Sponsors’ Day at Waitemata, and it was good to see Ian from Cityguard in attendance, who is our major sponsor.

Eden brought a strong supporter base and, with it, 92-year-old Tom O’Hanlon, who is very agile for his age.

It didn’t take long from kick-off for us to put ourselves under pressure, and two tries later Eden were up 12–0 after 15 minutes.

However, this side of ours has some grit, and we brought ourselves back into the fight with two tries — one after a nice backline move, the other after a succession of phases close to the line.

Another Eden try made it halftime, with Eden leading 19–12, but you felt Waitemata were right in the battle.

After halftime, our boys started to take some control. The lineout was functioning well, with both Z and Daniel Lawrence winning their own ball. The improvement in our lineout has been due to the hard work Ben McMillan has put in.

Daniel Lawrence once again was a colossus. He is a non-stop wrecking ball coming at the opposition with his hard-hitting tackles or his “put my head down and go” approach when running at defences.

I was taken by the work of the No. 7, Bernard Trevor. Only a small fella, but he makes up for his size with determination. His defence and tackling around the scrum were exemplary, but it was his ball handling that had me leaping up when he had the ball.

The fullback, Kyan, continues to improve, and he has a lot of confidence now with the ball in hand. Very adept under the high ball, and his willingness to counterattack shows that he is keen to have a crack.

Cooper got the start at No. 9 this week and is making steady progress with his clearances, while Aratz, the Spanish boy, has settled into whatever role Sooty wants to use him in.

I was impressed with our defence, and both Boaz and Lani were very solid and never allowed Eden to make any inroads on attack.

Unfortunately, we had to play “golden oldie” scrums, but that didn’t deter Jayden Ale (from our Under-21 side) from making his mark.

Already having played a full 80 minutes for our Under-21 side, he busied himself around the field, taking return kick-offs and getting a taste of Premier Rugby. Well done, young fella!!

We got to 19–19 with a cracking try from Lani after eight phases, with the ball being swung from one side of the field to the other. Patience and good passing saw them in at the corner. Very impressive.

Then the confidence kicked in with tries by the winger and Z, and we were in command at 34–19 with 10 minutes to go. Maybe our naivety didn’t allow us to slow down the game or find the corners. Before we knew it, Eden scored two quick tries and THAT penalty, which gave Eden the win, 36–34.

The boys must have felt deflated after that, but from the Weasel’s view, he couldn’t be more proud of the effort and the improvement from the start of the season.

The day started with a whopping 40–10 victory for the Under-21s over Pakuranga. I watched a little of that on the livestream, and this side is on a roll at present, but we are due for a few tough matches coming up in the next few weeks.

The Weasel is putting these reports on the website to promote our communications, as there is little in the way of press coverage for local rugby. The Weasel’s views are personal and not the views of the club, and in my endeavour to provide you with some commentary, I may overstep the mark. If that is the case, I apologise for any offence caused.

We have a week off over the King’s Birthday weekend, and we are back on 6 June, heading out east to Pakuranga in the hope that we can secure our first win.