Marist's Jo Bogileka (right) ready to fend off Border's Tom Symes. Photo / Lewis Gardner
Marist's Jo Bogileka (right) ready to fend off Border's Tom Symes. Photo / Lewis Gardner
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It was opening day jitters for home side Dave Hoskin Carriers Marist as their new-look Tasman Tanning Premier squad remains a level behind the classy performers in Waverley Harvesting Border.
However, the defending champions and Grand Hotel Challenge Shield holders left a windy Spriggens Park with food for thought as well on Saturday, particularly when it comes to their discipline.
A match threatening to become a blowout at 34-0 by halftime petered out to 39-10 at the end of a stop-start affair.
Marist played right into the hands of Border's exciting ball-runners in the opening stanza, after the visitors won the toss and took first use of the influential breeze.
Indecision or being pushed back by hard tackling at the second and third phases would inevitably lead to loose passes and dropped ball, with Border's speedsters and their co-captains swooping on unforced errors to dash off on four of their six tries.
Both lightning winger Vereneki Tikoisolomone and flanker Angus Middleton, the latter fresh after missing last year's shortened representative season, scored doubles.
Middleton grabbed Border's only points of the second half on a 50m intercept - the second try Marist gave up in that fashion after No 8 Semi Vodosese also snatched the ball from an ill-directed pass to run 70m in the first half and leave the home team's heads low.
It was good to see former Steelform Whanganui loose forward Kieran Hussey back on the local scene, as he twisted through tacklers to score under the posts nearing halftime.
With more size, strength and, most importantly, continuity as a playing group, Border didn't look like they'd lost a step, until the second half as they turned to face the wind and with a safe scoreline began to over-extend themselves with some dropped ball and loose passes of their own.
Initially, Marist continued to struggle, with their young backline still learning to operate as one unit, while a number of the forwards couldn't hang onto the ball in close contact.
However, they managed two tries, one a smart piece of individual skill by first five Ashton Coates, and the other coming from a forward drive from hooker Jack Yarrall, who ran over several would-be tacklers throughout the match.
Lindsay Horrocks has the ball on the move for Border. Photo / Lewis Gardner
Border were defending with 14 men at the time, having to play 20 consecutive minutes of the second half that way, with both former Whanganui players Ranato Tikoisolomone and Sam Madams being sent behind the posts shortly after they came onto the field.
This followed up from lock Toby Lennox also getting the yellow card in the first half for more professional fouls after repeated warnings from referee Sean Ferguson.
Knowing he has only a 10-game round-robin to get his team playing correctly to the whistle, Border coach Cole Baldwin had a long conference with Ferguson at full time to make sure he understood the official's interpretations, after a second-half where their momentum stalled.
"It's just our fitness really. Going away from the plan we had in place and how we wanted to play.
"We know if we can get that side of it right, it's going to work in our favour a little bit more.
"First half, probably as good as you're going to see from a first-round game, got to be positive about that – scrum went well, bit of work to on the other set-piece side of it with the lineout, but you're not going to be perfect in round one.
"You're going to struggle in this competition if you give away three yellow cards in every game, that's something we need to look at.
"We've sort of addressed that now, we know what they were for, and so we'll be making sure that doesn't happen again."
Having given his team a serve at halftime, Marist coach Travers Hopkins got glimpses of what they can do with some go-forward during the final quarter.
"We just looked a little bit at sea and maybe just a little bit of ring-rust," he said.
"We'll certainly put that to fish and chip paper, so to speak, but I think that second 40 is probably a truer reflection of the ability that I see in the team."
He agreed the side seemed to run out of ideas after a couple of rucks and pushed for opportunities that weren't there.
"You don't want to give Border any points; it's hard enough to get points against them, so you can't give them to them on a plate.
"It is a new team, a lot of new players and combinations, even switching with Jo [Bogileka] taking off in the second half, which was already pre-planned.
"It gave some of our newer guys a chance to have a bit of shine, and I think our bench did really well today, probably lifted the tempo, which is what we wanted from the start."
Border 39 (V Tikoisolomone 2, A Middleton 2, S Vodosese, K Hussey tries; N Harding pen, 3 con) bt Marist 10 (A Coates, J Yarrall tries). HT: 34-0.
