Rangiuru's Leah Wilson makes a break against Whakarewarewa. Photo / George Novak
Rangiuru's Leah Wilson makes a break against Whakarewarewa. Photo / George Novak
With just four teams in the Baywide Premier Women's Championship this year, semifinals spots are a given.
However, there is still plenty to play for in the round-robin as the competition is so evenly contested, whichever teams can secure home semifinals will have a massive advantage going into the knockoutrounds.
Having both picked up wins in the first match of the second round the weekend prior, Whakarewarewa and Rangiuru met in Te Puke on Sunday in what turned out to be an epic encounter.
The two sides met in the first game of the season in April and a buzzer-beating try from Whakarewarewa saw the game finish tied up at 20-all.
On Sunday, it was a much more open affair as Whakarewarewa dominated the first half and took a 20-7 lead. However, the home side Rangiuru turned things around in the second half, scoring 32 unanswered points to claim a 39-20 win.
Whakarewarewa had all the possession and territory in the opening stages of the game and it was not long before star fullback Autumn-Rain Stephens sliced through a gap from 20m out and reached out to score in the tackle.
Rangiuru hit back with a penalty try after Helena Coughlan was tackled high going for the line.
Whakarewarewa came back strongly with tries to Natalie Walford, Stephens and Kaci James to lead 20-7 at halftime.
Whatever was spoken about in the Rangiuru halftime team talk worked because they looked like a different team in the second half. Five minutes in they had a player advantage too as Walford was sin binned for a high tackle.
Rangiuru's Anahera Mohi scored from the resulting penalty. Her teammate Myracle Monga scored shortly afterwards before Mohi ran in for her second and the home side led 24-20.
Walford came back from the sin bin but the damage was done as Rangiuru ran in three more tries to secure a comfortable bonus point win and put one hand on a home semifinal.
Whakarewarewa halfback Polly Playle fires the ball from the back of a ruck. Photo / George Novak
Rangiuru captain Christie Yule said her side did not start the game well but the way they came back would give them renewed belief moving forward.
"I'm not going to lie, it was all them in the first half and we needed to pull finger and show a bit of attitude, heart and work ethic out there. Luckily, we were able to do that in the second half.
"It was just a matter of flicking that switch and I guess that's something we'll take forward going into future games because we need to be able to do that right from the get-go. Everyone will learn something from that and that's credit to a team if they can learn from it and not let it happen next time."
I'm not going to lie, it was all them in the first half and we needed to pull finger and show a bit of attitude, heart and work ethic out there.
Despite the loss, Whakarewarewa coach Ron James saw plenty of positives, his side's first half performance was some of the best rugby they've played all season.
"I think we're starting to get back to how we started the season. We've had quite a few injuries and illness and that took it's toll midway through the season.
"Today we started that first 40 minutes and showed what we're capable of. The thing was we had girls who hadn't played for six to eight weeks and that showed in the second half. The sin bin really cost us too but everywhere else we were right on top of them."
The key now was to continue building aiming for the perfect performance come semifinal time.
"We're using these games as stepping stones, we didn't get the win but we took a point away from it. We've got Rangataua at home next week and I fully expect us to be a lot better," James said.
