With Saturday's 20-9 win over Waihi, Whangamata have kept their semi final hopes alive.  It'll be via the hard track though, thanks to Thames battling to an away 7-3 win over our next match up, Tairua.  So no favours offered here by Thames!

Saturday though, saw Whangamata post their 4th win on the trot, and with each game in the last month basically being a "win and we're still in with a chance of semi  final, lose and we're gone', the equation remains the same next week.

The first game of the season where the coaching staff could almost relax before the 80th minute.  With most every game this season going down to the wire, one way or the other, Whangamata comfortably dispatched cellar dwellers Waihou on Saturday.

While comfortable on the scoreboard 38-21, it was a little tougher than that wide margin would suggest, with Waihou closing to 9-16 shortly after the halftime break.  However, Whangamata was always in control, Waihou never really looked like scoring a try while the game was in the balance, with Whangamata's solid defence being impregnable.

It wasn’t pretty, it certainly wasn’t flashy, but it was was entertaining, nail biting, riveting, and ultimately, winning rugby produced by Whangamata in front of a large and vocal home crowd on Saturday

In a match where the lead changed hands with each score, the result was anybodies through to the final few minutes. But when Whangamata took the lead for the third and ultimately final time, 17-15 through an unstoppable James Lovegrove try. From there though, the Whangamata crowd, in full voice, carried the red and whites through to the final whistle. The win puts Whangamata into the top four, on equal points with Thames, but by virtue of the win, they hold the 4^th semi final spot – for now.

While the match was a scrappy stop-start affair, it was bound to be, with the match carrying the hopes of both teams for the remainder of the season. It was played with an intensity that would have done a final proud, neither side backing down an inch. It was an absorbing rugby encounter, with both teams gaining the upper hand at times, but neither dominating.

The old adage, ‘a wins a wins a win a win’ stands true for the ten to nil win over COBRAS. A horrible day for rugby, with at times gale force winds, rain showers, and the wind changing direction up and down the field all through the match seeing it pretty tough to play any sort of controlled football.

Whangamata played into the wind (mostly) in the first 40 minutes, and through staunch defence kept the home side scoreless, and in one of the rare forays into opposition territory, Pete Maisey managed to land a penalty goal to take the halftime score to three nil.

It was a classic game of two halves as Whangamata took on playing through champions Hauraki North. With a wind at their back, Whangamata led at the halftime mark 13-10, before losing the match 13-30, conceding a late try to blow the score out from a more realistic 13-23.

A bad start from Whangamata though saw the red and whites down by 0-7 almost before the spectators had taken their seats as blue wave after blue wave of North attack saw them dot down out wide after the Whangamata defence just ran out of numbers on the short side.