Northland Rugby's Development team is optimistic they can shake up their big-city rivals in their first competition match against North Harbour tomorrow.
Coach Adriaan Ferris said several of the players were fringe Air New Zealand Cup players and he hoped their performance in front of first team assistant coach Blair Larsen
would help carry the team to an upset win. "We feel we're stronger than in previous years but I suppose the proof will be in the pudding," he said.
North Harbour, runner-up in last year's national development competition, were certain to have a strong squad this season. "We know we'll be up against it but, although we're a feeder for the Air New Zealand Cup team, we're also a team in our own right and when we were on camp last week, we talked about playing for each other and I hope that comes through during the match," he said.
The competition will be a long one and with quarterfinals, semifinals and finals, it won't be completed until late October.
It's been a long season for the players already, most recently finishing long club-rugby seasons and there is a long injury list. Steve Baker, Ross Neal, Jojo Ranger, Moto Peters, Tee Paulo, John Cocker and Elliott Nelson are unavailable for the match through injury.
"Some of the guys are pretty tired but they're excited to be playing rep rugby and hopefully that will be enough when we get to Harbour," Ferris said. The match will kick off at the Onewa Domain at 2.30pm.
Northland:
1 Ross Wright, 2 Robbie Abel, 3 Haimona Brown, 4 Andy White, 5 Matt Harrison, 6 Solomon Palu, 7 Jared McKenzie, 8 Latu Moala 9 Logan Wendt 10 Cass Walding 11 Maurice Cooper 12 Warren Dunn 13 Sione Fonua 14 Simon Munro 15 Matt Wright. Reserves: 16 Tom Vainikolo 17 Matt Wallis 18 Stu Oldfield 19 John Taufa 20 Scott Wilson 21 Hugh Rawiri 22 Isaia Nawaqa. Stand-by reserves: Murray Scoles, Luke Muggeridge
