50 years of the Billy Wallace Trophy: Part 7

Celebrating 50 years of the Billy Wallace Best and Fairest Wellington Premier club rugby competition. The Billy Wallace competition has been contested annually since its inception in 1966. Players in every Premier match are awarded points on a 3, 2 and 1 basis.

Part 7 below profiles the winners between 1996-2000

1996
Winners: James Ogden and Paul Moran
Position: Both first five-eighths
Clubs: Ogden Poneke and Moran Marist St Pat’s 
Best and Fairest points accrued: 16
About: The two first five-eighths emerged as joint winners after the last afternoon of the season, with competition leader Moran forced to watch from the sidelines as Ogden and three others that were involved in the Jubilee Cup and Hardham Cup finals had chances to catch or overtake him. His MSP team wasn’t in the finals, but four players still alive were: Wests flanker Hemi Pou, Johnsonville flanker Sene Ta’ala, Ta’ala’s teammate and fullback Trent Eagle and Poneke flyhalf Ogden - who started the final three points adrift of Moran. Poneke beat Wests 9-8 in the Jubilee Cup final, with Ogden, who four years earlier was playing social rugby for Ories, kicking a penalty into the wind and drop kicking two goals to nudge them to victory. For his effort, Ogden was awarded Player of the Final and he drew level with Moran. Ogden also finished the 1996 season as the highest points scorer with 221 points, ahead of Petone’s Simon Mannix with 219 and Moran with 2013.

1997
Winner: Richard Watt
Position: Lock
Club: Poneke
Best and Fairest points accrued: 20
About: Poneke went from Jubilee Cup winners in 1996 to Hardham Cup contenders in 1997. The party was still going at Kilbirnie throughout the summer and other clubs were hungrier than Poneke when the Swindale Shield rolled around the following year. Poneke captain Richard Watt was still one of the best locks in the competition and he picked up steady points throughout the first round and into the second. After an unbeaten round-robin campaign, Poneke beat Wellington 36-29 in their Hardham Cup semi-final and then Oriental-Rongotai 16-15 in a tight final, with No. 8 Dave Lolo scoring the winning try 10 minutes from fulltime. Billy Wallace winner Watt accumulated 20 points, heading off Avalon halfback Mitchell Forbes with 19 and a trio of loose forwards on 18, Poneke’s Lolo, Sene Ta’ala and Hemi Pou of Wests. After first representing Wellington in 1989-90, Watt played some matches for the Lions in 1998-99, before retiring to later become Poneke’s coach. Now assistant coach of the Lions and Hurricanes.

1998
Winner: Gavin Hill
Position: No. 8
Club: Oriental-Rongotai
Best and Fairest points accrued: 16
About: Former Auckland Warrior rugby league player joined Ories in 1998, who two years earlier had been threatened with relegation and a possible merger with another club, possibly Poneke. In 1997 they almost beat Poneke in the Hardham Cup final (see above) and in 1998 they won the Hardham Cup, securing their future. Hill, alongside another Ories newcomer, New Zealand Maori pivot Steve Hirinui, was at the forefront of their resurgence. Hill scored the key try of the 39-13 final win over HOBM, after a tighthead scrum win and pushover. Hill went into the final trailing HOBM’s Doug Power and Upper Hutt’s Mike Robinson by two points. Robinson’s season was over, but Power just needed a point to win or share the competition. But it was Hill who grabbed 3 points and Power none and he got up to claim the Billy Wallace outright. Goal-kicking forward Hill remained at Ories until 2000 and later coached in the Wairarapa and Auckland.

1999
Winner: Hemi Pou
Position: Loose Forward
Club: Western Suburbs
Best and Fairest points accrued: N/A
About: Wests were at the peak of their powers in the late 1990s, having won the Jubilee Cup in 1998. Hemi Pou was a rugged and uncompromising blindside flanker with a smart rugby brain. He had featured in the Billy Wallace competition previously and was just a couple of good performances away from winning it in 1997.Pou, who had made his debut for Wellington in June 1999, led Wests into battle in some big Jubilee Cup round-robin clashes. He was Player of the Match in a 19-13 win over Petone and featured strongly in a 19-14 win over MSP, a game that also saw young loose forward partner Rodney So’oialo star. But then their season ended abruptly when they were bundled out of the semi-finals by MSP,15-16. Pou played matches for the Lions between 1999-03. Post rugby he entered the fashion business and was a nationally ranked jiu jitsu exponent. He currently works with the Rongotai College First XV and with youth in Wellington’s eastern suburbs.

2000
Winner: Scott Waldrom
Position: Openside flanker
Club: Avalon
Best and Fairest points accrued: N/A
About: The first winner from Avalon, after Paul Tainui had won it for forerunner club Naenae Old Boys in 1971. Also the sixth flanker to collect the Billy Wallace winner’s cheque in the previous decade. Scott Waldrom had burst out of St Pat’s Silverstream and into Avalon’s Premier side the previous year. Avalon were in the Hardham Cup in 1999 but 2000 was the start of a successful several-year period when they could have and perhaps should have made at least a couple of Jubilee Cup finals. In 2000, Waldrom’s Avalon finished fifth in the Jubilee Cup. Despite two tries by Waldrom, they lost 21-29 to Poneke in the last round, while Johnsonville pulled out a bonus point win against Ories to leap from sixth to fourth. Waldrom had done enough by then to win the best and fairest competition. He made the Wellington Colts in the rep season that followed.