Welcome!

Welcome to the latest newsletter keeping you in touch with the news from within the Christchurch Football Club.

Firstly, we start by saying a huge thank you to Oscar Bennett and Eldon Craven for joining us this year and putting their all out on to the field.

Hope you enjoy your English Summer, and we can't wait to see you back at pre-season!

A big weekend for rugby coming up this weekend with Shirley Boys High School playing against Christs College tomorrow at 4pm.

Saturday brings the Crying Towel back into play as our Premier Men take on Linwood.

And finally, we are fortunate to have the Noosa Dolphins returning for an action-packed weekend, many of you will see them around the club, please make them feel welcome, and if anyone wants to come down on Sunday to watch them take on Shirley Boys High School and Christchurch Boys High School U15 teams in a game of 3 halves, you are most welcome!

Read on for more details…

Premier Mens Match Report

Premiers v Marist Albion

Saturday 12th June 3pm @ Chch Park.

HT: 12-21 FT: 12-70.

It was always going to a big ask for the Christchurch lads to tip over 2024 defending champions Marist-Albion. Never an easy task, the team started slowly and allowed Marist-Albion to score a couple of early tries. These tries both coming from CFC attacking Marist-Albion, however a turn-over or an error gave the opposition the ball and off they went. 

Not deterred by the start CFC got back into the game. After some hard yardage by the forwards, front rower Angus Liddle dotted down for a meat pie. Shortly after Mitch Barry, playing is blazer game, was able to cross as well bringing the score to 12-14. The remainder of the first half was fairly even however Marist-Albion were able to dot down 1 more time before half to take a lead of 21-12. 

The remainder of the game was all Marist-Albion. They kept CFC in their half for most of the match. Despite attempts and breaks CFC were unable to add any further points to the half time tally. Marist-Albion had a great driving maul and seemed to score at will off this. Combined with 1st 5/8 Shun Miyake converting all 10 tries gave Marist-Albion a comfortable 70-12 win.

Whilst the scoreboard doesn't paint great picture, you have to hand it to the CFC lads. They bounced back from bad start to get back in the game. They were in it at half time. Winger Takehiro Watanabe was into everything on attack and defence. Player of the Day Sam Lawry combined with fellow loosie Eldon Craven were hitting anything that moved.  

Its about now Sponge would say “flush that one and move on!” Well, the toilets getting a bit clogged up now, it’s time the lads had one to not flush. What better than this week’s annual Crying Towel match v Linwood, at Linwood, on their Club Day. Let’s block their toilet!

Bones

Premier Womens Match Report

It was do or die for the Christchurch Women on Saturday as we headed over to Tane Norton Park to take on the Linwood Wāhine. 

With a bye weekend coming up and the opportunity for a straight shot at the final, Christchurch had to win with a bonus point, and prevent Linwood from getting any points at all to make it through. 

With a warmup described by the coach as “sometimes maybe good, sometimes maybe sh*t”, there was a flutter of nerves through the group as the girls ran out onto the field. The nerves were justified in the first half, despite a very quick try for Christchurch by Manea Waaka, as frantic offense and complete disregard for the game plan put Christchurch regularly on the backfoot as opportunities to score went lacking. Linwood responded with a try of their own 20 minutes into the first half, followed by a quick dash over the line by CFC’s Caitlin Sears to take the teams into halftime at 12 – 7. 

A stern talking-to by coach Rebecca Todd was all that was needed for the girls to get themselves together and as the forwards settled into their work, the injection of pace and assertive decision-making by Martha Mataele (who just popped in to lend a hand during her rugby league bye weekend) began to lay waste to the Linwood defence. Scoring two back-to-back tries within the first 20 minutes of the second half, Martha began to shovel points on for Christchurch, both converted by Caitlin Sears. 

Christchurch’s well drilled mauls began to take effect and despite Steph Te Ohaere-Fox mistaking the black football lines on the field for a try-line and diving to the ground early (an action for which she will be suitably fined), the platform the forwards were setting allowed the backs to start raining points down on the green and black jerseys. Caitlin, Manea and Emma Whinney all sprinted in their own tries, until a final maul sent Steph over the (correct) try-line. Some sharp conversion kicking from Cailtin finalised the scoreboard at a convincing 50-7. 

The CFC Women will rest up for a week before we take on University of Canterbury final rematch at Rugby Park on Saturday 29 June. 

 Nina Poletti

Premier Reserve (Crocs) Match 

The Crocs had the opportunity to play at Lancaster park against Otautahi last week, it’s a great field full of history and I think it’s a privilege to be able to play there. 

We talked all week about starting the game well and applying pressure in the right areas of the field. OT came out fired up and ready for a physical battle, but true to the character of this team they met that physicality and played with a high level of skill and tempo to score the first points. 

We controlled the game well with some fantastic kicking from Will Duncan, kicking a 50/22 and finding the grass with kicks from hand. Having Shun return from injury was just what the team needed, and he scored a great try and caused problems for the OT defence for the whole game. Mikey shearer put in a good shift with plenty of hard work in defence and aggressive running in attack, scoring a try out wide was a good reward for Mikey. 

The defence this week was particularly impressive, OT are a very physical team with some big lads in the forwards and backs. The Crocs made a mistake in midfield that led to a runaway try to OT. The second score from OT was from a long period of attack and eventually they managed to score. For the rest of the game our line speed and aggression in contact was awesome. We didn’t have a full bench of players so the lads had to dig deep and really support each other to get the win. 

This group of players haven’t had it easy this season, with low playing numbers and injuries to key players it’s been tough on them. Kyle and I are both really proud of their attitude to go out every week and work as hard as they can for each other. As we head into the business end of the season, we stand a really good chance of making finals, we know the squad will do everything they can to win a trophy for the club. 

Our next game is against Sydenham in two weeks' time, it’s Josh VDP last game before he heads overseas. Josh has been an excellent player for CFC for a long time now. Josh will be hugely missed by the club, not just because he’s a great player but because he is a true club man that is a pleasure to coach and have a beer with after the game.  We would love to be able to give him the send-off he deserves with a good win. If there any players that have played rugby with Josh at CFC and you would like to come down and take the field, support the team or share a beer with Josh and the Crocs, you are more than welcome to. 

Player of the day Ben Middleton. 

Crocs win 33-10

UP THE CROCS

Matt Aked 

Classics (Choppers) Match Report

As we headed to Linfield Park for what should've been an enjoyable rematch against old rivals the Linwood Dogs Bollocks, spirits were high but were soon to come crashing down. 

After narrowly losing to these chaps by 1 point in the first round we knew we could easily beat this team. However not long after arriving at the grounds we noticed our opposition looked vastly different to last time & had magically doubled in numbers, not to be put off we warmed up.

Warm up complete & the toss done it was time to get stuck in, & right from the get-go we realised we were out of our depth as it didn't take Linwood long to get on the score board & from there, they were quite relentless for the rest of the half as they piled on 30 odd points. 

Half time arrived & some super inspiring words from some super inspirational players got the boys fizzed to get better in the 2nd half. By now we had figured out that some league teams had finished for the season & with Linwood having 13 on their bench the one-sided score line was starting to make sense. We did however play a lot better in the second half & restricted the score from totally blowing out with some courageous defence & the odd sneaky little dart we showed what we can be capable of, but there was just no keeping up with 13 rolling subs so, it was never going to be our day.

It's a real shame the game was played in this way, it's not what social rugby is about, this should've been a fair epic battle that both teams were looking forward too. Well at least now we know why the Warriors lost later that night, half of them were over in Linwood. 

Player of the day was Lube, great running son!! 

Choppers out. 

Up up

Lumber Jack

Blazer Game

On Saturday 15th June 2024, Premiers Co-Captain Mitchell (Mitch) Barry played his blazer game in front of a home crowd against Marist Albion.

Mitchell joined the CFC Premiers at the beginning of the 2023 season. His first game was 15 April 2023, and he has been a regular starter at half-back or 1st five since then.  

Congratulations Mitch on this well-deserved milestone. 

Mitch is photographed here with has dad Bill, who had the pleasure of presenting his blazer to him.   

Bobs Word 

With our great club’s 160th Celebration dinner fast approaching I couldn’t help thinking what an influential man Jock Hobbs had been in NZ Rugby.

What triggered these thoughts late on a gloomy Sunday afternoon around 4.30PM you may well ask?

I for one have always been intrigued how NZRU and the various media outlets have always put ex AB’S Captain Sean Fitzpatrick up on such a pedestal?

Yes, it’s fair to say he was a great hooker, great leader, and very likely a great bloke, but it was he who in the mid 90’s led an attempted pro breakaway by the All Blacks to a “Packer like” professional league luring the big names away from the NZRU.

It was only then that Jock Hobbs who I think was Chairman of the NZRU Board realised that we had an attempted ‘coup’ on their hands and along with sports lawyer David Howman persuaded Jeff Wilson and Josh Kronfield not to sign with Fitzpatrick’s rebels. Jock along with the aforementioned because of their ‘sway ‘then managed to halt the rest of the AB’s from joining Fitzpatrick’s breakaway group, meaning his coup against the establishment had failed. I argue, he had almost committed treason and although now living in the UK should never receive the accolades he now receives. Thank goodness for Jock, Goldie, and Josh.

A great 70’s reunion last weekend. Very well attended and wonderful to catch up with these guys. It was also great to see the likes of Dan Charteris, Charlie Hore, Norge Martin and 2 metre Peter Bowden down at the club having a few ‘quiets’ on Saturday evening.

A big week ahead for Div One with The Crying Towel on Saturday. I have been so impressed with their attitude this year despite their results and know that Linwood will be given back “the Towel” on Saturday.

See you all there.

Give Em The Axe

Bob

Thank you

A big thank you to Tom Christie for taking out of your busy schedule to come and offer some advice and words of wisdom to our Colts team.

Its always a privilege having former players that have gone on to bigger and better things, coming back to help with anything they can.

I'm sure the Colts players will use all that you've taught them this weekend.

Junior Rugby

Pictured above is Martha Mataele and her husband with some of our Senior Girls Players - it is always such a privilege having players coming back to join their club and showcase their skill to upcoming talent. The girls loved getting their pic taken with one of their favourites.

You will all now be aware of the upcoming End of Term Party on 5th July, we can't wait to see as many of you there as possible!

Upcoming next week is the arrival of the pies from the fundraiser that was run. It would be great to have as much help with this as possible to make it a smooth transition.

Introducing the next Junior Committee member Lana Johnston. 

Christchurch Football Club 160th Dinner

The Christchurch Football Club invites members and guests to join us for a celebration of this great club and all it has achieved over the 160 years it has been around.

Special Guest Steve Tew will be guest speaker while we celebrate the club and our legends, alongside delicious food and drinks.

Please click on the link here to register your interest in either a seat or a table, please note tables are going fast so be in quick!

Any questions to be directed to events@christchurchpark.co.nz

Book this Venue

If you are a business that is looking for a central conference venue or meeting space with full catering and motel units, Christchurch Football Club is the perfect place! Members discount available.

Please contact: Jen Muller 021 0222 7810

Article added: Monday 24 June 2024