How to watch rugby

Your Correspondent was at the habitually excellent Otago Farmers Market by the railway station this morning, getting the habitually excellent bacon buttie and large flat white which constitutes Saturday brunch - as well as further salacious extract of oink to see me through the day, today being Eat Only Pig Day by imperial decree of me, just then. On the ridiculously long railway station platform stood one of the Taieri Gorge tourist excursion trains doing its prelaunch checks. However, the crowd milling on the platform didn't look like a tourist crowd. Middle aged, male, paunchy, uniformly dressed in Otago jerseys and All Blacks jackets, the odd sly durry or can of Speights in hand, they gathered in clumps like Central Otago tussock on the plains of the station platform. Didn't look like the usual catering arrangements either, judging by the slab after slab of Speights and the tray after tray of Marlows Pies that were being shovelled into the buffet car like the action of a demented coal-train stoker. Meanwhile, a brass band murdered songs you didn't like anyway, while a small stall flogged overpriced blue-and-gold bunting and trinketry to staunch Southern men attempting to wear cobalt-and-saffron coloured jesters' hats with some form of stoicism.

Ranfurly Shield challenge, I remembered. Awesome.

The Ranfurly Shield is one of those misty-eyed old traditions of NZ provincial rugby that you'd hate to see go by the wayside with the march of progress, in the same way there was a little inward cheer when the Sheffield Shield was reinstated in Australian state cricket. The Ranfurly Shield an old-fashioned challenge trophy which runs alongside the regular-season provincial competition games - whoever holds it, defends it whenever they play at home. For much of the past ten years the Log of Wood has effectively been the Auckland-Canterbury Perpetual Shield, but in recent years some of the smaller unions have managed to nick the Log off the big boys, starting with North Harbour a few seasons back. They had a street parade, a civic reception from the Mayor of North Shore City, and got so ludicrously off-chops that they lost their next game (a semi-final, so not counting for Shield challenge honours) by a week and a half. Currently Otago's Highlander mates from down the road, Southland, have the Log in their pool room having kicked Canterbury's teeth in at the half-finished AMI stadium in Chch last year, on their way to an excellent season for the Stags.

My adopted province of Otago, who haven't held the shield since 1957 (and who were cheated out of it by a dodgy last-minute penalty vs Canty in '94, the nearest they've come since) play Southland tonight in Invercargill. It's more than just a Shield challenge; in the past year or two Southland have taken the ascendancy over Otago in terms of the strength of the Highlanders provinces, and while it sucks less than losing to fucking Canterbury, it still sucks to lose to your little brother at backyard footy. Otago are rebuilding under ex-Reds coach Phil Mooney, who blooded most of the kids who've made Ewen McKenzie look good this year in the Super Umpteen (can't remember what number we're up to now), are coming off a loss in the first round of the provincial ITM Cup, Southland off a win... there's more than just the Log riding on this. But, in a sort of heartwarming, old-fashioned sort of way, it's the Log that matters. Certainly does to the middle-aged blokes on the platform at the Dunedin railway station. Even if it's just an excuse to get a leave pass from the missus and get away with the boys for the day. Most of the carriages looked to have been booked by supporters clubs or by local companies - something of a corporate box on rails - and as far as I can tell, if you can come up with a more elegant way to organise an away trip to a game of footy, you'd be onto something. That, my friends, is the way to watch rugby.

The ABs-jacket-and-durry brigade are one half of the usual rugby crowd at Carisbrook, and presumably will be at the new, shiny, roofed and better-bloody-get-finished-before-RWC2011 harbourside stadium which will replace the old concrete box at the Brook. The other half - not that it's a half any more, given the dwindling numbers involved - are of course the students, the scarfies, the lifeblood of the town, insert further cliches here and pause for editing. Except these days the students don't go to the rugby, for a whole smorgasboard of reasons, all of which related to Gen Y and Z being overentitled little brats who see university as a fee-for-service degree factory and not an enriching cultural experience for the betterment of their personal development. Last time Southland played at the Brook, Stags kids outnumbered Otago scarfies two to one. They won, too.

Which brings back into question the point behind building a $200M plastic-lidded stadium (it's not $200M as-budgeted but probably will be once all gets tallied up), which despite noises made by the council and the developers about concerts and events, will be a rugby venue first and foremost. It's a brilliant, beautiful thing. Awe-inspiring. Will be a wonderful place to watch the game. BUT NOONE'S WATCHING ANY MORE. Interest in the perennially choking All Blacks has never been at a lower ebb in NZ, and all levels below that are practically flatlining. Even if just for a few weeks at the height of the FIFA World Cup, football was the number one sport in the country. Didn't last - though the Phoenix haven't kicked off in the A-League yet, that will give a better long-term barometer of whether football's made a leap forward - but even to be in the position where rugby's hegemony is being questioned is an indicator of just how far it's fallen.

Still, the Corporate Name Stadium Underwritten By University Coin will be a bloody good way to watch rugby. Even if it's not quite as awesome as booking out a train carriage with pies, Speights and mates, and talking complete rubbish over a few cans while the rolling green hills of Southland rush past the windows. Because when it comes to sports-watching missions, there's nothing like a roadtrip. Except, perhaps, a railtrip.

Hope it makes up for Otago getting smashed in the Shield challenge later on though, cos they will.

The Doctor is OUT.