The crucial win moves Hastings into third on the ladder while Havelock North now sit in sixth spot – at serious risk of missing out on a semifinal spot for the Maddison Trophy.<\/p>\n
There are only two rounds remaining before the semifinals.<\/p>\n
Havelock North had led 26-14 at halftime and extended that lead to 33-19 at one stage in the second half, before Hastings Sports launched their comeback. <\/p>\n
Highlanders and Magpies halfback Folau Fakatava, who played two tests for the All Blacks in 2022, came on at halftime for Hastings and was instrumental in lifting his side.<\/p>\n
Hastings Rugby and Sports halfback Folau Fakatava in action in a previous season. Photo \/ Paul Taylor <\/p>\n
He set up two of his side\u2019s four tries in the second half, and also had some nice touches in the build-up to the other two.<\/p>\n
Thompson said he was a welcome addition, having finished his Super Rugby season.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously its great having an All Black and a Highlander come back into the mix, with our young boys, it always picks everyone up, so having him back is great.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said it was a great match and his side had a lot of belief they could win.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe knew the first half wasn\u2019t our best half, but we were still in the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe cut out mistakes, and we showed in the second half we were good enough to come back and win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hastings Rugby and Sports coach Jason Long said they\u2019d suffered a couple of close losses this season, so it was great to get a close win and finish the game out.<\/p>\n
He was rapt with the entire team\u2019s effort and paid special mention of Uregei, Fakatava, Jo Fuimaono, and Oscar Sowman.<\/p>\n
Hastings winger John Lameko also scored a great individual try to open the scoring, while Havelock North\u2019s Cooper Flanders showed his class setting up a try and scoring one. <\/p>\n
Hastings Rugby and Sports 36 (John Lameko 2, Louie Uregei 2, Blake Tresidder, Max Gomez tries; Oscar Sowman 3 con) defeated Havelock North 33 (Nehemiah Lauvao, Jesse Paewai, Tom Brock, unnamed, Cooper Flanders; Will Cole 4 con) HT: 14-26.<\/p>\n
Other results: Napier Tech defeated Napier Pirate 24-22, Napier Old Boy Marist defeated MAC 74-5, Taradale defeated Bridge Pa 99-7.<\/p>\n
Table: Taradale 20, Napier Old Boys Marist 20, Hastings Rugby and Sports 19, Napier Tech 17, Napier Pirate 16, Havelock North 14, MAC 14, Bridge Pa 1.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The crucial win moves Hastings into third on the ladder while Havelock North now sit in sixth spot…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":734940,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,9826,67976,303,10970,55138,260957,21694,65604,355279,9492,72099,23445,47,8936,20664,9664,760,304129,85,47867,355280,319,10593],"class_list":["post-734939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bay","tag-beat","tag-black","tag-club","tag-comeback","tag-comefrombehind","tag-former","tag-hastings","tag-havelock","tag-hawkes","tag-helping","tag-late","tag-north","tag-over","tag-produce","tag-return","tag-rugby","tag-shone","tag-sports","tag-stage","tag-thrilling","tag-to","tag-victory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/734939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=734939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/734939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/734940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=734939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=734939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=734939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}