Li bags five against Taranaki
The twinkling boots of North Harbour wing Tevita Li were too quick for an understrength Taranaki side, as he equalled the union’s try-scoring record in a big Mitre 10 Cup victory at Albany.
Li raced away for five tries in Harbour’s 64-33 win on Sunday, equalling Glenn Davis’ haul against Poverty Bay-East Coast in 1999. Since the national provincial competition was revamped in 2006, Harbour’s best try haul in a match was three, twice, by Matt Luamanu.
Time will tell if Harbour get any benefit out of their final round robin match against a seriously weakened visiting team.
Taranaki opted to send what was effectively a B side north and while it benefited Li, the hosts were not given a massive test ahead of their premiership semifinal against Canterbury.
While North Harbour’s frontline were having what was effectively a training run at times, the vast majority of Taranaki’s first choice XV were at home having the weekend off before they host Tasman in the other semifinal on Saturday night.
Just how much confidence North Harbour take out of the match remains unknown but they at least got to try out some moves ahead of their trip to Christchurch.
North Harbour opened the scoring in just the seventh minute when Taranaki wing Jackson Ormond, who has not played for three months after breaking his leg in club rugby, was caught out defensively before Bryn Hall eventually crossed.
They doubled their advantage less than five minutes later when Li finished off some expansive play but there was a worrying sign for North Harbour when Hall left the field with what appeared to be a wrist injury that he might have been carrying given the level of strapping he started the match with.
Taranaki could, and probably should, have hit back but Ormond’s try was scratched following a forward pass that was picked up on review.
The inexperience of Taranaki’s line-up was evident through their mistakes and just how easily they were found out on defence to conceded a third and fourth with just over a quarter of the match gone.
With little or no ball it was evident once Li had crossed for his second that things could get ugly for the under-manned visitors but
to their credit Declan O’Donnell finished off a sweeping move to get Taranaki on the board.
The pace of the game was starting to tell on Taranaki’s players as they were noticeably gasping, especially those who have had such limited game time over the space of the competition.
Their decision making was also highly questionable and a poor passing option led to Li’s hat-trick well before the halftime whistle sounded.
They refused to lie down, though, and scored a couple of rippers themselves to narrow the margin to two scoring plays at the break.
However, the same problems that hurt Taranaki in the first half returned early in the second as North Harbour scored their sixth try through Matt Duffie.
The sides then traded tries before the match was held up for a period when Gerard Cowley-Tuioti was knocked out after a head clash with Johnny Fa’auli.
There was also time for 18-yearold first five-eighth Ciarahn Matoe to score a second try in what was a fairly tidy starting debut.
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