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Sideline Sid Sports correspondant & historian www.sunlive.co.nz |
Just when the local cricket season is coming to the business end of the season, someone said to me that Super Rugby had kicked off last weekend.
Sideline Sid was brought up on a diet of cricket in the summer and a rugby season that ran from around Easter to mid August.
To understand the new Super Rugby competition, one needs to have the intelligence of a rocket scientist or nuclear physicist.
How can you play in a competition where you don't meet all the other teams and then call it the Southern Hemisphere championship, is beyond me.
In my book, Super Rugby is an artificial competition with little regional pride, that pays many of its players wheel barrow loads of money.
Enough of my talking on a soap box and back to local cricket. This Saturday sees the Baywide T20 title decided at Blake Park.
Otumoetai Cadets are likely to have another classic Bay of Plenty inter-city battle, with defending champions Rotorua Central in the title decider.
On the adjacent Bay Oval, the Bay of Plenty senior men's team will put their Fergus Hickey Rosebowl season unbeaten record on the line against Poverty Bay in a two day match.
Success for Bay of Plenty against the competition minnows will give the Bay boys the ND trophy for the 15th time.
With the majority of the Bay first eleven drawn from the five Western Bay of Plenty premier clubs, there could be plenty of celebrating in town on Sunday night.
Still to come on the local cricket scene in March is the Williams Cup grand final, which will be fought out by Mount Maunganui, Cadets, Te Puke and Greerton, who all qualified for the playoffs last weekend.
Also on the line are the Western Bay Reserve and B Grade trophies. Western Bay grade cricket plays a big part in the Bay of Plenty Cricket pathway, with the majority of the regions professional players having started out in Western Bay grade cricket as youngsters eager to learn their craft.
There will be a seamless transition between local rugby and cricket this year, with the cricket halting for the annual winter break one week and rugby kicking off the following weekend at Easter.
Baywide rugby has gone full circle in less than a decade, with recent revamps dumped for a revival of the Baywide three division competition.
Sideline Sid welcomes the return season long three division competition. The club rugby year starts with two divisions of 12 teams, who split into competitions of eight, for the championship rounds.
The major advantage is that teams find their level in the championship rounds with few one sided battles that took place in Baywide rugby last season.
Automatic promotion-relegation adds an extra edge to the title races.
Theoretically, a team can win their way into Baywide rugby from regional competition and play with the big boys in the premier division in two seasons. However, it can also cause imbalance, where the top echelon is dominated by sides from one region of the Bay of Plenty.
The answer for teams who seek premier status is strong club administration that sets in place long term planning to achieve the clubs goals.
Maybe the way forward for such as the Eastern Bay one team clubs is the dreaded word of amalgamation.
The success of Tauranga Sports in Baywide premier rugby, since their first title in 1999, was primarily achieved by the amalgamation of two Tauranga City clubs nearly three decades ago.