Whangaruru happy to be playing

TAKING PART: Players like Whangaruru fullback Recee Le Varason will be allowed to take part in the 2016 Southern Districts Division One competition.PHOTO/FILE

THE Whangaruru Rugby Football Club has been handed a lifeline to continue playing rugby in a Northland Rugby Union-administered competition next year.

However, the ongoing participation of Whangaruru relies heavily on the club's willingness and ability to change its attitude and, more importantly, aims to keep its strong associations with the notorious Head Hunters gang away from the playing field.

The lifeline follows the release of the findings of an independent investigation into the breakdown of the Southern Districts Division Two competition (recently renamed the Districts Division One competition) this season, after several clubs refused to play Whangaruru because of the club's Head Hunter ties. The NRU asked rugby league legend Graham Lowe and Quay Chambers' barrister Alan Webb to conduct the review.

"I'm just happy that we're able to keep playing rugby, that's the main thing," Whangaruru coach Hepi Haika said of the outcomes of the review.

The Northland Rugby Union (NRU), which has acknowledged a lack of leadership around the governance of the competition, is resolute it can facilitate the needs of the nine clubs in the newly-coined Southern Districts Division One competition.

"Effectively it has been a breakdown in communication that we need to take a fair bit of criticism for," NRU chief executive Jeremy Parkinson said.

The NRU signed off on the future of the competition for the 2016 season in a meeting with its nine clubs on Monday.

It has agreed to provide more support in the areas of judiciary, continual monitoring of the competition, delegation, as well as bolstering the quality of referees officiating matches and banning gang insignia from clubrooms - all of which are recommendations consistent with the review's findings.

"When these issues did happen there was no proper forum and channels for them to air their concerns," Parkinson admitted. "We've taken everything on board, we're going to show some more leadership. The more people sitting in the room to share their thoughts, the better it's going to be."

Going without a game for a good portion of the 2015 season, Haika said Whangaruru lost several players to rugby league as a result of games being boycotted. Despite this, he's content with the outcomes presented to the clubs.

"We're all happy with the result that we came to in the end," Haika said.

"If they [the clubs and NRU] would have brought that to my attention before it blew up the way it did, we might have been able to nullify it. [But] we'll see how we go next year, I'm sure it will go pretty well."

Haika added that the three Head Hunters gang members playing in his team feel much the same. "They're happy about it, all they want to do is play rugby because they're good rugby players. The three guys that play for me are the top players in my team."

Intent on stubbing out future violence both on the field and off it Parkinson confirmed Whangaruru has agreed to actively engage in tidying up their act.

"We want to work with Whangaruru so they can have rugby in their community. They have identified some challenges in their community which they're willing to address as well. An outcome through the process of the review is they're now aware of the allegations that were against them... it's up to them to address them and they've said that they will do that.

"What we're saying is we want all clubs to work with their communities to encourage good behaviour. Sideline behaviour is a big concern across all codes throughout the whole country, not just in Northland. It's up to the NRU to work with clubs to encourage positive sideline behaviour [and] keep people behind the ropes."