Impressive Woodlands sends warning to opposition
WOODLANDS has fired a warning shot that has echoed around Southland’s premier club rugby scene.
The Stu Browncoached Woodlands side delivered a blistering firsthalf performance in round three action against Star on Saturday on its way to a 5726 win.
Star headed into the game unbeaten, but Woodlands looked a class above the home team for much of the game.
Key tight forwards Morgan Mitchell and Manaaki SelbyRickit were missing for Star but their absence should not be overplayed in assessing the whopping Woodlands win.
On top of the five competition points, Woodlands also picked up the Phil Butt Memorial Shield played for between the two clubs. Woodlands ran in six first tries in a remarkable 40 minutes of running rugby.
Former Warriors under20 rugby league player and new Woodlands recruit, Jarel Hemehema, playing on the wing, opened the scoring with a nice try after just a few minutes.
The onslaught continued and, before the 20minute mark had even ticked over, Woodlands had notched up its fourtry bonus point at 260. It scored a further two firsthalf tries to lead 407 at halftime.
Star’s sole highlight in the first half came through an impressive individual effort from loose forward Tama Toomata who showed good strength and evasive qualities to score a longrange try.
Woodlands’ dominance continued in the early stages of the second half when first fiveeighth Ignacio Costa pushed it out to 437 with a penalty before younger brother Nico showed good pace to scoot away and score a try.
Early in the game, the third of the Costa brothers, fullback Rodrigo, also showed some nice skills but he had to leave the field with a collarbone injury.
Lewis Ormond added another try to the Woodlands tally to make it 577, which prompted some stern words from Star’s senior players behind the goalposts as they pondered what was going wrong.
To the home team’s credit, it did finish strongly and even managed to take something out of what was an otherwise difficult afternoon. Star scored three late tries, one brilliant one to wing Ben Pope, as the Blue and Whites picked up a fourtry bonus point.
Star’s loss means Marist now is the only unbeaten team through the first three weeks of the season, although it was provided with a big scare against an impressive PiratesOld Boys on Saturday.
PiratesOld Boys made much of the play throughout the game before Marist was able to come back to lock in a 3934 win.
In the third premier fixture on Saturday, Blues finally claimed the honours in another tight contest.
Blues had lost its opening two games by three and five points respectively, but on Saturday it came out on the right side of the 2015 scoreline against the EasternNorthern Barbarians in, Invercargill.