MARTINBOROUH RUGBY CLUB

The season is over for the Premier and Senior Reserve teams, and what a season it was! Our Premier team made it to the Tui Cup Final, our first final in 24 year years…the last time we won was 26 years ago! Unfortunately it was not to be the fairy tale ending we would have liked, losing 12-25 to Gladstone, however we are extremely proud of our team and look forward to bringing the trophy back to Martinborough in 2018!

The support from the town and local businesses was amazing, it was great seeing the town covered in green & black. A special mention goes to P&K who printed off all the posters for us to display around town, also to BP Martinborough, Bell St Early Learning Centre, Neighbourhood, The Pukemanu, P&K, Four Square Jellicoe Street, and Unichem for their awesome displays of balloons, streamers, jerseys etc.
Our Senior Reserve team, although not making the final, finished the season extremely well. Playing in a competition of 12 teams, we made it to the playoffs involving the top four teams. A round robin competition was then played, although we managed to beat Masterton Red Star in a thrilling game, Mother Nature intervened which meant we were not able to play Puketoi and with split points from that game it meant we finished 3rd. MRS went on to win the competition, it should be noted that we were the only team to have beaten them during the season!
Congratulations to all our players who have been selected to represent Wairarapa Bush.
HEARTLAND SQUAD – James Pakoti, Tim Priest, Christopher Raymond, Armyn Sanders, Jacob Warren. DEVELOPMENT SQUAD – Stacie Aporo, Tipene Haira, Jonathan Hartnell, Mana Ngaau, Cody Cunningham. UNDER 20s – Tristan Flutey, William Haira, Tom Lovell, Alex Priest, Chance Ropiha, Thomas Uatuku. UNDER 13s – Ethan Boyd, Max Donaldson, Tyler Edney, Joseph Gillies, Connor Hislop, Keanu Paul. UNDER 12s – William Clarkson, Sam Hislop. UNDER 11s – Kingston Love, Josh Smith.
The Wairarapa Bush Rugby Awards were held recently and what a night for Christopher Raymond – Premier Player of the Year WINNER Pat Shannahan Trophy – 
James Bruce – Top Coach of the Year WINNER Lane Penn Trophy –
Rachael Colton – Senior Administrator of the Year WINNER David Galvin Trophy – 
Martinborough were also finalists for the Supreme Club of the Year, and Maori Player of the Year (Tipene Haira).
CONGRATULATIONS to Tristan Flutely who has been named in the NZ Heartland Under 19 Squad.  Tristan will join other top young talent from the Heartland Unions to compete at the annual Jock Hobbs Memorial National U19 Tournament, they will compete against the top players from each of the Mitre 10 Cup provincial unions in Taupo this month.
ADVERTISING OPPORTUNITY – If you would like to advertise your business AND support our rugby club then you may be interested in a billboard on the side of our no1 field. Although the rugby season is over our grounds still get a lot of use, we are doing another run of signs and if you jump on board now your sign will be up before the start of our summer touch competition, bootcamps, Charity Fun Ride, Cruise Martinborough, not to mention the number of groups that hire the clubrooms for private events!
Contact Mike – dustys@dustysandlulu.com for more information – lock in a sign BEFORE 13 SEPTEMBER to ensure you don’t miss out on all the summer events!! Watch this space for details of our summer social touch tournament returning in November!
Photo caption Jayde Te Kani on the offence – Photo Tegan King