lead in division two with Hawkes Bay.
Manawatu-Wanganui remained in the hunt when Ewen Westergaard nailed a 4m birdie putt on the last hole to square his match with Shaun Jones and earn a half with Hawkes Bay.
That left Manawatu-Wanganui sharing third place with Waikato.
Earlier, Hawkes Bay looked to have secured the points when former New Zealand representative Leighton James bagged a 6.5m birdie putt on the last to win his match 1 up.
Wellington made 24 birdies to beat Auckland in a high-quality match.
Wellington's wins went to Adam Church, Thomas Spearman-Burn and Sean Kells, while Auckland's wins were secured by Fraser Wilkin and Ryan Fox, who beat fellow international Peter Spearman-Burn 2 up.
The pair traded birdies in a rollercoaster match before an eagle from Fox at the 14th gave him the winning advantage.
The loss to Bay of Plenty yesterday was Otago's first of the tournament.
In the early stages of the round, Otago was in control with Andrew Hobbs, Mitch Bosley and Michael Minty all in front at the turn, while Duncan Croudis, fresh from his return from China, turned a two-down deficit after five holes to be square at the turn.
But on the homeward nine the Bay team showed its class with Andrew Stewart beating Otago No 1 Brent McEwan on the 17th green.
Hobbs lost the initiative on the homeward nine to also lose by 2 and 1, while Bosley lost his match to Kieran Muir despite birdieing the final hole.
Otago's only game scores came from Croudis, who overcame jet-lag to score a half on the final hole with Bradley Kendall, while No 5 Michael Minty led all the way but finished square with the Bay's Nic Meyer.
Otago coach Ben Gallie was disappointed with the loss but said that the margin did not deflect the closeness of the encounter.
He also was aware that the constant weather delays did not help his team which led by 3 to 1 after the first nine holes.
Otago is favoured to add to its winning margin in the fifth and only round to be played this morning when it meets Poverty Bay-East Coast.
In other match-ups, division one leader Bay of Plenty plays Canterbury, Wellington takes on Manawatu-Wanganui and Waikato faces Auckland.
There are two further rounds tomorrow, with semifinals and the final on Saturday.
