Hornby and Halswell happy in the rain

Press, 4 July 1979, Page 14

Hornby and Halswell happy in the rain

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JOHN COFFEY

The top four teams in the Canterbury rugby league premiership might have been clearly defined at the half-way stage, but happenings at the Show Grounds last Sunday proved that the leading group cannot afford to relax against lower-ranked opposition. It was a drab and cheerless day. but the supporters of Hornby and Halswell soon forgot about the dampness and cold as their clubs achieved quite unexpected victories over Linwood and Addington, respectively. Hornby and Halswell still share last equal position on the points table. However, their wins considerably closed the gap which had opened between them and Kaiapoi and they are no longer certain participants if another premier qualifying competition is held later this winter.

The 10-3 success > enjoyed by Halswell fur- j ther underlined the per- ; plexing progress by Ad- [ dington this year. Adding- s ton was the only team to j beat one of the co-leaders, j Papanui, in the first full i round of the premiership, | yet it has lost to both \ Hornby and Halswell and !' was held to a draw by Kaiapoi. I The strengths of . the Halswell XIII were well ■ geared for wet-weather football. It recovered from the concession of an early \ try to gradually wrest control by means of a solid forward effort, led by Lester Wilson and . David Baxter, and the sound inside back combination of Phil Wool-. .j" house and Phil Prescott. if It has not been an easy i assignment for Halswell to ; justify its promotion to

the premier grade, but its only humiliating losses have been to the powerful Marist-Western Suburbs and Papanui teams. Halswell probably owed its continued retention of its new status to its victory over Hornby in April, and the upsetting of Addington signalled another significant step in its pro-

gress. Equally heartening for the code was the return to prominence of Hornby, which was without Wayne Wallace and Merv Manson because of injuries. Even the loss of Robin Alfeld failed to have any detrimental effect on the side. There were some mitigating circumstances for

Linwood. Rex Dalzell, Paul Truscott. Wally Wilson, Cliff Leney and Lewis Hudson have had a torrid last few weeks with club and representative commitments. Linwood has noticeably faded in the final quarter recently, and having the bve next weekend will be a welcome relief. But Hornby deserved full credit for stemming a Linwood revival, coming from behind twice, and finishing in stunning fashion with three tries as the match neared its end. Mel Tihore, apparently revelling in the added responsibility of captaincy, Steve Bazeley and Stu Wells proved that they were qualified to more than share the honours wit* the formidable Linwood pack. Grant Hallett ran freely on the wing for two more tries — he has eight in the premiership — and Kelvin Kelly and John Payne also gave particularly good service in the backs. Hornby and Halswell will have the opportunity to test their new found confidence against each other next Sunday. The winner will almost certainly move ahead of Kaiapoi — which is drawn against Marist — and Hornby will be keen to reverse the first round loss it suffered to its young neighbouring club.

Not all of the surprises were confined to the No. 2 playing field. Papanui yet again had to regroup its resources to slip ahead of Sydenham, as it had done when narrowly beating Marist and Linwood, when drawing with Eastern Sub-urbs-Hertz, and when nudged out bv only one point in its fixture with Addington.