Gladstone continued to make the pace in the premier club rugby division series after a hard-fought 12-5 win over Pioneer.
Pioneer actually opened the scoring when Tommy Harmon scored a good try butthe remainder of the scoring action came from the boot of Gladstone first-five Ngatai Walker, who landed four penalty
goals.
The fact that Pioneer came away with one bonus point was deserved as they contested keenly in all departments until the last 15 minutes or so when the Gladstone forwards took a semblance of control.
Interestingly enough it was the entry into the game of young Gladstone prop Jacob Ross which seemingly made the biggest difference to the end result as he was rock-like at scrum time and an energetic worker in all other phases of the tight forward game.
Another player who considerably assisted the Gladstone cause when he came off the reserve bench was halfback James Bruce, whose astute reading of the game from a tactical viewpoint was immediately obvious.
Pioneer might have been on the losing end but they were competitive up front and dangerous enough when running the ball through their backs to suggest they are still serious contenders for the premier division title.
Not only Gladstone relied largely on penalty kicks for their win on Saturday, Carterton did likewise in their 19-3 beating of defending champions Eketahuna.
Carterton's Reuben Daysh scored the only try of the match with the rest of the his team's points coming from the boot of fullback Jono Hurley, who was successful with four penalties and one conversion. And Eketahuna's only points came from a penalty as well.
Marist though did manage a couple of tries - to Daryl Pollock and Phil Aporo- in their 20-11 win over Greytown-Tuhirangi, a victory which kept Marist's hopes of a premier division title alive but which virtually ended Greytown-Tuhirangi's dreams in that regard. The latter did score a try through Mike Hansen but while their forwards were typically industrious their backs lacked the spark of their Marist counterparts.
Points are: Gladstone 43, Carterton 41, Pioneer 38, Eketahuna 37, Marist 37 and Greytown-Tuhirangi 31.
