Statistics suggest there will be no clear favourite when Wairarapa-Bush and Buller square off in the Lochore Cup rugby final in Westport this coming Saturday.
For, whereas Wairarapa-Bush did beat Buller 23-16 in their only clash to date this season, the overall win-loss record of the two teams in 2010 Heartlandchampionship games sees Buller with a slight edge. Of their nine games they have won five and lost four, while Wairarapa-Bush have won three and lost six.
Interestingly enough, the two teams played in the same preliminary round pool. There Wairarapa-Bush beat Buller (23-16) and East Coast (33-14) and lost to Mid-Canterbury (17-30), Poverty Bay (6-62) and North Otago (20-29) while Buller beat East Coast (18-7) and lost to Wairarapa-Bush (16-23), North Otago (20-44), Mid-Canterbury (12-32) and Poverty Bay (13-21).
Those results consigned both Wairarapa-Bush and Buller to the Lochore Cup section of the championship and Buller made their way to the semifinals with wins over Horowhenua-Kapiti (23-11) and West Coast (20-11) and a solitary loss to King Country (4-55). The path to the semis for Wairarapa-Bush was, of course, somewhat different as they lost to West Coast (30-35), Horowhenua-Kapiti (17-31) and King Country (22-43) and only gained a semis berth when West Coast was stripped of five competition points for playing an ineligible player against them.
And history shows, of course, that Wairarapa-Bush took full advantage of that reprieve by upsetting King Country 21-17 in their semi in Te Kuiti at the weekend, while Buller also surprised, grabbing their grand finals spot by beating the higher seeded Horowhenua-Kapiti in Levin by 19-14.
Neither Wairarapa-Bush nor Buller have any players in the national Heartland XV named over the weekend for a three-match tour which will see the 24-man squad play New Zealand Marist in Wanganui on November 6, New Zealand Defence Forces in Levin on November 10 and a Parramatta Invitation XV in Sydney on November 13.
