After slow starts, the Arrowtown and Wakatipu Premiers rugby sides are tracking well, but face real tests this afternoon.
Arrowtown, who last week end signed off the Central Otago comp’s first round with their first home win, beating much-improved Alexandra 36-26, face the powerful Cromwell side, also at home.
While Wakatipu, who smashed bottom-placed Matakanui Combined 50-7 in Omakau, face a tough away game against Alex, who beat them in the season-opener in Queenstown.
Arrowtown coach Simon Harper says their Alex game, just their second win this season, ‘‘was definitely a game we needed to win, but we need to just keep winning, we’ve got to make up some ground’’.
He’s delighted they’ve picked up some talented players including four Fijians — ‘‘we’re calling ourselves the Bulls Drua’’ — and Sri Lankan first-five Damian Ratwatte, and says that’s lifting the others.
‘‘Like [40-year-old] Aidan Winter, he just smashed it for 80 minutes, but all the boys are just putting their hand up.’’
Asked how they’ll beat Cromwell, who beat them 34-12 in their season-opener, Harper quips he’ll probably just start the Fijian who defected from their side — ‘‘that might get them wound up enough, I think’’.
He concedes Cromwell are a good side but would love his side to make it two wins in a row — ‘‘therein lies the challenge, really’’.
Meanwhile, Wakatipu coach Brett Anderson says ‘‘we’re starting to execute things we’ve been trying to do for a couple of months’’.
‘‘The ball’s starting to stick for us, and the combinations are starting to gel a bit better.
‘‘Going into the second round, we’re happy with where we’re at, but we are wary of the fact we need to put together some consistent performances and have a strong second round.’’
After three wins from six games, Anderson notes they’re only ahead of Alex on points differential, so today’s match ‘‘will set a good gauge for where we’re at’’.
Today’s games kick off 2.30pm.
Meanwhile, the Wakatipu Wanderers continued their unbeaten home run with a 58-12 win over Midlands last Saturday.
Big scalp nearly collected
Newly promoted to the Otago School Rugby Championship’s top-six division, Wakatipu High’s 1st XV nearly pipped last year’s winners, Dunedin’s John McGlashan College, in their first home game last Saturday.
They lost only 27-25, but, as a consolation, outscored Johnnies four tries to three.
Today they play Southland Boys’, again at home, at 12.45pm.
Meanwhile, the Wakatipu women’s side’s lost four of their first five games, but are improving each week and only lost 33-29 to Albion, in Gore, last Sunday.
‘‘We’ve got a lot of new girls who are having to come in and take up some of the bigger roles our senior girls haven’t been able to fill due to injury,’’ co-coach Laura Sadler says.
‘‘Our goal this season isn’t really to win heaps of games, it’s essentially just to create a good base level of girls who are going to come back next season.’’
Today they play Marist in Invercargill.
