Rugby finals across the Bay, and the Pacific

YMP captain Leon McEnteer holds aloft the Ron Parker Memorial Cup after a Hawke's Bay Division 3 rugby championships 48-24 win over Flaxmere in an historic first home final for YMP at Raupunga on Saturday. Photo / Doug Laing

The dreams of a tiny Hawke's Bay rugby club stretched out into the Pacific on Saturday on a provincial club finals day that already had possibly its biggest ever reach - the 190km from Porangahau in the south to Raupunga in the north.

On an historical day at Raupunga, local side YMP, which has at times had to rely on granddads and grandsons to make up the numbers and hasn't trained since daylight-saving ended at the start of April because it has no lights, won its second successive Hawke's Bay third division title with a new mix of Fijian footballers who work in the Mohaka Forest.

The seven players made a five-try contribution in YMP's 48-24 over Flaxmere to retain the Ron Parker Memorial Cup in the first club rugby final ever played in Raupunga.

The 2016 final scheduled for Raupunga between the same two sides was abandoned and awarded to top qualifiers YMP after Flaxmere was unable to get to the match firstly because the road was closed by a storm, and secondly because there was no other suitable date for the team to travel again.

YMP also retained third division challenge trophy the Sachs Johnston Shield, and but for missing out on some games because of visiting teams' defaults - six, they counted - might have also repeated a 2016 clean sweep which also included being first round champions.

On the day, with new Hawke's Bay union board member and former Magpies manager Mark Sowman on hand to present the trophy afterwards, YMP bolted to a 26-0 lead after 29 minutes, but after losing centre Wiremu Shelford to injury conceded two converted tries before a reshuffle in the backline someone reckoned might even be tried at "practice" some time.

The second half, McEnteer said, was about retaining the ball, and "sparking the boys up again" after Flaxmere got to within nine points inside the last quarter. The ability to retain the ball was highlighted by some of the tries, three of which went to wing Eferemo Davoba.

With the sudden increase in player numbers, albeit small, YMP is now considering the previously thought impossible, "going-up" to the second division, hopefully without having to rely on its youngest followers to pull on the green and white strip each weekend.

The "coach," Guy Taylor, said there weren't any of the young teenagers in the side on Saturday, but added: "A lot of those guys were 15 when they started."

He and captain Leon McEnteer, a former Napier Pirates player who captained that club to two Hawke's Bay rugby league titles, see the step-up required to play the higher grade, which involves much greater travel, and more training.

"But we're going to need some lights," said McEnteer, pointing to the single pole which once constituted floodlights out in grassroots rugby.

It was green also in the south where both home side Porangahau and Otane wore the colour in a second division final Otane won 12-5, and at Napier's McLean Park where Napier Old Boys Marist retained the Maddison Trophy as Premier champions with a 31-26 win over Clive. Green was however on the receiving end in the Premier Reserve grade final in which Taradale beat Napier OBM 26-14, and in the Colts final in which Central Hawke's Bay side Onga Tiko beat Hastings Rugby and Sports 34-11.