Busy weekend of rugby starting tonight

It is another busy weekend of rugby around the Wellington region and further afield for several representative teams and for the last of the club rugby semi-finals of the season.

The weekend’s rugby starts this evening at Westpac Stadium, where the Wellington U19s play the Hurricanes Heartland team at 5.05pm in round two of the Central Region Shield.

The U19s will be hoping to secure their second bonus point of the series, ahead of their third match next week against Hawke’s Bay and then the Jock Hobbs Memorial Tournament in Taupo in September.

The U19s will be looking for a fast start tonight, to follow up their 28-0 win over Manawatu last Saturday, while the Hurricanes Heartland team missed out to the Junior Magpies 3-36. Both matches were played in terrible conditions.

The U19s contest will be broadcast live, on 1161AM, 87.6FM, teupoko.co.nz, iheartradio.com (search “te upoko”) or tunein.com (search “te upoko”).

Following this, the Wellington Lions play Canterbury in the third round of the Mitre 10 Cup competition and for the Harry Saundercock Shield. Kick-off in the NPC game is 7.35pm.

The semi-finals of the Reserve Grade Division 2 see top qualifiers the Upper Hutt Rams J8s host the MSP Internationals at Maoribank Park and the Paremata-Plimmerton Punters and OBU Pink Ginners meeting at Ngati Toa Domain. Both Alan Seerup Cup semi-finals kick-off at 2.30pm.

Expected fairer conditions on Saturday will be a welcome relief for several other representative teams in action tomorrow.

In games at home, the Wellington Samoans U18s and the Wellington Centurions U18s meet at Kilbirnie Park at 11.15am. This is a pre-season meeting, ahead of the Hurricanes U18 competition starting next weeked,

This is followed at Kilbirnie Park by the senior match between the Wellington Samoans and the Centurions Development in the first round of the Festival Cup and The Hurricanes Development Shield. They kick-off at 1.00pm.

One  of the two senior Wellington Maori teams are in action tomorrow. The Maori Development side’s game against the Horowhenua Kapiti Development team at Petone has been cancelled. The Wellington Maori team travels to Palmerston North to play their Manawatu counterparts, at the Arena Manawatu #4 at 1.00pm.

The Wellington Pride has an internal camp, ahead of their Women’s NPC season opening next Saturday against Canterbury while the Wellington Development team has tomorrow off, ahead of a block of three matches in a week starting from next Saturday.

There are also three matches involving Wellington First XV teams tomorrow in Hurricanes region semi-final knockout fixtures.

Last Sunday’s Premiership winners Scots College are hosting Palmerston North Boys’ High School at Jerry Collins Stadium at 2.30pm, while beaten finalists St Pat’s Silverstream travel to play Hastings Boys’ High School.

The other match is the Hurricanes region Co-ed Cup knockout between Aotea College and Kapiti College, at Aotea at 1.00pm.