Promising Heartland draw for Wairarapa-Bush

Wairarapa-Bush no 8 So'otala Fa'aso'o scores against South Canterbury at Memorial Park, Masterton in last year's Heartland match. Photo / Chris Kilford

Wairarapa-Bush head coach Josh Syms has no complaints with his team's draw for the 2016 Heartland rugby championship, and it's easy to understand why.

Each team in this 12-team competition plays eight pool games which means there are three unions they don't have to play there and Wairarapa-Bush have drawn the lucky marble, missing both last year's Meads Cup finalists, South Canterbury and Wanganui, as well as West Coast.

South Canterbury beat Wairarapa-Bush 25-21 in the Meads Cup semis last year after having beaten them 35-26 in pool play while Wanganui and Wairarapa-Bush met in the last round of pool matches with Wanganui winning a high-scoring fixture 57-35. West Coast beat Wairarapa-Bush 36-33.

Three of the four home games Wairarapa-Bush have in this year's competition are against teams they defeated in 2015, Thames Valley, Buller and East Coast, and the fourth is against King Country, who they were not drawn against last year.

The King Country clash on August 27 will open their 2016 campaign and will kick off at 2.30pm as will the encounter with Buller on October 1.

There will, however, be a later kick-off for the games against Thames Valley on September 17 and East Coast on October 15, both will be played under lights, starting at 6pm.

Neither team will have home advantage when Horowhenua-Kapiti and Wairarapa-Bush do battle in their pool match on September 2.

It will be at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington with a 3.05pm start and will be televised live by Sky Sport.

The other three away pool games for Wairarapa-Bush are against Mid-Canterbury in Ashburton on September 10, North Otago in Oamaru on September 24 and Poverty Bay in Gisborne on October 7.

Wairarapa-Bush did not play Mid-Canterbury or Poverty Bay in the Heartland competition last year and lost narrowly 16-18 to North Otago.

Nobody understands better than Josh Syms the danger of basing this year's prospects on last year's results because teams can change radically in terms of playing resources from season to season but he sees the 2016 draw as looking to be "more favourable than unfavourable".

"On paper we have come out of it okay but like everybody knows it will all come down to how well we prepare and how well we play," he said.

Syms is of the view, however, that to achieve their initial objective of the Meads Cup semis for the second season running, Wairarapa-Bush will very probably have to do better in pool play than they did then when they made the top four by edging out Horowhenua-Kapiti for the fourth spot on countback.

"You'd usually expect to win five, even maybe six, games to make the Meads Cup semis and I have a feeling that could be the case this year," he said.