Sideline Sid Sports correspondant & historian www.sunlive.co.nz

With the Baywide rugby competition reaching the business end of the season, over the ditch Sideline Sid looks forward to each Sunday to catch up with the results on SunLive.

With Western Bay having three teams in this weekend's premier semi-finals, there's a real likelihood of the top echelon silverware coming home to the Western Bay of Plenty for the 10th successive season.

Both defending premier title-holders Tauranga Sports and Te Puke Sports – who won back-to-back titles in 2011 and 2012 – know what it takes to lift the Baywide big prize in triumph.

Rotorua representative Whakarewarewa has put a dismal 2013 rugby year behind them to be in the frame to give other contenders a real shake in the post-section title race.

But from the early rounds of the competition, in the balmy days of autumn, my pick to take the current season's premier honours has been Mount Maunganui.

The Mount last won the Baywide premier title in 2005, when former Steamers coach and current New Zealand Women's Sevens mentor Sean Horan coached the green-and-yellow uniformed side.

When the Mount Maunganui XV has been on song this season they've a looked unbeatable. With a solid forward unit up front, the Mount's back line love nothing better than to run the ball from their own goal line, to thrill their myriad of supporters.

The season-long premier title race ensures the clubs must front up to 18 rounds of preliminary rounds, before the top four contest the last two weeks of the season.

Greerton Marist, which made huge strides during the competition to finish just outside the top four, has come a long way since winning promotion from Division One three years ago.

One side which looked like genuine contenders at the end of the first round, in mid-May, was Rotoiti.

The Rotorua lake-sider's fall down the standings has shown injuries and lack of player depth can really take its toll in the season-long contest.

I'd like to wish all of the contenders in the five Baywide divisions success during the next two weeks.

And in the finest traditions of Bay of Plenty club rugby – that stretches back further than a century – I know the victors will celebrate with style and console their beaten opponents with genuine humility.