It was a cold dose of reality for Steelform Whanganui in Lower Hutt on Saturday as a slightly under-strength and younger side lost 41-0 to a stacked Wellington Centurions RFC.

Playing in frigid and wet conditions with a strong breeze from one end of the ground, a Whanganui team still trying to nurse injured veterans through to the start of the Bunnings Heartland Championship could not match the deep roster of home talent for firepower, and being wearied in the second half went into their shells somewhat.

With anointed first-five Te Atawahi Mason a late injury withdrawal, his club-mate and apprentice player Rehimana Meihana stepped into the role, along with new reserve forwards Jonty Bird and Jay Tora playing their first senior Whanganui games.

Other players new to this season had starting positions ahead of absentees, and facing a quality opponent who has remained unbeaten against Whanganui in five years of preseason, the task was always going to difficult.

Down 19-0 at halftime despite having had the advantage of the wind, Whanganui only found the going tougher as Centurions brought on their big bench and some of their stronger players began to find more gaps.

They also got the shine of the referee whistle at the breakdown, although differing interpretation only explains away so much given Whanganui’s isolated carriers and difficulty controlling the slippery ball.

You only had to look at the resumes of some of the Centurions try-scorers to see why they had the ability to maintain simple but effective structure in adverse conditions.

No8 and former NZ Under 20’s rep Jeremiah Avei-Collins ran amok early with a try and two assists, including to his fellow 2024 Wellington Lions player in halfback Mitchell McLeod – Avei-Collins only becoming less effective following a jarring tackle from Whanganui centre Shaun O’Leary.

Regardless, soon the ‘bomb squad’ of the Centurions were ready to come onto the field early in the second half.

They helped push veteran lock Teofilo Paulo, 37 tests for Samoa and 26 Super Rugby games for the Blues, over to reopen the scoring, with yet another Lions squad member in reserve prop Salesa Seumanufagai twisting through tacklers to reach the line minutes later.

Whanganui halfback Cody Mitchell tried to marshal direction where it was lacking before handing over to the returning Daniel Kauika, who only lasted a few minutes before suffering a devastating dislocated kneecap, adding another headache to coach Jason Hamlin’s backline plans.

“Reihana comes into more calculation [now] as a halfback, that’s the reason we took the apprentice and there we go.

“I thought [the new players] did really well - Jonty came on and did his role in terms of scrum-time, he’s only going to get better at that sort of thing.

 “Jay Tora came in and did some good things as well, so really stoked.”

Another piece of good news was after his long injury layoff, 2024 incumbent hooker Alesana Tofa was able to get some precious minutes near the end of the match in the loose forwards, after apprentice forward Atriane Marino had already come on at rake for Taranaki import Matt Picard.

“He’s like a caged lion the last couple of weeks. He’s been wanting to go and we’ve just been ‘nah, hold you back’, and he was alright,” said Hamlin of Tofa.

“This week will be really key around what [hooker] looks like for us, but he come up really well and we’ve got some options.”

Beyond that, the younger and second-tier squad members had been through a bit of a humbling process ahead of the start of Heartland.

“There was so many things we’ve been working on that went right for us, but we didn’t execute the top-end stuff,” said Hamlin.

“We got into position a lot, where we wanted to be in terms of how we structure our defence, and then we didn’t make one-on-one tackles and we didn’t finish the job off.

“You’re going to have discrepancies around referee calls and how they see it, but that’s something we’ll have to keep working on.

“There were parts of it we looked pretty poor, and I know they were tired and cold [at the end], and there was a lot of walking in our game that we’re trying hard to get away from.”

Centurions  41 (J Avei-Collins, M McLeod, F Rayasi, T Paulo, S Seumanufagai, J Walmsley, D Johnson   tries; S Uelese 2 con, I Campbell con) bt Whanganui 0. HT: 19-0.
 

By Jared Smith