League: Broncos have eye on bigger picture

Despite a 56-nil pummelling by Northern Wairoa, the Hora Hora Broncos are having a positive influence on teenagers in the Whangarei community.

With the Broncos rugby league team in only its second year, assistant coach Dion Nathan said it's a case of keeping an eye on the big picture even though the weekend's result may not be flattering for his side.

"It's unheard of having rugby and rugby league together [at the same club] but what we've found is we need to develop and keep our teenagers in the game," Nathan said.

"We played a very good team from Dargaville, they operate well and we're really focused on having a strong team for next year.

"Our main thing is aiming to keep striving to finish in the top six.

"[But], at the end of the day it's good to see a number of families out enjoying a day at the park."

Nathan added it was difficult to keep his side's chin up during Saturday's game, but said his side had shown guts to keep plugging away at the dominant Northern Wairoa side.

"We've just got to try and keep it enjoyable, but keep the boys focused on the overall goal and that it requires some commitment to get that far. And, they seem to be blooming regardless of the score.

"One thing the boys didn't do was resort to getting niggly which is credit to them," Nathan said.

Last week, Hora Hora narrowly lost to Portland while Northern Wairoa found themselves on the receiving end of a heavy defeat to Hikurangi.

Northern Wairoa coach Charles Selkirk said for his side it was pleasing to see a transition between the training field and game day.

"We had to get up and play our sets, but we were keener than them to win," Selkirk said.

"The boys swept their cobwebs out [last week] and played much better.

"Great effort for the boys to hold opposition out to a nil score. We knew we were going to win three-quarters of the way through but they did well to keep them [Hora Hora] scoreless."

In total Selkirk's side managed 11 tries in the romping, but the coach knows next weekend's game against Takahiwai is going to be a tough one - especially since his side had never beaten them, to his knowledge.

In other premier league games, Takahiwai come out on top of Portland 30-20; Hikurangi kept its winning ways by beating City 56-22; Hokianga breezed past Otaua 54-12; and Moerewa accounted for Kerikeri 66-4.