While New Zealand rugby’s 12 Heartland Provincial Unions are highly competitive on the field, the strength of their bonds off it are as strong as ever following the devastation of Cyclone Gabrielle earlier this year.
The cyclone left thousands of rugby participants in Poverty Bay and Ngāti Porou East Coast dealing with the impact, which has still to this day made it difficult for people to register for sport.
As a result, funds were raised by the unions in conjunction with the New Zealand Community Trust (NZCT) and Sport Gisborne Tairāwhiti’s initiative Pay Half, Play Hard, intended to remove financial barriers enabling players to play club rugby either at a reduced cost or for free.
The funds will provide financial support for around 4000 rugby players across Poverty Bay and Ngāti Porou East Coast.
Poverty Bay Rugby Football Union chief executive Ray Noble said the priorities of the organisation had shifted since the cyclone.
“When you’re in the weeds rugby goes out the window,” he said. “You think about supporting communities as a whole, whether that’s shovelling silt or providing goods and services — that was more important to us.”
The Heartland fundraising drive was initiated by Mid-Canterbury Rugby Union chief executive Tanya Dearns who at the time was running garage sales in an old storage unit and raised a significant amount of money from it.
“After the garage sales I spoke with our board around what we could do with the money and suggested we supported our Heartland unions on the East Coast to provide them with some form of support,” Dearns said. “I then put the challenge out to my colleagues in the Heartland community and said, ‘hey who wants to jump on the bandwagon?’”
Heartland unions Buller, Horowhenua-Kapiti, King Country, Mid-Canterbury, South-Canterbury, North Otago, Thames Valley, Wairarapa Bush, Wanganui and West Coast combined fundraising efforts of $2000 each.
North Harbour Rugby Union also supported the efforts with $2000 and New Zealand Rugby contributed $5000, bringing the total up to $27,000.
Other unions such Northland donated framed NPC jerseys while Waikato gave a monetary gift.
“For us all to come together is the epitome of what we’re all about at Heartland. We talk about rugby being the heart of our communities and it truly is,” Dearns said.
“On the East Coast their hospitality is amazing. They welcome you with open arms and this gesture is a way of giving back and letting them know we support them.
“It’s cool to be able to help them continue on with the things they’re doing without it heavily impacting their participation numbers.”
Noble said when the region was in response mode it made the gesture that much more unexpected.
“To learn what our unions had done was awesome. You feel privileged and humbled when something like this happens.
“Once there was a sense of normality the recovery process included getting people back out there playing rugby.
“For a lot of our players, they’re a part of the primary industries, which took a big hit, so we were worried about our player numbers. Bbut the cyclone had the opposite effect. We’ve got more people playing than we’ve ever had.”
Ngāti Porou East Coast Rugby Union chief executive Leroy Kururangi said the gesture was a testament to the close relationships between the unions.
“We are very grateful for our fellow Heartland unions. United we’re strong,” Kururangi said.
“We’re a small union ourselves but have learned to remain positive while we adapt to unfortunate circumstances.”
Tamatea to coach Coast; new role for Gear
Ngāti Porou East Coast will have a new coach at the helm in the 2023 Heartland Championship — former Coast and Poverty Bay player Kahu Tamatea.
The NPEC union announced Tamatea’s appointment on its Facebook page yesterday.
He takes over from former All Black Hosea Gear, who remains with the Coast in the new role of director of rugby.
Tamatea is coaching YMP in the Poverty Bay Premier club rugby competition. The team have won all nine of their games this season and are hot favourites to retain the Lee Bros Shield crown.
From a renowned rugby family, Tamatea played nine matches for the Coast in 2003 and 82 games for Poverty Bay over 11 seasons, the last of those in 2015.
He also played for West Coast in 2019 and twice made the Heartland XV squad — in 2006 and 2010.
