Long wait for Otago
OTAGO looks set to join the three Aucklandbased teams on the sideline for another couple of weeks.
New Zealand Rugby yesterday confirmed the NPC and the Farah Palmer Cup would restart on September 17, while the Heartland Championship could finally get under away.
The competitions are able to resume after the Government announced on Monday the country, with the exception of Auckland, would move to Covid19 Alert Level 2 from 11.59pm yesterday.
NZR will release a revised draw in due course, but not everyone will be invited to the party.
Auckland is stuck in lockdown, which means its three NPC teams will not be able to resume training until the city drops a couple of alert levels.
They are going to have to play catchup games, which will make for a very messy draw.
NZR community rugby general manager Steve Lancaster said it was a difficult challenge to rejig the draw.
‘‘What we intend to do is simply resume the draw without the fixtures that those teams were scheduled to play . . . and then we will look to make those games up later in the season,’’ he said.
The preferred option is to resume the NPC from round seven. That is bad news for Otago, as it is scheduled to play CountiesManukau in Auckland on September 19, and North Harbour in Dunedin on September 26.
Neither of those games will be going ahead, which means Otago may not return to the field until October 2, when it travels to Palmerston North to play Manawatu.
Otago Rugby Football Union general manager Richard Kinley said NZR was still working through the options but ‘‘that was a likely scenario, but not the only one they are working on’’.
‘‘There are a whole lot of variables, though. What does it mean if Auckland has another week in lockdown longer than we are anticipating at the moment?’’
If Otago does not play until
October 2, it will have been seven weeks since its 3410 loss to Hawke’s Bay on August 14.
There has been some preliminary talk about staging an intrasquad game to give the team some game time.
While NZR still has a lot to work through before confirming the NPC draw, Lancaster said it was lucky to be a position where the competitions could resume.
“Although we’d love to get everyone back out there this weekend, player safety must be our No 1 priority, so we have built in a week for our teams to prepare before they return to the field,’’ he said.
‘‘And importantly, with play resuming next weekend we are planning to play the full schedule of matches in all three competitions, with later completion dates for each.
“We know it’s a tough situation for everyone in Auckland, but we are taking a positive view that the alert levels will go down and we are making contingency plans for Auckland, North Harbour and Counties Manukau to rejoin the competitions with minimal disruption when they are able.’’
With just two rounds remaining in the Farah Palmer Cup, it is likely the games involving the two Auckland teams will not be played and points will be shared.
‘‘The earliest we anticipate them rejoining the competition is for the playoffs, so that is what we are looking at at the moment, but we have to finalise exactly how we manage that.’’
The Otago Spirit’s remaining games are against Bay of Plenty and Canterbury.
The Heartland Championship had not got under way before the country was plunged into lockdown. The new draw is expected to be out in the next few days and may not look very different.