The St Kentigern team celebrate their 22-7 win over Auckland Grammar. Photo / Doug Sherring
The St Kentigern team celebrate their 22-7 win over Auckland Grammar. Photo / Doug Sherring
Online insults were traded before the school rugby season's most prestigious game yesterday, the Auckland secondary final between St Kentigern College and Auckland Grammar School.
Fans at Eden Park were kept apart during the match, which St Kents won 22-7, despite the absence of their skipper Sootala Fa'aso'o.
The captain'sfall from grace was the talk of the elite school community this week, as old boys and onlookers took to Twitter. Most banter back and forth about his exclusion from the game and loss of his head boy status, for an unexplained misdemeanour, was too explicit for publication.
Meanwhile, Auckland Rugby's high performance manager, Ant Strachan, said he had been kept appraised of the situation and that Fa'aso'o would be considered for the academy programme next year "when we have all the appropriate information".
Warriors recruitment manager Dean Bell said the franchise was interested in Fa'aso'o but it was clear he wanted to stay in rugby.
There is no legal obligation for a school to notify police of incidents where students potentially break the law, but Ministry of Education spokeswoman Emma Peel said that the ministry would expect a school to have discussions with the police if a serious incident occurred. St Kents has not indicated whether Fa'aso'o's actions were that serious, however, and his manager Kent Hale would not comment.
