Utiku gone and Premier rugby postponed

The Blue & White hoops of the Utiku rugby club will not be seen in Premier rugby this year, with the entire competition delayed for another week to accommodate their absence.

Tasman Tanning Premier rugby has had a false start as the WRFU has opted to cancel today's opening round and start all over again next weekend after Utiku Old Boys have been withdrawn for the season.

At the 11th hour of 7pm on Thursday, WRFU development officer Paul Kenny said Utiku informed them they just did not have the numbers to play Black Bull Liquor Pirates at Spriggens Park this afternoon.

Already trying to go ahead without a Senior team underneath Premier, there was a brief consideration for Utiku to drop down and play in the lower grade, but now the Blue & White hoops will not be seen at all in 2018.

Kenny said yesterday morning the loss of Utiku had thrown the entire nine-team draw into disarray, forcing them to consider introducing the dreaded "double bye" where the team already getting a weekend off doesn't play and neither does the side scheduled to face Utiku.

This format, which often sees teams play only once in three weekends, was universally panned in 2015 when Marton were also a late withdrawal from Premier, and Kenny said the WRFU operations committee were looking at all the alternatives.

"Whether we do a re-allocation of the Prems, or what we do."

Yet by late afternoon, Kenny said with no clear assurances from Utiku about having a full squad, the union has decided to abandon the first weekend of Premier rugby and re-do the draw as an eight-team competition.

"They were too humming and harring, we had to make a decision.

"It's been a nightmare. There was talk of amalgamation when Utiku met with Taihape a few weeks ago, but they [Utiku] were 50-50 on it."

Suddenly, with an extra four weekends due to having only eight teams, Premier will now have four breaks – today, Anzac Day weekend, a gap week between the end of Round 1 and start of Round 2, and Queens Birthday weekend, which will host the annual Town vs Country representative trial.

The Senior competiton, consisting of 10 teams, will continue as normal and starts today, leading into the semifinals for both grades on July 14.

Having lost their competition matches this afternoon, a number of Premier teams have decided to face each other today in "preseason" fixtures.

It is a sad state of affairs for Utiku to be without rugby, the club having been established in 1949 and in their modern format consisting of two adult teams until 2017.

Utiku club president Luke Bird did not wish to comment about the meeting to discuss amalgamation with the Taihape club.

Bird said the Premier team, under second-year coach and stalwart club player Matt Gilbert, had only failed muster in the week before kickoff.

"We had a full squad in preseason, and then seven said they couldn't turn up.

"Our prop got injured and we were skinny in the front row anyway.

"We haven't given it away yet, we're still not sure."

The club often augmented their lineup with players coming down from Waiouru, but Bird said this year those players were "hit and miss" whether they would turn up.

Utiku had worked hard in recent years to lift their small Taihape-based club up the ladder of the Premier competition, most notably in arranging for talented Fijians and future Steelform Wanganui representatives Samu Kubunavanua, Michael Nabuliwaqa and Malakai Volou to come over on work visas.

It made the team competitive to the point of winning the 2015 Premier consolation trophy.

However, all three players left to join the new Settler's Honey Ngamatapouri club in 2016, with Utiku going right back to the lower end of the points table and struggling for numbers going forward, which included losing their Senior team early into the 2017 season.

It is understood several of the remaining players who wish to continue playing will now link up with neighbouring team PGG Wrightson/Balance Taihape, which will help alleviate their own personnel issues.

As today will only see Senior rugby games played, there will be no gate charge for Spriggens Park to watch Pirates play Marist Buffalos.