Hawke's Bay Tui into Farah Palmer Championship final after one-point win over Kauri

Dominant prop Ashley Palu had a standout game for the Tui against Northland. Photo / Dennis Mansfield

Hawke's Bay Tui head for Manawatū this weekend to try to blow away the table-topping Cyclones in the Farah Palmer Cup Championship division final.

The Tui won a nail-biting semi 27-26 at Semenoff Stadium in Whangarei against the Northland Kauri on Friday.

The Tui had started strongly with a surge into the Northland 22 in the first 5 minutes, but dominant prop Ashley Palu crossed the line, only to be held up.

In the 11th minute, the Kauri turned down a three-point gift and kick-passed to the right to expose the Tui defence, and the home side had the game's first five-pointer.

Northland scored again in the 16th minute from a lineout set-piece, and after 20 minutes led 21-0 when Kauri midfielder Victoria Subritzky-Nafatali

crossed after nine phases of play.

That stung the Tui into action and winger Rakai McCafferty

showed great hands in grasping a low-flying pass to score out wide in the 27th minute.

Palu had featured in an earlier surge just before McCafferty touched down - a few minutes later the flying prop powered her way downfield in a 20m run through six defenders, to be brought down just short.

But the ball swung wide quickly to captain Krysten Cottrell

who touched down to make it 21-10 to Northland at the break.

Early in the second half, Subritzky-Nafatali scored again to push the Kauri out to 26-10.

The kick was missed, as was the Tui's conversion when Palu crossed after 52 minutes with an angled run of her own.

With 15 minutes to run, at 26-15 up, Northland were a player down after a yellow card.

Left winger Harmony Kautai

took advantage to make it 26-20.

The Tui swung back onto the attack, and No 8 Kathleen Brown crossed.

On a day when the goalkicking wasn't going well for either team, Brown had the presence of mind to regain her feet and head for the posts to improve the kick position for a one-point 27-26 comeback victory.

The Championship final is set to be played at 11.35am on Saturday although there is doubt around the later Premiership final with Waikato at an increased alert level as of Monday.