Central Pulse

So you thought I was kidding about the netball?

ANZ are the sponsors of the Trans-Tasman netball competition, known as the ANZ Championship, so there is yet another sporting fixture for which I receive discounted tickets. We decided that we should take a look at this game of netball next time it came to town...

The Central Pulse are our local team in the ANZ Championship (there are 5 teams each from Australia and New Zealand). They play in various stadia around the central New Zealand region, with a couple of games in Wellington's TSB Arena. Their opponents this week were the Melbourne Vixens.

We drove into town for a 4:20 start, getting to the Arena in time to take our seats with 10 minutes to spare. I went to the bar to get us some drinks, and found that the selections available were definitely targeted at a different audience to what's available at the rugby! There wasn't even a decent Kiwi beer on sale, but the wine selection was far wider. How I suffer for my art. I bought a Heineken.

The game started and for the first quarter, the Pulse kept on level terms, finishing the quarter 1 point down at 11-10. At the beginning of the second quarter, though, they had a points drought as they were intercepted, missed chances, and generally failed, and were soon 9 points adrift. they finished the quarter at 29-19, and never really recovered from that. They started to close the gap in the third quarter, to 3 points at one stage, but then it opened up again, They finally finished at 52-40, which was a bit of a hammering.

It was good fast action, and I think we'd go to another match. it would be nice if the Pulse could get their act together and win next time! Still, the Vixens are top of the table at the moment so I suppose it's not too bad to lose to them.

So, that's another sporting event off the "I've never been to..." list.

Taking It Seriously

New Zealanders take their sport seriously. Very seriously. They also take women’s sport seriously – far more so than in the UK.

Prompted by an ad I heard on the radio, I looked up Whitcoull’s (one of the large bookshop chains here) top five books at the moment:

1. The Free Range Cook – Annabel Longbein: NZ cook publishes cookbook to go with her TV programme in time for Christmas, unsurprisingly popular.
2. Dead Or Alive – Tom Clancy: international bestseller…er…best-sells.
3. Coasters – Al Brown: Kiwi chef goes coastal, writes book.
4. Rescue – Anita Shreve: internationally-renowned author writes another book.
5. Greatest Moments In NZ Netball History – Michael Binum: does what it says on the tin.

Yes, you read that right.

The Rugby Match

On Friday, we went to watch a rugby match. No, not the All Blacks, nor even the Wellington Lions, but the annual Treasury against Land Information NZ (or “Linz” as they are popularly known) match. This fixture is over 100 years old, between the two oldest departments of the NZ Civil Service. We got on the number 2 bus, and headed out to Hataitai Park on a sunny spring afternoon.

Hataitai is a pleasant suburb of Wellington; I’d been there once before when I was getting my medical done for my visa application. It is also home to Wellington’s oldest rugby club, called (unsurprisingly) Wellington Football Club. We found the location without too much difficulty, having stopped along the way to take some photos.

When we got there, we were somewhat dismayed by the lack of activity. It was ten minutes to kick-off, and there was no sign of anyone on the pitch, and a worrying lack of cars in the car park; time to make some calls back to the Treasury to check that we’re in the right place.

“The match has been moved to the artificial pitch at Newtown”, we were informed. “Great”, I thought. “That’s not far away. Do you know where the pitch is?” A further phone call elicited the response that it was on John Street. As I had taken the precaution of bringing a map with me, I was able to locate it, and we set off on foot. The route was basically round the base of Mount Victoria (we could have gone up and over, but it was particularly muddy after the rains of yesterday, so we decided against that).

We finally arrived at John Street, and immediately started casting about for the location of the rugby club. We found it eventually, and managed to catch the last 10 minutes of the match. Treasury lost 10-12, having missed a penalty in the dying seconds of the game.

The game ended before I could get a decent action shot.

Afterwards, we were invited to Linz’ offices in Lambton Quay, where there were drinks to be had and prizes were handed out. There had also been two netball matches (women’s and mixed) played between the two departments. Treasury managed to lose both of those as well. Nevertheless, there was a good spirit of camaraderie between the two departments…we got the impression that the Treasury had done rather better than they usually do. Linz let slip the fact that they had been practising, which we felt was a bit unfair.

They Do Things Differently Here

They take netball seriously. The Silver Ferns are currently in a 3-match test series against Australia (the “Diamonds”) which is drawn one all at the moment, with the decider on Sunday.

How seriously do they take it? NZ’s top domestic drama series, This Is Not My Life, was moved from its regular 8:30pm slot for the netball to be broadcast live on tvnz One. That’s serious.