World Footy News

Sunday 13th December will see the much awaited Wellington Grand Final between the undefeated Eastern Suburbs Bulldogs and the Hutt Valley Eagles who won four and lost four. The Wellington season was disrupted by weather conditions causing the cancellation of the Lightning Premiership, Round 9 and Preliminary Final but as those involved with international footy would know, it is about getting the season finished regardless.

The Bulldogs will be gunning for their third Premiership in a row and their fourth in five years and it is hard to see them being seriously challenged given their complete dominance of the local season and competition, having lost just one game in three years. This is a Club that has former NZ Falcons captain John Jackson and current coach of Wellington’s all conquering NPC side as coach. It has 11 members of that victorious team likely to be playing in the final with Andrew Eastwood, Joe Fiu, Charlie Graham, Peter Halstead, Rocky Leofo, Danny Morgan, Ambrose Plaister, Graham Rattenbury, Mac Ta’avao, James Terry and Liam Townsend in the squad. Topping that list off are former NZ Falcons or squad members in Guy Ferguson, Wayne Harvey, Taoho Patuawa , Isaac O’Connor , Byron Roff and the great Mike Severinsen, with Canterbury NPC player Stan Chung and Waikato NPC player Luke Kneebone also involved. In a word, it is star-studded and surprisingly, considering it has had 46 players have a game during the season, it does not have one Australian in the whole squad.

However it is just two hours of footy and everyone knows that things can happen. Leading the Eagles outfit is current Wellington captain James Kusel, said to be one of the very finest footballers produced in the Wellington region by long time Wellington football identity Neil Hargreaves. It is certain that Bulldogs coach Jackson will be looking to curb his influence on the game but he must not be too focused on Kusel as the Eagles’ captain has a great support cast. Tough on-baller Troy Lavery, speedy linkman Lachlan Keating and strong key position players in Sam Sherring, Brendan Carrick and Lenny Reeves will make this one hell of a contest. Cameron Heka, the NZ Hawks U20 vice captain in the recent matches against the VAFA U18 side will also be sure to have an effect on the outcome. Both Heka and Reeves were involved in the extended squad for the 2008 International Cup Falcons so they are obviously quality players.

WFN looks forward to reporting on what promises to be a great game of football very soon.