Southland season typified in loss to Otago
Southland’s finale in the 2017 Mitre 10 Cup against Otago on Saturday provided a compact snapshot to just what their entire season has been like.
They produced patches which were worthy of getting excited about, but ultimately they were too inconsistent throughout the 80 minutes, kicked a lot, and were made to pay on the back of their errors.
To add to the struggles the Southland scrum on many occasions headed in reverse without any handbrake and it made for another tough evening in Dunedin.
Otago outscored Southland six tries to three in a 43-19 win in the Donald Stuart Memorial Trophy fixture.
They didn’t just keep that trophy locked away the win also ensured Otago will yet again be part of the Championship playoffs in 2017.
It took 16 minutes before Otago opened the scoring against through a try to wing Mitchell Scott. Otago had a 5m scrum after initially being held up over the line.
Scott received the ball close to the scrum and bust through the Stags defence to score. The Josh Ioane conversion made it 7-0.
Ioane extended it to a 10-0 lead 10 minutes later through a penalty, before Southland finally got some reward for their endeavour.
Some nice interplay from the Stags backline, which included a good Matt Johnson offload, put fullback Lewis Ormond in the clear.
Ormond then produced some impressive acrobatics with his dive towards the corner post to squeeze in and score.
But just a matter of minutes later that good work was overturned.
An overthrown Southland lineout sent Otago flanker Dillon Hunt on a big run before it was centre Sio Tomkinson who finished for the home team’s second try of the day.
At 17-5 late in the first half Otago found themselves in a strong position, but they weren’t content with that.
They rolled the dice by turning down plenty of kickable penalties and eventually that gamble paid off.
With time up on the clock in the first half, Teihorangi Walden sent a big cut out pass the way of wing Jona Nareki.
Nareki matched Ormond’s deeds at the other end by leaping towards the corner post and stayed in to score.
Despite Ioane missing the conversion Otago still were able to go into halftime with a healthy 22-5 lead.
Walden notched up the important fourth try bonus point in the 49th minute when he run a good line off a close-range lineout.
Southland were able to strike back soon after through Lewis Ormond’s second try but soon after it was lights out for the Stags – literally.
First flanker Phil Halder was shown a yellow card for a tackle which was deemed late and also dangerous before in bizarre circumstances the game was thrown into darkness.
A thunderstorm cut power to many parts of Dunedin and in turn cut the lights at Forsyth Barr, briefly.
The game continued as many of the lights sparked back into action before Otago dealt yet another blow to Southland.
They demolished the Southland scrum from close range, a common sight throughout the fixture.
The ball was then flung wide to replacement wing Latu Vaeno who went in untouched to score.
Southland and Otago then went about trading tries with replacement midfielder James Schrader scoring for the Stags before replacement Otago prop Jonah Aoina then powered over from close range.
That Aoina try was the last act of the game in terms of scoring, and as the game wound up, so did Southland’s season. A forgettable one.