Wairarapa wins 'hellishly close' final

Wairarapa Paddlers Expose have won the national canoe polo league title in what skipper Carl Duncan labelled a "hellishly close" final with hot favourites, Justice of Christchurch.
Held at the Naenae pool in Wellington the match saw Expose trailing by two goals with less than two minutes to play.
They reduced the margin to just one when former Makoura College pupil Kyzen MacDonald scored and then with only two seconds remaining on the clock Duncan produced the equaliser, thereby meaning the championship would go to the first team scoring in extra time.
And that was Expose who initially grabbed possession when Duncan won the charge out and held it for all of three minutes before Sam Ashton of Hawke's Bay provided the clincher.
"It was hellishly close, a real battle royal," Duncan, an old boy of Chanel College who these days resides as does MacDonald in Palmerston North, said. "Honestly, I thought we had left our run too late in ordinary time but it's amazing how things can change in 60 seconds."
For Expose, which competes under the Wairarapa Paddlers banner in deference to the part played by Duncan and MacDonald in their formation, it was national title number two, the first coming in 2006. And they took special pleasure in beating Justice, who have long been regarded as the strongest canoe polo club in the country and who include another former Chanel College pupil in Dean Mischewski in their line-up.
"They (Justice) had won the champs six times in the last eight years so we were pretty stoked to knock them off," Duncan said.
For Duncan and MacDonald the icing on the cake came when the New Zealand A and B teams were announced to attend the Oceania canoe polo championships in Penrith, Sydney, in October. Duncan was named as vice-captain of the A team and MacDonald as captain of the Bs. Australia will be New Zealand's main opponent there and will start favourites after finishing fourth in last year's world championships where a New Zealand team including Duncan came eighth, three places better than what they were previously.
The highlight for Duncan at the worlds was playing against the Dutch team which were the eventual champions and scoring three of New Zealand's goals in their gutsy 4-6 defeat.
Meanwhile, the Wairarapa Paddlers were also represented in the B grade section of the national league and while they did not fill a major placing they too performed with credit. Both Duncan and MacDonald along with another former star player in Robin Russell have provided coach Brenda Clayton with assistance in that role and Duncan believes several of the youngsters in the side have the potential to also make a name for themselves on the national scene.