Linwood faces bleak prospect in league

Press, 26 September 1988, Page 28

Linwood faces bleak prospect in league

By

JOHN COFFEY

Linwood faces the bleak prospect of relegation to the Canterbury rugby league premier reserve grade next season.

An 18-16 victory to Sydenham over Kaiapoi at the Addington Show Grounds on Saturday consigned Linwood to its fate.

AH three clubs returned matching results of two wins and one loss during the pro-motion-relegation series, the junior club, Woolston, being outclassed.

When it came to separating the tied trio Sydenham did best with a scoring percentage of 291. Kaiapoi (172 per cent) nudged out Linwood (159 per cent) for the final place in the eight-team 1989 premiership. It will be only the fifth winter since premier (formerly senior) rugby league began in Canterbury in 1913 that Linwood has been missing. There was no competition in 1916, and Linwood lost its senior status between 1927 and 1929. Linwood can look to its own failure to beat Kaiapoi and its poor second half against Woolston for the cause of the sad ending to its seventy-fifth anniversary season. The regular players had responded well over the second round of the premiership, only to be discarded for the promotion-relegation fix-

tures. But the relief in the Sydenham dressing room and the jubilation of the Kaiapoi camp testified to the closeness of Saturday’s contest. A knee injury cost Sydenham the services of Esene Faimalo at halftime, and its supporters saw a comfortable 18-8 lead whittled away by Kaiapoi after the resumption. Both teams lost valuable points through fumbles, and Sydenham had to defend desperately over the last few minutes to prevent the points which would have dropped it to the premier reserve division. Tony Taase’s second try for Sydenham just before the interval had pushed Kaiapoi’s scoring percentage below that of Linwood. That order was reversed when the Kaiapoi hooker, Rick Watson, ran 40 metres to score and Bryce Dryden kicked the conversion with 30 minutes left. Dryden was the player most responsible for keeping Kaiapoi in premier football. He twice retrieved his own kicks for his first-half try and he missed only one of his five goal-kicking opportunities. Dryden also tackled well on cover-defence duties. The “man of the match”

award went to Glen Cummins for a second consecutive appearance. Cummins had another strong game from prop, Peter Kaisa and Senare Tia 'Tia being other forwards to impress. Apart from his try-scoring run, Watson gave Kaiapoi plenty of possession from the second-half scrums, three times gaining possession against the feed. Having so much ball, combined with a strong back wind and Sydenham’s loss of Faimalo, greatly assisted Kaiapoi to achieve its territorial domination over the last vital 40 minutes. One of the objectives of the promotion-relegation format is to retain sustained interest from all clubs to the end of every season. It certainly achieved that on Saturday. Sydenham 18 (Tony Taase two, Phil Cropper tries; Kelvin Williams three goals) beat Kaiapoi 16 (Bryce Dryden, Rick Watson tries; Dryden four goals). Halftime, 18-8. Scrums, Kaiapoi 13-9. Penalties, Kaiapoi 4-2. Referee, Mr Ken Blackler.

Final points:A Pt % W L F Syd 2 1 108 37 4 291 Kaia 2 1 74 43 4 172 159 Lin 2 1 70 44 4 Wool 0 4 24 152 0 15