Wyndham win ‘entertaining’ game against Te Anau

Round two of Southland’s division one club rugby competition kicked off on Saturday with a draw at Riversdale, a close game in Te Anau and a hiding at Edendale.

Wyndham travelled north to take on Te Anau and preserved their unbeaten record with a 34-5 victory.

Wyndham scored a vital try on halftime to lead 22-6 but Te Anau came right back into it in the second half and were trailing 27-25 with 10 minutes remaining.

Te Anau had a strong breeze at their backs but couldn’t get out of their own territory in the concluding stages and it was Wyndham who scored the final try.

Wyndham halfback Luke Cald- well played a good game, hooker Mark Kingsbury continued his top form and openside flanker Nathan Bee also impressed.

Te Anau coach Ray Hemi said: ‘‘It was an entertaining game but unfortunately we didn’t earn any competition points.’’

Centre Angus Larsen put in another big effort, and loose forwards Grant Taylor and Fine Mahine made some strong line breaks.

Riversdale had home ground advantage against Tokanui, but the visitors retained the Speights Shield, drawing 20-20.

Tokanui led 10-6 at halftime but coach Rata Smith said:

‘‘The boys never fired up until after the break; we raced out to 20-9 lead before the wheels fell off.

‘‘Ten minutes of decent rugby in each half is not enough to win a game.

‘‘It was a step down in quality from previous games but our team defence was still a strength.’’

Riversdale dominated the scrums, scoring two pushover tries – the second one on fulltime.

Riversdale coach Garth Lindsay said: ‘‘We were lucky, our last 15 minutes was good but they were the superior team prior to that.’’

Hooker Jono Stone, No 8 Rob Blatch were the pack leaders, and first five-eighth Willy Tree was solid and kicked the pressure conversion on fulltime.

Edendale were a confident team facing up to Drummond-LimehillsStar after comfortably disposing of the combined side 24-10 back in April.

The cheese-makers bettered that performance in Saturday’s encounter by embarrassing the visitors 39-13.

In perfect conditions Edendale had a superior kicking game, held ascendancy in set play and were well organised on defence, easily creating turnovers from the isolated ball-runners.

Despite being outmuscled and out-enthused in the dull first half DLS would have been content to only trail 12-3.

DLS kicked a goal after the break before Edendale ran in three good team tries to lead 27-6.

After 60 minutes DLS momentarily fired up and looked to be back in the game after their best forward Tom Wylie scored a converted try, but the white flag came out soon after and the locals ran in two more tries.

Edendale coach Mark Hourston said: ‘‘It was good to see our disci- pline was much week.

‘‘We spread the ball well and scored some nice tries. Lock Oliver Craig was strong in lineouts and around the park.’’

DLS were again missing a handful of key players but team spokesman Jo McIlwrick said: ‘‘We need to do better with what we’ve got, a change in attitude is required.’’

Second five-eighth Jack Maguire looked dangerous with the limited opportunities, and gutsy halfback Ritchie Allison had a blinder.

Waikaka had the weekend off with the bye.

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