LEAGUE - Big guns in battle to stay at top

Takahiwai Warriors and Kaikohe Lions face off tomorrow to see who will join Portland Panthers on the top of the Whangarei and Districts Rugby League table.
The three teams are sitting on 10 points, but Portland have the bye to recover from their bruising 28-22 win over Ngawha last week.
Kaikohe will be without inform stand-off Tuffy Munro, who is unavailable through family commitments, and assistant coach Dion Akuhata said the Lions will be missing a few other senior players.
"We'll definitely be under-strength with a number of our players still carrying injuries from last weekend against the Bay Slayers. We've still got plenty of numbers to select from, but we're concerned that a few of our key players could be out," he said.
"We'll certainly be up against it because it's a fortress out at Takahiwai, we haven't won out there in a long time, so we'll be looking to break that hoodoo."
Takahiwai coach Mark Freeman said his team are looking forward to the clash.
"We're reasonably happy with our progress this year, we haven't really settled on a top side yet and we're still trying to get our patterns and our defence right before the second round," he said.
Takahiwai always pull a decent crowd to the ground, but what surely would have been the biggest crowd-puller of the round: The match between the Hikurangi Stags and the Ngawha Saints, will once again be watched by a handful of people at the Ngawha Prison.
Both teams have had this clash on their radar for a while now and will be well-prepared for the match.
"Portland didn't do us any favours by beating them last week and they'll certainly be ready for us on Saturday," Stags player-coach Joe Rau said.
Rau said the team had been relying on some of their under-18 players over the last couple of games to get a full squad on the park, but he was hopeful some of their senior players would return from injury in time for tomorrow's important match.
With all of the top-of-the-table action, there is another vital encounter to be played out this weekend as the Bay Slayers host the Northern Wairoa Bulls.
Both teams are propping up the league table and are expecting their first win of the season.
And the two teams have caused the more fancied teams some scares and it seems just a matter of time until they claim some major scalps.
In the remaining match of the round Marist Brothers will test their progress against Moerewa Tigers, a team who have been good at home this season, but have yet to win a match on the road.