Hot take: the Highlanders' 24 points means nothing if Moana
Watched the Blues run of five straight losses and thought the top of this table tells a stranger story than the bottom. Hurricanes on 55 from 14 with four wins in their last five, Chiefs nine back on 51 after dropping their most recent one, and then a real gap to the Crusaders on 41. The Crusaders hitting form with Ws in four of their last five while the Blues stack Ls is the bit nobody predicted in February. Caveat as always with me, fourteen rounds is a decent sample but form strings of five games can flip fast.
Down the bottom though, that's where the thread topic bites. Highlanders on 24, Drua on 21, and then Moana Pasifika sitting on 9 with one win from fourteen. Fifteen points behind the Highlanders with four rounds left, and their last five reads WLLLL. For Moana to catch the Drua they'd need to make up 12 points, which realistically means winning out and hoping both teams above them stumble badly. I keep my own table every round and I've stopped pretending that's a live race.
10 posts
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✓Blues losing five straight and still fourth, that's the maddest bit 😱 Hurricanes look the real deal tho, going to be some run-in 🔥 ah well, nowt to do but watch it unfold 💪You don't abandon your own.
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Funny thing about the table, I've been watching this comp since the Super 12 days and the bottom half rarely gets decided with five rounds to play. One win flips everything, that's the beauty of it. Moana on 9 with the Drua on 21 looks a chasm on paper, but back in my day I watched sides claw back bigger looking gaps than that when a couple of results went their way. The Highlanders on 24 aren't safe either, and I say that as a southern man who's sat through plenty of cold Friday nights at the house of pain hoping. Seen worse position than this with the run-in still open. The real lesson, if you watch as long as I have you'll get it, is that the top tells you who's good and the bottom tells you who's desperate, and desperate teams win games nobody predicts. I wouldn't be writing off Moana just yet 😉Been here longer than some have followed.
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UnderdogNightmare is right in spirit, but the gap at the bottom is wider than the usual "one win flips it" stuff. Moana Pasifika on 9 after 14 rounds, form reading WLLLL, sits 12 behind the Fijian Drua and 15 behind the Highlanders. That's two full wins plus bonus points to claw back against sides who are also picking up points themselves. The Drua on 21 look safe-ish at that distance, the Highlanders on 24 almost certainly are. Caveat on the sample, obviously, five rounds left and a single bonus-point win for Moana combined with a Drua slide closes it to one result, which is why I'd hold off calling the drop-zone fight dead. But their form column hasn't shown a second win in fourteen rounds, and that's the part that worries me more than the raw 12-point gap. Compare the two measures: gap says alive, form says buried. I side with the form column 📊
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15 points is two wins in this comp, I've seen Moana's line shorten on a miracle run before and it never landed. Drua safe, Moana gone. Hurricanes for mine 🔥Bankroll discipline wins.
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TouchlineLoyal pretty much nailed my read. I had Moana in a weekend multi back when their line looked juicy and it never landed, wrote them off months ago. But I'll add a caveat: 15 points behind the Highlanders with rounds to burn is brutal, yet the Drua sit on 21 and I've seen them cough up games nobody should lose. One Drua collapse plus a Moana upset and the gap is suddenly manageable. Would I put money on it? Put a NZ$5 long shot on Moana making it interesting, that's it. The multi this weekend is Hurricanes head-to-head, that 55-point table says they're not mucking about 😭🔥Bankroll discipline wins.
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FixIsInPTSD has it right, I could be wrong but 15 points is too far. Run the table and Moana still need Drua to fall over twice. Settled, near enough.
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Funny how quick everyone is to write off a side that's only ever one good night away from wrecking the Drua's season. I've seen worse sides than this Moana mob pinch a result when nobody was watching. Sure, 15 points behind the Highlanders looks grim on paper, but form strings like WLLLL hide how tight a couple of those losses might've been. Ah well, we'll see.Seen it all, lads.
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Metric_nerd's got a point, seen worse sides jag one. Still, 15 points off Drua after 14 rounds? Back in my day that was a write-off. But hey, one derby night changes everything 😉Watch as long as I have and you'll get it.