Rugby: I'll tell you why I bother: guts are better than gold

Taranaki supporter PATRICK GOWER writes that there is only one way to support the amber and blacks - without fear or favour

Amber-and-black hoops, black shorts, amber-and-black hooped socks.

That's what Andy Slater and the rest of the Taranaki team will wear in tonight's NPC semifinal against Canterbury - and their hearts on their sleeves.

Not many people outside my home province are giving Taranaki much of a chance.

The same people have also said we didn't have a show of making the semifinals.

I've always said they would get this far and I reckon they will go even further yet - I'll bet my life there will be a Taranaki boilover in tonight's game.

Most of the people I tell this to - including respected rugby scribes - call me one-eyed, irrational and, at worst, downright delusional.

They often say: "Why do you bother?"

What they don't understand is that Taranaki supporters are not fair-weather friends.

Just like our forward pack, we're tough up-front on any given day.

I'm the first to agree that this can leave you red-faced from time to time, but that's a price I've been paying for many years.

As a 13-year-old I went to watch Taranaki - then captained by fullback Kieran Crowley, with a young Andy Slater on the blindside flank - play a midweek game against the 1990 touring Wallabies.

It poured that day - even that didn't help our chances - and we went down 3-27.

But all I can remember was "the Colt" punting a soaking wet Adidas Universal leather ball from one end of the park to the other in the driving rain.

Each time he let rip, there was a mighty bang, so much so that my old man said to me: "Jeezus, son, it's like a shotgun going off!"

After the game I huddled with hundreds of other autograph hunters waiting for Campo and his mates under the main stand.

I goosestepped the balding winger and went straight for "the Colt," who put his name next to his listing on my dog-earred programme with what I thought at the time was a kind, personal remark - "Best wishes."

My dreams - and looking back now they really were dreams - of emulating "the Colt" and Andy Slater and wearing the amber and black evaporated not long after, but every now and then I would think of giving everything else away for just one game in the No 15 shirt.

The reality is that the Taranaki team would be better served with my support off the field, rather than on it, and that's what they get, week-in, week-out.

So when Taranaki played their NPC game against Auckland earlier this season, I was disgusted to see a gentleman on the front page of the Weekend Herald with what he called "torn loyalties."

He had grown up in New Plymouth, but had lived in Auckland for the past 20 years and, after some "soul-searching," showed his true colours and wore scarves from both provinces.

I'm sorry, mate, but that just doesn't cut it.

Was he wearing two scarves on August 31, 1996? That was the day 15 so-called nobodies from a small and insignificant province came and wrested the Ranfurly Shield from the Aucklanders' cold, dead hands.

And that's why I bother - because every now and then our boys show us that guts are better than gold, courage is worth more than cash, and spirit wins more games than spandex.

I'm expecting more of the same tonight, because, as the saying goes - always bet on amber and black.