Tantrum wants repeat play

Wairarapa-Bush rugby coach Kelvin Tantrum wants more of the same when his team plays Buller in the Lochore Cup Heartland championship grand final at Victoria Square, Westport this Saturday.
Delighted at the manner in which his team stuck rigidly to their game plan in the upset 21-17 win over King Country in their semifinal in Te Kuiti at the weekend, Tantrum has nothing different in mind for the competition decider.
"Quite honestly we've been aiming to play the same game plan week after week but we've only actually managed it a couple of times," Tantrum said. "The semifinal showed what can happen when we stick at it for the full 80 minutes, do that again and there's no reason why we shouldn't get another good result."
Tantrum readily concedes there is nothing special about the game plan either, rather it is a case of focusing on playing what he calls "simple, basic rugby" with the forwards and backs complementing each other.
"You don't need to be a genius to understand what we are trying to do, it's all about the forwards establishing control and the backs making good decisions about what they do with the ball when it comes their way," he said. "And defensively we need to be tight, we have to keep mistakes to an absolute minimum."
The only time Wairarapa-Bush and Buller have met this season was at the start of the 2010 Heartland championship with Wairarapa-Bush travelling to Westport and coming away with a hard-fought 23-16 victory.
Tantrum recalls Buller as playing a similar style of rugby to his own team with the forwards being rugged and uncompromising in the battle for possession and particularly effective when allowed to work up a full head of steam. "They have a couple of very good ball runners in their pack and from what we saw a lot of their attacking play revolves around them," he said.
Tantrum says the fact the Lochore Cup will be at stake in the final will "very definitely" be an incentive for his squad to make a strong showing.
It will be the first time they have played for this particular trophy, which is named in honour of Wairarapa's Sir Brian Lochore, a legendary figure in not only local circles but throughout the rugby world. Expectations are that Sir Brian will be in Westport for the after-match presentation ceremony and Tantrum says it would be a "real thrill" for the whole squad to see Joe Harwood shaking hands with him as the winning captain.
Another "first" for many of the Wairarapa-Bush line-up is that they will be playing in a match with live television coverage. It will be broadcast on Sky Sport One and the Rugby Channel with the kick-off being at the earlier-than-usual time of 1.05pm so that the Meads Cup grand final between North Otago and Wanganui in Oamaru can also be shown live later in the afternoon.
Tantrum and assistant coach Neil Foote won't settle on their starting line-up for the Westport trip until the knocks and bruises suffered in the semifinal success over King Country are assessed but, all things being equal, Tantrum doesn't envisage any changes being made from the side which initially took the field in Te Kuiti.
"Frankly, everything went so well there it wouldn't really make sense to make any changes," he said. "We do have a couple of players who right now are a little bit doubtful but I'd be surprised if they aren't up and running by the next couple of days."
Asked if there had been any talk of some of the more experienced players in his squad calling it a day on their representative careers after the final, Tantrum said it had not featured in pre-match discussions. As was the case with his own future in the coaching role. "For us the build-up to this game is all about concentrating on what we have to do to beat Buller, and that's the way we intend it to stay," he said.