Graeme Taylor: Back to enjoying some real footie

Well it seems a few weeks since we had some rugby to watch after the end of the Super Rugby season.
So along came Friday night and I secreted myself off to my man cave so I didn't have to endure another episode of Trinny and Suzanne dressing women they described as hour glasses, pears, statues etc.
I thought to myself, great the real rugby is starting again and I thought back to the great ITM Cup matches of last season and I recalled how Hawke's Bay had started slowly and from that time were playing catch up in an effort to make the top echelon of this year's competition.
My immediate thought was, we must start well this year and not be in catch up mode. The condensed season will not give slow starters many opportunities to get ahead of the pack.
Watching the Hawke's Bay- Manawatu game also reminded me how good Saturday afternoon footie is. We had a fine day, dry, firm surface to play on and as a consequence we did not have the unforced errors and poor skill execution that was evident in some of the evening matches over the weekend.
We all know the result of the fixture and those thoughts about a good winning start to the season didn't come to fruition, however I must say I thought it wasn't a bad game. Hawke's Bay started well enough and had the better of the early exchanges and they we able to convert pressure into points through the boot of Horrell. The new boy Forbes was showing plenty of potential with some strong scrummaging and great carries of the ball in broken play.
The game went to halftime and it was shaping up as anybody's game.
The old adage 'the team who scores first after half time" would have suggested Hawke's Bay was on track for a fine win, when Ryan McLeod showed the benefits of good support play, after there had been some great interpassing and straight running.
Again Forbes and Hugh Reed made major contributions in the buildup to the try. His try gave Hawke's Bay the lead 16-11 and at that time they held the advantage. However, Manawatu obviously got the message their tickets to the 125th celebrations were going to be cancelled if they didn't win the game and they produced a splendid try to Tomasi Cama. All the Manawatu outside backs combining at great pace to produce the try.
Hawke's Bay responded and Sinoti Sinoti's try was a great demonstration of players coming in support of the ball carrier from positions of depth, bursting onto the ball at speed and using the ball to beat the man. Unfortunately we do not see enough of this simple formula in current rugby. At this point in time I was comfortably sitting thinking a Bay victory, but again Manawatu bounced back and eventually scored two good tries to cement their win and provide a suitable backdrop to the 125th anniversary celebrations. Hawke's Bay have to quickly regroup and prepare to meet Southland who also were first round loses. A vital game in the context of this provincial season.
On a bright note, at the end of the weekend, I couldn't help thinking how well endowed NZ rugby is with first five eighths. Obviously Aaron Cruden was the difference between the two teams in the game that mattered to us but Anscombe for Auckland, Lima Sopoanga and Michael Hobbs for Wellington, this kid from Southland and of course Carter and Slade.
It will be interesting to see who emerges over the next few years to be the main man at RWC 2015 in England. Well that's looking a bit too far ahead, so let's just get down to the park tomorrow night and support our boys.