A large crew of hard core South Island Warriors fans, boarded a special Air New Zealand charter flight in Christchurch this morning, so they could cheer on their team against the Dolphins in the qualifying game in Auckland.<\/p>\n
The Christchurch Airport departure lounge rang with chants of “Oooo ahh, up the Wahs” as fans waited to board the aptly named Wahs Express.<\/p>\n
One mega fan had only booked her flight the night before. “I’m scared, I’m scared for the game, but I’m excited, super excited,” she said.<\/p>\n
Broadcaster Lana Searle, who hosted the flight, said the nerves were real. “I feel like I woke up and I was going to get named in the team, that’s how nervous I feel.”<\/p>\n
Another fan had decided to brave his fear of flying for the occasion. “I’m really nervous about the flight and really nervous about the game, but I don’t fly well, so there’s a whole lotta nerves… can’t miss it eh?”<\/p>\n
League legend Awen Guttenbeil was also on the flight. “When a team’s winning, everyone wants a piece of it,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I’m confident the boys will get the job done, but finals footy, anything can happen, and the Dolphins are a very good team.”<\/p>\n
Hardcore fans boarded the “Wahs Express” from Christchurch this morning, saying the turnout proves the Warriors are “not just the Auckland Warriors” but the whole country’s team. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n
Searle said there was a reason the charter flight had proven so popular in the south.<\/p>\n
“They aren’t just the Auckland Warriors, they’re the New Zealand Warriors, and this just proves that. There’s a collective feeling across the country that they’re our team.”<\/p>\n
Disembarking in Auckland, one passenger described the flight as amazing. “Everybody’s bouncing, it was awesome.”<\/p>\n
Another South Islander arriving said the team meant more than just the game itself. “These guys, whether it’s a league game for 80 minutes a week, are giving people something to dream for.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A large crew of hard core South Island Warriors fans, boarded a special Air New Zealand charter flight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597954,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[158,111,43,139,577,69,3006],"class_list":["post-597953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-christchurch-canterbury","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nrl","tag-nz","tag-warriors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597953\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}