McAlister's 19 points help sink Auckland

4.25pm

North Harbour piled on more rugby misery on their neighbours and rivals Auckland today with a 34-32 NPC win at Eden Park.

It was Harbour's first win on Auckland's home ground since 1998 and their first victory in the Battle of the Bridge since the 2001 season, when Harbour won 16-5 at Albany.

The chief destroyer today was midfield back Luke McAlister, who scored 19 of Harbour's points from a try, two penalty goals and four conversions.

He crossed the line again as the fulltime hooter sounded but the video referee ruled out the try.

Only six minutes earlier the second five-eighth had kicked the winning points when he converted Rico Gear's second try.

It was the first time Harbour had taken the lead in the game as well.

For Harbour, it was their first win in the competition this year following a draw and two losses and for Auckland it was their third loss despite the return of their All Blacks such as Carlos Spencer, Xavier Rush and Joe Rokocoko.

The result is likely to cause some stir in the Auckland rugby circles.

After Waikato had given them a record thrashing last weekend, coach Pat Lam apologised to their supporters.

While Auckland built up their tries through their strong forwards, North Harbour's came from long-range attacks or counter attacks in which McAlister, Gear, Nick Evans and Anthony Tuitavaki featured.

Auckland scored one of the quickest tries (in 14sec) in the competition when midfield back Sam Tuitupou kicked ahead and scored after Harbour had fumbled the kick-off.

By the 32nd minute they seemed to have the game sewn up after winger Isa Nacewa and loose forward Sione Lauaki had scored tries as well. But Auckland's 22-3 lead was whittled down in the next eight minutes when flanker Craig Newby charged down a kick from Spencer to score and Tuitavaki put Gear away for this first try.

McAlister's goals helped close the score to 22-17 at halftime and he added another penalty to make it 22-20 before lock Brad Mika's powerful burst enabled to Auckland to go ahead 27-20 with a try.

McAlister scored his try and converted it to level the scores.

Spencer's casual approach to a penalty kick from close range will probably haunt him for the rest of the week. It could have given Auckland a lead again. However Auckland did come back to lead again, courtesy of a fine try by the big-stepping centre Ben Atiga.

Harbour hit back with their backs moving swiftly in attack to allow Gear through for the score-levelling try. McAlister then nailed the winning points.

North Harbour 34 (Craig Newby, Rico Gear, Luke McAlister, Rico Gear tries; McAlister 2 pen, 4 con)

Auckland 32 (Sam Tuitupou, Isa Nacewa, Sione Lauaki, Brad Mika, Ben Atiga tries; Carlos Spencer pen, 2 con)

Halftime: 17-22

- NZPA

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