Footy's tough at the bottom of the top

It's not easy being the newly promoted team in the Southern Districts premier rugby competition but equal measures of optimism and realism could help Otamatea Hawks survive more than a season at the top level.
After being unable to take their place in the premier grade last season due to a lack of players, it seems that, with a week to go before the competition starts, the Hawks have already that first hurdle. Hawks manager Hone Pene said it was touch and go for a while.
"It's been a topsy-turvy start. I'd say a lot of clubs will have been facing the same thing, numbers have been fluctuating, but now we're only a week away from starting numbers have started to strengthen," he said.
The Hawks have benefited from some other rural clubs being unable to raise teams.
"Ruawai have fallen over this year and I've been fortunate in picking up a group of their players and another group from Waimaria, who decided to come and play for us instead of playing for Mangakahia and that's strengthened our numbers," he said.
The extra numbers have shored up the premier reserves but the big problem is always how the premier team copes with the step up in quality from the second division into the first.
"No doubt about it, it's going to be a hard season. We will be the newbies on the block but we're keen to have a crack at it, we're going to get beaten and that's a fact but we have to start somewhere," Pene said.
Some newly promoted clubs have prospered in the premier grade with Mid Western being the most recent example. Others have had to grind out a season or two of defeats before finally reaching the level where they can compete evenly with the rest of the competition. Whangarei Old Boys were closer to the latter model and Pene has talked with the club's coaches about their progress.
"They said if you are really serious about going up you've got to hang in there and if you get thrashed just wipe it out and look towards the next game - so that's what we plan to do," he said.
The team's basic plan is to improve every week to be in a position to cause an upset or two in the second round and then hopefully be good enough to comfortably beat the Division One champions in the promotion-relegation match.
That will be the their "final" and after that they will be hoping to use their experience to move slowly up the ladder next season, attracting a few more recruits as they go.
Pene's mission is get two squads that want to stay together for the whole season - he'll gladly leave the coaching to Walker.
"Justin [is] going to coach to the best of his ability and I'll just go out and get players."