{"id":8747,"date":"2012-03-09T15:01:34","date_gmt":"2012-03-09T13:01:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/03\/rugby-chiefs-hold-off-crusaders-to-win-in-napier\/"},"modified":"2012-03-09T15:01:34","modified_gmt":"2012-03-09T13:01:34","slug":"rugby-chiefs-hold-off-crusaders-to-win-in-napier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/rugby-chiefs-hold-off-crusaders-to-win-in-napier\/","title":{"rendered":"Rugby-Chiefs hold off Crusaders to win in Napier"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

March 9<\/span> (Reuters) – The Waikato Chiefs held off a late
\nbarrage to beat the Canterbury Crusaders 24-19 in a bruising
\nSuper Rugby encounter in Napier on Friday.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The Chiefs, who upset the Auckland Blues last week, scored
\ntries either side of halftime through flanker Liam Messam and
\nprop Sona Taumalolo while flyhalf Aaron Cruden punished the
\nfrequent Crusaders penalties with 14 points from the boot.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The Crusaders, playing what was technically a home match,
\npicked up from a disappointing first half performance with a try
\nfrom Robbie Fruean after the break but still slumped to a second
\nsuccessive defeat after losing to the Highlanders last week.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

They will particularly rue scrumhalf Andy Ellis’s attempt at
\na quick dropout from his 22 midway through the second half,
\nwhich backfired for Taumalolo to crash over the line under a
\npile of bodies moments later.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The Chiefs had the best of the first half and but for two
\nmissed penalties from Cruden would have had a bigger lead than
\nthe 16-6 advantage they held at halftime.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Flanker Messam had made the most of the Waikato pressure to
\nbarge over the line in the 26th minute and Cruden added the
\nextra points and three penalties.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The seven-time champion Crusaders applied some pressure
\naround the break and centre Fruean got over the line eight
\nminutes after the restart after a rampaging run and neat offload
\nfrom number eight Kieran Read.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite Taumalolo’s try, two penalties in three minutes from
\nCrusaders flyhalf Tyler Bleyendaal made it a two point game at
\n21-19 soon after the hour mark but Cruden slotted his fourth
\npenalty three minutes from time and the Chiefs held on.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“In patches there it was great for us,” Crusaders captain
\nRead said in a pitchside interview. “But we couldn’t sustain it
\nand too many penalties killed it for us.”
\n\u00a0 Continued…<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

March 9 (Reuters) – The Waikato Chiefs held off a late barrage to beat the Canterbury Crusaders 24-19 in a bruising Super Rugby encounter in Napier on Friday. The Chiefs, who upset the Auckland Blues last week, scored tries either side of halftime through flanker Liam Messam and prop Sona Taumalolo while flyhalf Aaron Cruden […]<\/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-8747","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\/8747","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=8747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8747\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}