WHAT'S that line about how no press is bad press?
Your Chronicle sports editor received a rather bemusing request this week in the fallout of Steelform Wanganui being beaten at the last gasp by Mid Canterbury at Cooks Gardens.
Not everyone was happy with the Monday morning writeup of the match, which pointed out some key errors made at critical moments by certain Wanganui players.
Yet for the second week in a row a large lead was run down in the final quarter and this time, there was enough time, for the opposition to just barely pull themselves over the line - literally.
It may seem cruel to point out the shortcomings when the game was so nearly won.
But "nearly" and "actually" come at different parts of the dictionary and they have very different meanings.
Another individual it seemed prudent to spotlight was referee Alistair Payne, who stamped his not insignificant mark on proceedings with a 16-5 penalty count against Wanganui, while sinbinning both lock Sam Madams and prop Kamipeli Latu.
Talking with Madams after the game, he explained a Mid Canterbury player was deliberately lying all over the ball with Wanganui hot on attack and when the big fella introduced his boot into proceedings to clear it out, he found himself meeting the southerner's fists.
Anyone who has followed Wanganui rugby will appreciate "Loaf", as he is affectionately known, has only one default response to such a challenge and diplomacy ain't it.
Photographer Neil Jones snapped a picture worth a thousand words as Payne chose to just send Madams alone on his way from the kerfuffle.
So imagine the surprise when an email from the man himself arrived in the inbox on Tuesday.
Just wondering if you could send through that photo from the back page, Payne inquired.
It was a good action shot and any others of the referee in action would be appreciated.
They're going in the personal scrap book, the official explained.
I could just about detect an audible groan from Wanganui coach Jason Caskey when I told him about it on the phone on Thursday.
Payne offered to pay for said picture but I hope Wanganui fans will forgive me for sending him an electronic copy, free of charge.
It just seemed prudent to leave Payne with a favourable impression of the town and it's people.
After all, with three home games at Cooks Gardens remaining plus possible playoff fixtures, you never know when our favourite whistleblower might come this way again.
For the record, Payne was named the 2015 Francis Trophy winner for the best premier grade referee by the Wairarapa-Bush Rugby Referees Association, and also received the Ross Andrew Cup for top marks in law examination.
BY PRESS time or later on today it should be clear if Australia's great rugby league export Jarryd Hayne has completed the most remarkable transition in modern football and become a fulltime member of the San Francisco 49ers organisation.
The 27-year-old received a lot of raised eyebrows, through to out-and-out scoffs, in October last year when he announced he was turning down an offer of A$1.35million per year - around 20 per cent of a team's salary cap - to leave the Parramatta Eels and follow his dream of playing in the National Football League.
There was no way, detractors claimed, the talented two-time NRL player of the year would adjust to the gideon code with its complex drills and intricate patterns.
"No way" took the highway after just three preseason games as Hayne has proved that the fundamentals of league - explosive speed, evasive turn of direction, and the apparent lost art form of the fend (which the Americans call a "stiff arm") can be transferred if a player harnesses his natural gifts.
Australian and New Zealand league fans have to be grinning at the online reports coming out of California, where Hayne is being hailed as the second coming with his manoeuvres.
Evidently the Americans think a player who actually changes the ball from one hand to another so he can sweep aside his tackler, as opposed to, you know, just running hard and hoping for the best, is an innovator.
They marvelled when he didn't let a bouncing kick go past him so his team could just take it back to the 20 yard line and instead snatched it to run back an extra eight yards. Apparently that was a shocking gamble.
And when he lowered his shoulder so a defender crashed off him backwards, Hayne revealed himself as a titan of courageous strength.
They do know he spent nearly 10 years at the top of a code without shoulder pads and crash helmets, right?
Hayne probably feels snug as a bug when he takes the field these days, compared to a dusty April afternoon facing the Bulldogs or the Roosters forwards.
NFL commentary great John Madden was in no doubt the 49ers have to keep the high-profile Aussie now, given he has gone from a novelty act to being the talk of the entire NFL preseason.
Under the contract system in the United States, if the 49ers decided they would rather Hayne spend another season with their practice squad to keep drilling the fundamentals, they must first release him on to the open player market, and may only take him back if no other franchise expresses an interest.
From the way that Twitter and ESPN are "blowing up" about this guy, a lack of interest is just not going to happen.
Use him, or lose him.