NPC Rugby: Magpies work on defence in bid to roll North Harbour

Tom Parsons leads the Magpies out against Waikato for a Ranfurly Shield defence in 2021. Defence, of a different sort, will be big factor on Saturday night's game against North Harbour. Photo / NZME

There’s no ‘D’ in Tom Parsons, captain, but there’ll be a big emphasis on the ‘D’ as he leads the Hawke’s Bay when they face North Harbour in the teams’ opening 2023 Bunnings NPC match on Saturday evening at McLean Park, Napier.

With a squad put together by new head coach Brock James containing a number of players who have grown in the black-and-white hoops and gone into Super Rugby, the 33-year-old skipper and lock, who has more than 100 appearances in first class rugby to his name says some good combinations have been established.

But the last two weeks before an eagerly-anticipated Premiership kick-off have seen the Magpies conceding more than 30 points in each of two warm-up matches in Taupo, against Auckland on July 23 and then Waikato last Friday, showing what may happen when the big D, for defence, isn’t quite working the way it should.

The NPC is a “fun” competition, says Parsons, and it will be even more fun if the bit of frailty on defence is cleared-up on the day.

“Pre-season the boys have been working really hard, but against Auckland we weren’t too happy in the first half, leaking in defence around the edges,” he said, but the side has worked on that.

They were similarly exposed to a degree 12 months ago when, also at McLean Park, North Harbour went within a few minutes of ending the Hawke’s Bay Ranfurly Shield reign – something Wellington managed to do three weeks later.

It was only a 76th minute try to Magpies hooker Kianu Kereru-Symes that saved the day for his side to win 25-23, but it was day when North Harbour wing Tevita Li scored three tries, the third sparked from deep in Harbour territory by rising star and fullback Shaun Stevenson.

Stevenson, of course, won’t be around this time – making his All Blacks debut a few hours earlier, in Auckland, but back again for the Magpies will be such players as Parsons, who first played for Hawke’s Bay in 2021, and 2023 match tryscorers Kianu Kereru-Symes and Chase Tiatia.

The next-most recent match between the two was in 2020 when North Harbour had a 46-10 home win, two weeks after the Magpiesfirst win over Canterbury in almost 40 years 20-19.

It was against Canterbury in Christchurch in 2017 that Parsons first captained the Magpies, in the absence of regular skipper Ash Dixon, a situation which was to repeat in 2021 when the Bay beat Canterbury again.

Parsons, who grew up on an Ashcott farm near Waipukurau, is now the established leader, showing the promise had back in the day at Lindisfarne College, when he captained the school’s first XV on a trip to the UK.

There are not a lot of his earlier teammates around in the game, but he’s enjoyed working the latest crop coming through, such as prop Pouria Rakete-Stones and Hastings Boys’ High School products Kereru-Symes, halfback Folau Fakatava and first five-eighths Lincoln McClutchie, all of whom will be on the park on Saturday evening.

But he’s also been part of a rural rugby revival of sorts, with he, locking partner Frank Lochore, prop Joel Hintz and fullback and New Zealand Under 20 player Harry Godfrey, having played all their senior rugby in Hawke’s Bay for Waipukurau-based Central.

Separately, the Hawke’s Bay Tui women’s team head to Lower Hutt to play Wellington on Sunday, having beaten Auckland three weeks ago and being beaten just 14-10 last Saturday by Waikato.

A significant number of potential NPC stars will also be playing at Elwood Park, Hastings, on Saturday in Te Tini, a six-team tournament with Maori representative teams from Wellington to Poverty Bay, with games from 10am and a final at 3pm.

The Hawke’s Bay-North Harbour match on Saturday starts at 5.05pm, and the Magpies team is: Pouri Rakete-Stones, Kianu Kereru-Symes, Joel Hintz; Frank Lochore, Tom Parsons (captain); Marino Mikaele Tu’u, Josh Kaifa, Devan Flanders, Folau Fakatava, Lincoln McClutchie, Jonah Lowe, Chase Tiatia, Ollie Sapsford, Lolagi Visinia, Harry Godfrey. Subs: Jacob Devery, Tim Farrell, Isaac Salmon, Hunter Morrison, Sam Smith, Brad Weber, Nick Grigg, Caleb Makene.