The North Canterbury representative rugby team capped off a great season on Saturday, deservedly beating Ellesmere 13›0 at Lincoln, and bringing home the Southbridge Shield.
For the last decade Ellesmere teams have generally had the wood on their North Canterbury counterparts at both club and representative levels.
This has been decisively turned around this season with Glenmark›Cheviot and Saracens getting through to the final of the Luisetti Seeds combined rugby competition and now North Canterbury securing the most coveted of all the trophies in Country rugby.
It was immediately apparent this was a highly›motivated and well organised North Canterbury team. Although Ellesmere created some early territorial pressure, once this was successfully repulsed, North Canterbury set about stamping their authority on the match with two well›taken tries.
The first was scored at the 10 minute mark by hard›working prop, Ra Karena, after some slick interpassing down the left hand flank that featured a number of the forwards.
The second came just four minutes later when second five› eight Mike Keane broke a tackle and ran 20 metres to score.
This opened up an invaluable 10 point buffer for North Canterbury and proved to be the only points to be scored in the match until replacement Scott Allin landed a penalty goal in the final act of the game.
While there may have been no tries scored in the intervening 65 minutes, the match certainly did not lack interest.
The defensive efforts of both teams were of the highest standard. Ellesmere’s match plan involved a lot of hard straight running, especially around the fringes of the rucks and mauls.
Only once did Ellesmere really look like scoring.
At the 25 minute mark one of their big loose forwards broke clear from some loose play and charged at the lonely figure of fullback Harry Murray in front of his own posts. Murray proved up to the task lowering the ball› carrier in a copy›book one›on› one tackle, but he offended at the subsequent breakdown and was shown a yellow card.
His teammates rallied, repulsed that attack and safely negotiated the next 10 minutes despite having only 14 men.
North Canterbury’s effort in holding Ellesmere scoreless was the key to its success.
Up front, the whole of the forward pack and particularly the impressive loose forward trio of Josh Maynard, Andrew Hull and Danny Brooker were diligent on defence. Lock Flynn Crean had a massive game, tackling strongly, running hard with ball in hand, and along with Hull and Willie Kerr, gained a steady supply of line out ball.
The North Canterbury set scrum was a very efficient unit, too. They pushed Ellesmere off one of their own feeds and generally held the upper hand in that phase of the game.
Their combination, well› honed during the club rugby season and skilfully organised by Mike Keane, ensured that the defensive screen they put up proved impenetrable.
While unable to score any further tries itself, which was a tribute to Ellesmere’s defence, and in particular, their work at the breakdown, North Canterbury certainly won the territorial battle in the second half.
This ensured that the match was generally played at the right end of the field.
As the match progressed the leadership skills of Josh Maynard became more and more apparent, as he made many important tackles and ran strongly with ball in hand. It was most appropriate that he was the one to lift the Southbridge Shield aloft at the end of the match. North Canterbury 13 (Ra Karena, Mike Keane, tries, Scott Allin, penalty) Ellesmere 0.
Lower grade fixtures
North Canterbury took five teams to Lincoln on Saturday to front up to their Ellesmere counterparts, and four of the five came with wins. The North Canterbury Development Team, known as the Stags, played an attractive brand of rugby and had a very convincing win. One of the features was the make› shift hooker, Jared Gilmore scoring a brace of tries.
North Canterbury Development 36 (Korbyn Gray, Jarred Gilmore 2, Josh Cavanagh, Ethan McDuff, Kerran Jenkins, tries Ricky Allin 3 conversions beat Ellesmere Development 10.
In the Colts grade Ellesmere scored the only points of the first half with a try, but the second half was a veritable try› fest with both teams scoring four tries each.
Ellesmere opened up a big lead but the sterling efforts of players like Michael Jones, Jed McDonald, and Samson Vea in the North Canterbury forward pack started to bear some fruit as North Canterbury narrowed the gap dramatically towards the end of the match without ever really looking like winning it. North Canterbury Colts 28 (Michel Jones, Samson Vea, Callum Murdoch, Ra Eruera tries, Lachie Grant 4 conversions) lost to Ellesmere Colts 33.
RUGBY By PETER WILLIAMS
