Lineouts are a key component of any rugby match and they were an absolute boon for Greytown in their 26-17 win over East Coast in the grand final of the WBRFU's Tui Cup premier division competition at Trust House Memorial Park, Masterton, on Saturday.
Spearheaded by spring-heeled locks Norm Henricksen and Gareth Van Dalen, Greytown not only took down their own ball with consummate ease but most of East Coast's as well.
Henricksen at 34 years of age was aiming for his first premiership success and the former Wairarapa-Bush rep who is no longer available for Heartland selection had a whale of a game. Apart from his dominance at No2 in the lineout he was an aggressive scrapper for maul ball and an imposing runner in broken play.
The younger Van Dalen, who has just been named in the Wairarapa-Bush under-20 squad, ruled the roost in the middle of the lineout and had a huge workrate around the paddock, probably making as many tackles as any of the loosies. The high opinion Greytown coach Ritchie Robertson has of him is obviously well founded.
It wasn't only in the lineouts, however, that the Greytown forwards had a clear edge on their East Coast counterparts. They certainly had greater stability in the scrum, even managing a tighthead at one stage, and there was an impressive unity about the short passing rushes which actually became their side's most potent form of attack. Invariably skipper Kurt Simmonds was at the head of them with fellow front rower PJ Freeman and assertive No8 Tana Isaac in close support.
One of four brothers in the Greytown side, Tana Isaac would in fact have been a prime contender for any player of the match award. He made many powerful surges with ball in hand and was a punishing tackler around the fringes of the scrums and mauls.
Promising Greytown halfback Joseph Sio had been a doubtful starter for the final because of injury problems but you wouldn't have known it such was the quality of his performance. His passing had speed, length and accuracy, his tactical kicking was spot on and on the few occasions he decided to have a "dab" on his own he made valuable metreage.
The other standout individual in a Greytown backline which functioned smoothly on attack and defence was midfielder Tapaga Isaac. Several times he scythed his way through or around several would-be tacklers and he showed a good turn of pace when in open spaces.
Defensively too Isaac was strong, getting up quickly in the face of the dangerous East Coast midfielders and, consequently, shutting down most of their attacks before any momentum was gained. Also pivotal in that area was second-five Kingi Kaiwai, who adopted a similar approach to Isaac.
That East Coast did not bring their A game to the final would have been friustrating for them and their supporters but it did speak volumes for their character that even though they were outplayed the scoreline never blew out to unmanageable proportions.
In fact, had the try scored by their best player, second-five Jesse McGilvary, a couple of minutes from fulltime been converted they would have only needed another converted try in those dying stages to have levelled things up.
The big problem for East Coast through most of the match was that they couldn't hang on to what little quality ball they did manage to attain. Too many basic passing and handling errors were made for them to work up anything like a full head of steam and they weren't helped either by some of the option taking being rather less accurate than what it normally would be.
Even allowing for the struggles of those around him and the tightness of the Greytown defence McGilvary still looked a class performer in midfield, making three or four impressive bursts from broken play and being typically aggressive in his defensive work.
Another East Coast player whose dedication to the cause could never be questioned was flanker Joe Feast who seemed at times to be almost taking on the entire Greytown pack on his own and whose second half sin binning was probably created more by frustration than anything else.
Young No8 Tom Bowie also did enough to suggest he has a bright future in that role.
Try scorers for Greytown, which led 19-9 at the break, were Tana Isaac, Kingi Kaiwai and Hamish Meyrick while Reece Lett landed three penalties and a conversion. Jesse McGilvary scored a try for East Coast and Nick Olson kicked four penalty goals.