Sports News and Articles

Masterton Croquet Club can’t quite find the form that led them to win last year’s Central Districts Golf Croquet Interclub series, and find themselves at the bottom of the table after losing their latest games against Levin at Queen Elizabeth Park on Thursday. Golf Croquet is a quicker and less technical version of Association Croquet. “One of them is like playing drafts and the other one is like playing chess,” says club captain and umpire for the day, Russell Ward. “We have

If you’re looking for a pleasant and relaxing way to spend an hour or two on a Sunday afternoon, then you should definitely pop along to Masterton Pétanque Club. The terrain and clubrooms are located in the middle of Queen Elizabeth Park, so it’s a perfect, picturesque spot to either just sit and watch the games or perhaps be tempted to join in and participate in a fascinating game that on one hand is nice and simple, but on the other can be mischievously intricate. Pétanque

All three Giants teams scored good wins on Saturday. The Premier Reserves team were too good in their Intercity game at Porirua Park overcoming the home team eight runs to nil. The women travelled to Fraser Park to take on the Dodgers Divas and won 12 runs to 9, while the Premier 3 men were far too good for a young Demons team racing away to a 21 to 5 point win in the only game at South Park. So after just two weeks of play both the Premier 3 men and the women’s teams lead th

A tough weekend for the Wairarapa Utd U19 team at the annual National Championships held at Napier. Despite winning three of their five games and finishing the Group D division in second equal place with Bay Olympic, United missed out on progressing through to the quarter finals to the Auckland-based team on goal difference. On paper it looked like a fair result. Bay Olympic finished the round robin with a goal difference of six while United finished with minus one. However I

I stopped to speak to Carterton AFC president JP Delamere as he prepared for a game at Howard Booth Park, about the club’s successful season in the Wairarapa competition. “Yeah, the mighty Redbacks won Division One, won the Wairarapa Cup, and won the Super League Trophy. The Raiders won Division Three, and the Royals were second in the women’s comp.” And the Reapers? “Yeah, they had a season!” I wondered whether there was any prospect of the Redbacks moving up to compete in t

The Wairarapa United U19 team travel to Napier on Friday to compete in the annual Napier City Rovers U19 National Tournament. In its 50th year, the tournament is considered to be the country’s biggest and most prestigious U19 competition. Coach Patrick Wootton is happy with the team’s first round draw, “it’s probably the nicest pool we’ve had in the last couple of years." The U19 squad stop to pose for a quick photo during Monday evening's final training session “Taradale did

A good-sized crowd witnessed a great afternoon for two of the three senior Giants softball teams at South Park on Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately the Premier Reserves game was cancelled but the Premier 3’s and the women’s teams played some great softball and each scored fourteen runs to keep the local supporters happy. Bena Moeahu slogs the to the outfield during her team's 14-0 win over Totara Park The women play in the Hutt Valley Women’s Social competition and while the

The region’s top lawn bowlers braved the cloudy and chilly conditions at Carrington Bowling Club on Saturday for their first training session together. Men’s selector Richard Anderson was keeping a close eye on his squad and will announce his team in a week or so for Wairarapa’s annual fixture against Kapiti in November. Women’s selector Tanya Wheeler joined her squad on the greens as they also had their first outing together as a team. Richard says that they’ll probably only

OPINION ‘It should of been a whole lot better’ is how I would describe Wairarapa Bush’s performance in this year’s Heartland Championship. Having watched every home game and read all the reports and comments from their away games, my opinion is that they definitely had the individual skills, the pace, the strength and often the hunger to do a lot better, however they often seemed to lack the ability to work as a complete unit, were guilty of switching off every now and then,

A small but very vocal crowd packed the tiny scaffold-like stand at Howard Booth Park in Carterton on Saturday to watch the Carterton Reapers take on a visiting Birkenhead side. The game, which I’m sure most would agree wasn’t the best technically brilliant football you’ll ever see, was however thoroughly entertaining and funny, and both the players and spectators would have come away happy to have been part of it. Carterton player and spokesperson Rod O’Leary explained that

The Giants Premier Reserve team had a tough start to the season, going down eight runs to four against a strong-looking Hutt City United team at South Park on Saturday. Missing a few players from last season, and still without their recently-signed Australian pitcher, the team couldn’t match the Hutt team in their first outing after promotion to the Premier Reserve competition. Veteran pitcher Tony Nixon stepped up to the plate, and despite his vast experience and skill I’m s

The cricket season may just be begining and the oval at Masterton’s Queen Elizabeth II park won’t see any action for a week or two yet, but for head groundsman John Fletcher the preparation has been underway for months. In fact work on preparing the block began almost immediately after the previous playing season was over. “Our first job was to scarify the surface of the block which is basically a machine the rips up the grass and a little bit of the clay. Then we put new gra

I sat down with Dalefield and Wairarapa men’s hockey manager Mike van Woerkom with a cup of tea and some delicious home-made cinnamon pinwheels (thanks Carol) to chat about Dalefield’s season, the great result for Wairarapa at the recent National Hockey Championships, and his involvement with hockey in general. MIke dressed up against the cold at the National Hockey Stadium during the recent National Hockey Championships Every time I go to the turf at Clareville I see Mike as