Kevin Hare: Heartland Championship enthusiast on the weekend's Lochore and Meads finals

The Heartland Championship has reached grand final weekend, with North Otago hosting Horowhenua Kapiti in the Lochore final and Mid Canterbury hosting Thames Valley in the Meads final. 

Kevin Hare is a Heartland Championship enthusiast, and he spoke with Adam to preview the finals this weekend. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the All Sport Breakfast podcast with Darcy
Waldgrave from News Talk SEDB.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Heartland Championship drawing to a close for twenty twenty five
this weekend the Big Meads Cup Final. Today we'll see
Mid Canterbury hosting Thames Valley and Ashburton they're not too
far away from there. Tomorrow the Hall Cup North Otago
hosting Hoderford to a carpity. So let's have a preview
of these two grand finals. Our guru on all things

(00:33):
Heartland Championship Rugby as Kevin here, who joins us now,
morning to you, Kevin, and we're at finals already. It
goes fast, doesn't it.

Speaker 3 (00:41):
It certainly does. Good morning, Adam. Yeah, hey, it's what
a weekend of rugby we've gotten. Don't worry about that
NPC rubbish. We're at. We're at the pointing end now
of the Heartland kicking off this afternoon, but yeah, and
finishing on Sunday with the with the Haw Cup, so yeah, Martin,

(01:04):
really looking forward to it. Two great games to come.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Yeah, we'll get to the Meats Cup one for this
afternoon very shortly, but let's start with that one tomorrow.
Kevin you mentioned the Hawk Cup final for twenty twenty five.
North Otago have home ground advantage at the Maheno Domain
just south of Amuru there and they have traveling down
from the North Island hot if inother corpany what do
you make of this one?

Speaker 3 (01:26):
Yeah, well, Harris and I've jumped through the back door
literally from eighth place after their huge victory last weekend
against Wangmanili and you know, eighteen all at full time
and then they when they headn't scored twenty two points
an extra time. What you know, it was like against
Womanli at Cook's Gardens, So no one really saw that coming.

(01:48):
I knew it will be a close match. But North Otago,
I mean they snatched the victory from the jaws of
defeat literally against Poverty Bay when they went over for
a last second, tried to take out that forty eight
to forty six. And well, yeah, they get to host
Harfanilla and I've had sort of a mixed bag of

(02:09):
results against them in recent years. They haven't played this
year and around Robin, but the last time they did
play was in Amaru and harfan actually got up for
that one by sixteen points to fourteen. But the last
time the horror Fanilla actually before that in north Otago
was almost like eight years ago before that, and so

(02:32):
it's a few and far between these games. I've only
played thirty four games in north Otago are leading sorry,
Horrafanilla are leading this by nineteen games to fourteen with
a drawers, So north Otago home advantage. You know, it
all depends on how the north Otago guys all go
kicking and all that this weekend. But yeah, I'd have

(02:55):
to lean to north Otago even I'm in North Island
at heart. I think north Otago they've showed that they
can get out of the yeah, get the close games
and get them done.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Well, alright, well we'll lock that in. Yeah, and it's
another North South battle for today's Big Meads Cup final.
This is of course the top qualifying competition for the
twenty twenty five Heartland Championship and ash Burton will be
playing host to their seam mids Canterbury. And of course
also in North Verst South Battle Kevin, we've got Thames

(03:29):
Valley traveling down trying to defend their twenty twenty four title.

Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah, and you know, just by a coincidence, first game
of the season Teams Valley thirty four, Mid Canterbury fifty
up there at ye. So we've done the full circles,
started off with them and now we're going to sort
of end this afternoon with them and Teams Valley.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
I mean they've been going. At one point they were
in ninth position on the table, and after they picked
up a couple of losses, they sort of finally got
there their game plant into action in Quinn Collard, you know,
he's been kicking them right less than center. But this
was almost like a heavyweight title fight in itself between
Tom Recki from Mid Canterbury and Quinn Collard. I mean,

(04:12):
if we look at the stats between these two guys,
Tom Reky has had forty one conversions and nine penalties
and a try for one hundred and fourteen points. But
Quinn Collard, well, he knows how to cross the line
a bit more because he's had forty two conversions nine penalties,
but he had scored seven tries and is about to
crack one fifty this afternoon. And so it's going to

(04:36):
come down to which kicker plays the best game basically,
because if I either of them get injured early on
this afternoon or whatever, it could be damaging. And the
last time Mid Canterbury actually or sorry tam Zali, actually
one down in Mid Canterbury would have been back as

(04:57):
we have a quick looking at my stats here, that
would have been back in twenty nineteen. So it's sort
of been a hometown sort of okayness, they didn't win
in twenty twenty three, but that was a playoff game.
But yeah, all Mid Canterbury teams, Okay, I'm gonna I'm
gonna go for the home team only because they're unbeaten

(05:20):
and they'll be wanting to sort of share the record
of an unbeaten season with their neighbors to the south
in the South Cantabriyanto a couple of years ago. So yeah,
Mid Canterbury for me to win by six points.

Speaker 2 (05:35):
Okay, well, there you go. The two southern teams are
Kevin's pick. Thanks for chatting as always, Kevin, and enjoy
the big weekend. Is the Heartland Championship draws a close
for another year. Thanks for your time.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
Yeah nah, awesome man yet and good luck to all
the teams and get on and support them they need it.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
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