Eastern, Marist to meet again

Press, 9 April 1980, Page 36

Eastern, Marist to meet again

The 1979 championship grand finalists, Eastern Sub-urbs-Hertz and Marist-West-ern Suburbs, will be seeking to re-establish their reputation when the N.Z.I.G. rugby league premiership begins at the Show Grounds this evening. Eastern and Marist were seeded in. opposite halves of the Qantas-Radio Avon knock out tournament last month and were firm favourites to meet in the final. However, they were among the. casualties in a series of upsets which have added increased

interest to the premiership. It was perhaps understandable that Eastern, buffeted by

off-season losses of prominent players, should lose narrowly to a Sydenham side which had already had one competitive match. Marist, on the other hand, has an unchanged squad, but fell from the heights of a big win over Addington to lose to Linwppd-and then Sydenham in the.play-off for third

and fourth. The late 1970 s were sue-J

cessful years for Eastern and its only loss to Marist in their last 14 meetings was in

The 1978 minor semi-final-Eastern was dominant in the grand final last season, opening a 26-13 margin, but has since had to find replacements for half of its playersMarist is inevitably the enigma of the competition. So often it has begun a club programme with a rush, only to falter at vital times. On this occasion, without having to reach an early peak for a national Easter tournament commitment, it might be at

its best when the occasion demands. There will be a number of

interiguing individual tussles tonight none more so than that around the base of the scrummage. Eastern’s halves, Murray French and Peter Klink, made their debuts for Canterbury A last week-end-and they will be marked by the Canterbury B pair, Wayne O’Donnell and John MacGougan.