Masses expected at Battle of Bays

OUR SHIELD: Magpies player Jarvy Aoake and a fan after Ranfurly Shield defence No 9 a fortnight ago. Aoake is on the subs bench for today's Battle of the Bays defence. PHOTO/PAUL TAYLOR

The Hawke's Bay Rugby Union is looking for one of McLean Park's biggest crowds of the season today as a bit of Ranfurly Shield tradition returns in the form of a rare Saturday afternoon game - the first in 10 defences since the Magpies won the shield last year.

But the nostalgists who remember the week-in, week-out brilliantly fine Saturday afternoons of Hawke's Bay's last big Ranfurly Shield era at the end of the 1960s will have their fingers crossed today, with a southerly turn forecast by MetService for the Battle of the Bays, which starts at 2.35pm.

Kick-off against Bay of Plenty will be preceded by a moment's silence in tribute to former All Black Ian Uttley and wife Tinks who were killed in a Napier-Taupo Highway crash on Tuesday.

While union marketing manager Jay Campbell says the union's hopes for a big crowd are bolstered by pre-match sales exceeding 6000 tickets, the biggest pre-matchday sales this year, MetService warns they may need to rug up.

Wellington-based forecaster Lisa Murray says the weather is expected to change by midday, well before the kickoff, bringing showers and possibly heavy rain on the coast. Temperatures are forecast to dip to about 14C, which compares with yesterday's Hawke's Bay Airport high of 23C.

Mr Campbell expects the fact that it is a Saturday afternoon match - ideal for the family-day promotion that includes face-painting behind the Harris Stand plus full-squad autograph signing and Magpies poster giveaways after the game - is set to make it possibly the biggest event of the season.

But it brings some problems and Mr Campbell doesn't want any disappointments. "There's a curtain raiser, with four or five Magpies players in the teams, and spectators would be well advised to get there early," he said.

"The last two games we have been slammed at the gate just prior to kick-off - McLean Park cannot cope with 2000 people all descending en masse at once trying to gain entry."

There has always been a particular type of inter-region rivalry in the Battle of the Bays, mainly sorted out on the field.

But it hit a new level three years ago when the Magpies won the Bay of Plenty union's centennial match feature with a 32-13 win in Rotorua.

Many may remember it more for a sideline stoush involving the combatants' mascots - Hawke's Bay's Kahu and Bay of Plenty's Hori BoP.

While having played each other just three times in Ranfurly Shield matches, the history goes back 93 years to Hawke's Bay's first-ever defence, when they beat Bay of Plenty 17-16 at Nelson Park, Hastings, on September 2, 1922, three weeks after winning the trophy by beating Wellington 19-9.

The second Ranfurly Shield Battle of the Bays was on September 21, 1968, when Hawke's Bay, approaching the end of the second full season with the shield in the 1966-69 tenure, won 14-0, at McLean Park, and the most recent was the second defence last year, a 36-17 win, again to the holders, and also at McLean Park.

Bay of Plenty union media and events co-ordinator Amanda Thompson will be among the hopeful challenge supporters at the park, gathering at The Station Bar and Bistro in Napier earlier in the afternoon.

They're not worried about history, she said late yesterday, and hung hopes on their ITM Cup championship division team's form in a 37-26 ITM Cup win over upper division side Counties-Manukau a fortnight ago.

The match is part of a big weekend for Hawke's Bay, with the second day of the Bostock New Zealand Spring Racing Carnival in Hastings, including a bid for Windsor Park Plate glory by Taranaki galloper Kawi. Having won the carnival's Makfi Stakes opening-day feature, Kawi is hot favourite to take the second leg, and to head to the final day's Livamol Classic on October 3 with hopes of becoming the first galloper to win all three events in the same season. The first of the nine races today is at 12.12pm, and the main race at 4.20pm.

An added feature of the weekend is the Napier City Rovers' bid for national soccer supremacy in the Chatham Cup final against Auckland side Eastern Suburbs tomorrow, but it's in Auckland.