{"id":13168,"date":"2012-08-04T14:04:20","date_gmt":"2012-08-04T12:04:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/08\/update-1-rugby-waikato-chiefs-demolish-sharks-for-maiden-super-rugby-title\/"},"modified":"2012-08-04T14:04:20","modified_gmt":"2012-08-04T12:04:20","slug":"update-1-rugby-waikato-chiefs-demolish-sharks-for-maiden-super-rugby-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-1-rugby-waikato-chiefs-demolish-sharks-for-maiden-super-rugby-title\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 1-Rugby-Waikato Chiefs demolish Sharks for maiden Super Rugby title"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>(Adds detail and quotes)<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocatio\/spann\">Aug 4 (Reuters) &#8211; The Waikato Chiefs powered to their first<br \/>\never Super Rugby title on Saturday with a sparkling 37-6 win<br \/>\nover the travel-weary Sharks in Hamilton.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Chiefs lived up to their billing as the most<br \/>\nentertaining side in this season&#8217;s championship and also<br \/>\noutshone the hardworking South African forwards to bury memories<br \/>\nof their final humiliation to the Bulls three years ago.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Chiefs made light of difficult conditions at Waikato<br \/>\nStadium and led through tries by Tim Nanai-Williams, Kane<br \/>\nThompson and Lelia Masaga before Sonny Bill Williams marked his<br \/>\nfarewell appearance with his side&#8217;s fourth and final effort.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Chiefs become the sixth winners in 17 seasons of Super<br \/>\nRugby competition, while the Sharks simply looked drained by a<br \/>\nthird straight playoff away from home and have now lost all four<br \/>\nof their final appearances.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Sharks shocked the Queensland Reds in a playoff and<br \/>\novercame the Stormers, who led the regular-season rankings, in<br \/>\nthe semi-finals but managed only a pair of penalties on Saturday<br \/>\nfrom France fly-half Frederic Michalak.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The boys were getting up in their faces,&#8221; Chiefs captain<br \/>\nCraig Clarke said. \u201cWe&#8217;ve got a heap of pride in our defence. We<br \/>\ntalked about not giving over and keeping them to no tries. \u201cThis<br \/>\nis awesome.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The South Africans trailed 13-3 at the interval and had been<br \/>\nthe best second-half team in the competition going into the<br \/>\nfinal but unravelled as they chased the game as the Chiefs ran<br \/>\nthe ball back and kicked intelligently.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;\u201cThe Chiefs were outstanding tonight,&#8221; Sharks captain<br \/>\nKeegan Daniel said. &#8220;\u201cThey were outstanding all season.&#8221;<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Adds detail and quotes) Aug 4 (Reuters) &#8211; The Waikato Chiefs powered to their first ever Super Rugby title on Saturday with a sparkling 37-6 win over the travel-weary Sharks in Hamilton. The Chiefs lived up to their billing as the most entertaining side in this season&#8217;s championship and also outshone the hardworking South African [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-13168","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13168\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}