At Last
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At last the Ranfurly Shield gets the coverage it deserves. Not in ideal circumstances, New Zealand’s most storied and recognisable sporting trophy got split in to two this weekend, and suddenly people are engaged.
During a season when there have been far more column inches dedicated to poor crowds at the NPC rather than actual match reports this seems appropriate.
But while New Zealanders no longer go along to watch Shield games they still feel attached to it.
But the worst part of this is how the blokes in charge of the narrative have been so dismissive, and treated us like fools. Nobody likes that.
An unfortunate accident apparently. That has Intolerable Pressure written all over it. A simple “We are looking into the matter so I can’t comment” would have been less insulting, and more likely to de-escalate the story.
First there is the damage to the shield which is the biggest story of the many NRL like strands to this. Not just the Ranfurly Shield, but the stronger Ranfurly Shield which was reconstructed this year to immunise it from boofhead behaviour.
With the benefit of hindsight, was this in itself some kind of TikTok challenge?
Then there was the coke and the rolled up tube. That’s almost become a meme. Again, anyone saying Well you never know until it’s proven needs to realise we’re not as thick as those players.
The icing on the cake (so far) has been a drink driving crash resulting in another unfortunate incident. Hawkes Bay has the odd famous sporting DIC incidents over the year, and we are yet to find out whether a cockatoo was involved.
So how should NZR deal with this?
For a start they should humiliate Hawkes Bay as much as they can. They are now in possession of the shield. And at a time when they are being accused of ignoring rural NZ rugby maybe a summer tour might be in order. If you took the newly (again) refurbished shield to the likes of Oamaru, Ruatoria, Westport, Whanganui, Greymouth, Thames etc you would re-engage with those people and you’d send a message to the famously out of touch Hawkes Bay sporting fishheads.