Weekend news roundup

Women's rugby alive and well in The Gulf (Photo:Sandy Naylor and Chris Bath)

New Zealand

Auckland finished top of the pool section of the New Zealand NPC and will meet Waikato in the semi-finals next week, while Wellington, who finished in second place after a 67-5 thumping of Bay of Plenty, will play Counties Manukau.Auckland confirmed their top place thanks to a 39-5 win over Otago in Dunedin, while Counties Manukau's 23-10 win over Waikato on Friday ensured they finished third.

Although Canterbury failed to make the final four, despite a 35-17 win over Manuwatu, they had something to celebrate when Kendra Cocksedge (has been nominated as a finalist for World Rugby's women's player of the year)became the first woman to score a career 500 points in women's provincial championship rugby when landed the third of her five conversions."It's a pretty good milestone for her," Canterbury coach John Sherratt said. "She's been a great contributor and it's a nice accolade for Kendra in what's turned out to be a pretty good year for her."Canterbury finished fifth overall.

Results:

Scotland

Next weekend will see the firstDonna Kennedy Cup, a new East v West fixture that is part of a suite of changes Sheila Begbie and Shade Munro are making to the Scottish women's game which will also see the Premier League decided by the end of November instead of March.

One result is that the six-team Premier League, which is just past its mid-point, will now have a two week pause in the programme. To allow for the earlier finish the league kicked off in mid August, making it one of the earliest starts for any European league. At this midway point four teams remain in contention - Murrayfield Wanderers, Hillhead Jordanhill, RHC Cougars and Melrose, with six points separating the four teams. Only Melrose are unbeaten, but they face something of a fixture backlog having played two or three fewer games than the other teams.  Murrayfield Wanderers are on top, having only slipped up in their opening game against Hillhead in August, since when they have beaten all-comers except for Melrose, who they are due to play in a rearranged game on 15th.

Rapidly losing touch with the top four are Cartha Queen's Park, and Stirling County. The latter is having a particularly difficult season and have so far conceded 425 points in just five games, with only a single try scored against Queen's Park in a game they lost by 44-7, and now seem favourites for relegation. However that was also newly-promoted Queen's Park's only win so far this season, so things are not yet decided, though the 2014/15 Division 1 champions have been slightly more competitive against the top four.

The Donna Kennedy Cup and changes to the league structure are key parts to the plans to develop and raise the performance of the national squad. During their last camp, in mid September, they were also introduced to their new assistant coach, Graeme Young, ex-Stirling County, who was inspired by Munro to join the team: “I’d coached Scotland Club XV a couple of years ago so I sat down and spoke with Sean [Lineen] and with Shade. To hear him talk about his vision for the women’s game, and it seemed like a really exciting time - a time of change - to be involved and a great opportunity.”

The players that took part in that first four-day camp were:Forwards: Karen Dunbar (RHC Cougars); Sammy Durnan (Stewarty RFC); Katie Dougan (RHC Cougars); Jemma Forsyth (Hillhead Jordanhill); Jade Konkel (Hillhead Jordanhill); Heather Lockhart (Hillhead Jordanhill); Louise McMillian (Hillhead Jordanhill); Sarah Quick (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lisa Robertson (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lucy Park (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lana Skeldon (Melrose); Ruth Slaven (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lindsey Smith (Hillhead Jordanhill); Catriona Syme (Murrayfield Wanderers); Emma Wassell (Murrayfield Wanderers); Jenny Johnstone (Hillhead Jordanhill); Tamsin Tyeson (Hillhead Jordanhill).Backs:Claire Bain (RHC Cougars); Nuala Deans (Wasps); Abi Evans (Hillhead Jordanhill); Megan Gaffney (Hillhead Jordanhill); Nicola Halfpenny (Melrose); Lauren Harris (Melrose); Caitlin Harvey (Caithness/RHC Cougars); Gillian Inglis (Melrose); Hannah Illingworth (Tynedale); Rhona Lloyd (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lisa Martin (Murrayfield Wanderers); Emily Irving (Ayr); Chloe Rollie (Melrose); Charlotte Runcie (Lismore/Aberdeenshire Quines); Eilidh Sinclair (Murrayfield Wanderers); Lisa Thomson (Melrose)

Gulf States

The Women’s rugby season in the Gulf States kicks off next weekend.

The women's rugby teams of the Arabian Gulf RFU (as the area was, and is, occasionally know) were one of the pioneers of women's international sevens, playing in many of the early women's tournaments, including the very first at Hong Kong in 1997. However in 2010 the IRB decreed that the Union should be broken up between the various gulf states, with the aim to develop the game more among the local populations. One consequence of this has been that no women's gulf teams have played international rugby since 2010 - but the women's game is alive and well and this year the women's season will begin with the “Gulf Rugby Women’s Rugby 7s Cross Border league” (Cross Border7s), whichseason kicks off in Zayed Sports City, hosted by Abu Dhabi Harlequins onOctober 9th.

Such is the growing popularity of women’s rugby in the region,representatives from the clubs met at the end of last season and it wasrevisited that the goal for women’s rugby would be to ultimately shifttowards 15s.Therefore for 2015-16 we will see slightly less 7s tournaments, finishingearlier in the season and potentially making way for some 10s tournamentsand the usual 15s regionals at the end.

Six Cross Border 7s tournaments running from October 2015 –February 2016, and culminating in the “Finals” hosted at The Sevensgrounds, home of the Emirates Airline Dubai Rugby 7s. Each tournament ishosted by a different club, many of which will also be competing in the Dubai 7s on December 3rdto December 5th.

The clubs taking part in the Cross Border 7s this year will be – Abu Dhabi Harlequins,Dubai Hurricanes, Dubai Sharks (new for 2015-16), Sharjah Wanderers,Heartbeat Tigers, Al Ain Amblers, Kuwait Scorpions and Doha Rugby Club.Many of these clubs will field 2 teams, and this season a couple is even setto field an unprecedented 3 teams.

The teams will be playing across 3 divisions – A, B, C with prior seasonresults determining initial placement into the divisions, and ongoing resultsdetermining ranking within the division. Movement will also occur betweendivisions – i.e. a team that wins the division B tournament will be‘promoted’ into division A for the following tournament.

Dubai Hurricanes and Abu Dhabi Harlequins have been the strong and formteams over the years, but the growth of the game in Dubai, may see a shiftin the balance of power. With the multicultural community in the Gulf,maybe women’s team are playing a brand of rugby mixing, strong Irish andSouthern Hemisphere influences, along with the more historicallytraditional British rugby structures. It does make for some unconventionalrugby.

(Thanks to Sandy Naylor and Chris Bath for the information)

Hong Kong

Hong Kong's domestic season began this weekend as the fomer British colony and now Chinese "Special Administrative Region" starts to count down to the Asian Olympic qualifier next month.

Although Hong Kong returned to China in 1997, it not only retained its separate membership of World Rugby but also its own National Olympic Committee, as a result of which it sends its own athletes to The Games.And when it comes to sevens Hong Kong have in recent tournaments edged ahead of China in Asia - only Japan would seem to stand between them and a place in Rio.

That rise to the top of Asian rugby is built on an expanding domestic game that has has grown this year to 25-team league, with 18teams(four more than last year) playing 15s in the Premiership and National leagues and a further 7 playing 10s in the feeder Development competition.ThePremiership has grown to sevens teams for this season, with the aim of becoming an eight-team league in 2016/17.Natixis Hong Kong Football Club are the new team in the league, joiningdefending champions Societe General Valley Black, Gai Wu, Borrelli Walsh USRC Tigers, Abacus Kowloon, SCAA Causeway Bay and Tai Po Dragons.

However the most significant change to is the introduction of a new competition - the Women's Rugby Super Series - to bridge the gap between the domestic and national games."The top 66 players will be split into three Barbarian sides which will play against each other, The goal is to better prepare and help transition players to full representative rugby," said HKRU Women's Development Manager Sam Feausi. "The Super Series will give coaches and selectors an opportunity to look at our best players and test combinations with an eye on the coming international season."

However it will not all be about the elite."On the other end of the scale, we will be monitoring how successful clubs are in introducing beginners and less experienced players to rugby and transitioning them from National 10s to higher levels of competition," added Feausi.

The intial round of matches suggest that the championship could be closer than many national leagues. No try bonuses being awarded and largest win was Gai Wu's 22-0 defeat of Causeway Bay. In other games Valley beat Tigers 17-0, and newcomers Hong Kong FC started well with a 20-7 win over Kowloon.

The league phase runs until the end of February, and we will revisit it at various points during the season.

Italy

Thenewly-expandedItalian league got underway this weekend, and Roberta Giraudo - manager of champions Valsungana - summarised the challenge his team faces toLo Strill One Sportivobefore their opening fixture:

"We have been preparing for a month, knowing that we have to pick up from where we left off last season. We are the team to beat and no one will give us anything. The rivals out there will be Monza, last years beaten finalists, Treviso, and Riviera del Brenta (although they will have changed a lot). And then we need to watch out for Colorno, who can tap into a large pool of support."

The champions go off to a good start with a 44-0 away win at Casale, but it was tough baptism for the new teams. The memorably-named Chicken CUS Pavia were thrown into the deep end with a home game against Rugby Monza - and came away with a 0-114 defeat; Rugby Cogoleto & Prov. Ovest also lost their opening game at home, in this case 0-36 to Torino; Rugby Club i Medici lost 46-0 away to Roma; Frascati 2015 were beaten 64-0 by Ragazze; and Donne Etruscan did best of all, but still went down 34-5 to Bologna.

Finally Benetton beat Colorno away 27-12.