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The boycott of St Kentigern College’s first XV rugby team has extended down the country, with the central North Island’s Super Eight schools refusing to play the Auckland school.

Ten Auckland schools had already bandied together to shun St Kents because of their recruitment policy they feel is unethical in bolstering the strength of their playing stocks.

That has effectively seen St Kents locked out of competing in next year’s Auckland 1A competition.

But if they were to look for games a little further south, they are also out of luck, because, after hearing of the boycott up north, all sides in the Super Eight competition have supported that move, following a meeting in the past couple of days.

The Super Eight is a competitive league comprising Hamilton Boys’ High School, Palmerston North Boys’ High School, Hastings Boys’ High School, Rotorua Boys’ High School, New Plymouth Boys’ High School, Gisborne Boys’ High School, Napier Boys’ High School and Tauranga Boys’ College.

While those teams wouldn’t normally come up against St Kents in the course of a season, if they were approached for a game they would all be declining the offer.

It’s understood that refusal to play will mirror however long those Auckland schools continue their boycott.

‘‘As a Super Eight entity we’ve unanimously agreed to support our Auckland counterparts,’’ Palmerston North Boys’ High School rector David Bovey said.

‘‘If they were looking for fixtures, we wouldn’t play them.’’

While he said it was disappointing something like this had happened, Bovey did feel it