Hinuera beat visitors

McPherson Hinuera 34 Marist 20

Contractors Te Awamutu

Played at Wealleans Park on a lush field with sparkling skies, Hinuera fielded a rearranged back line that took time to gel.

Josh Hedge was hesitant with his delivery at half back, a chore he will need to sharpen in the coming weeks with regular, Travis Eggink, absent for two games.

Levi Henare and Noa Madanawa were welcome starters, the former returning from injury, the latter a late beginning to the season. Madanawa, was a mixed bag, scoring a try but earning a 10 minute period behind the posts for an indiscretion in the second spell.

Marist were on the back foot from the opening whistle when their scrum went backwards from the first engagement. Ben Whaiapu on one side relieved dad Dan McGillivray on the other and Tait Payze squeezed in between made life difficult for the visitors.

As the game wore on, the pace caught up with the visitors.

On four occasions play was halted for injury, which allowed them time to catch their breath.

Hinuera opened the scoring with a Toby O’Reilly penalty, a conversion was added to Madanawa’s try, Hinuera 10-nil in the 20th minute. Marist replied with a penalty following an altercation, which ref Shawn Watson calmly deflected with a quiet word. McGillivray scored, O’Reilly converted, Hinuera 17-3 at the break.

From the restart Hinuera had to dodge around injured Marist players with the ref allowing play to carry on. Luke Gaenswicke was up in support to dot down, O’Reilly converted, Hinuera 24-3. Ryan Wilson burst onto the ball to score the bonus point try, then O’Reilly himself scored, jumped the fence near the dead ball line but couldn’t convert to complete the trifecta, Hinuera 34- 3. Annoyingly, Hinuera as has happened in the past, conceded points via two converted tries and a penalty to close the gap to 34-20.

Next week away to Suburbs. Leo Moana was player of the day, was presented with his blazer to the delight of his parents and also earned dork of the day.