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Billy Wallace competition Team of the Season

Jubilee Cup Premier | 05 August 2014 | Steven White

Above: Vaea Fifita on the burst for the Wellington Axemen against MSP B in a recent Hardham Cup match. Fifita finished fourth in the Best & Fairest competition despite his team only being eligible for points for 11 rounds out of a possible 20.

This year's second annual Wellington club rugby Billy Wallace Best & Fairest competition team would go pretty well together, we think.

His team came up just short of capturing what would have been a historic maiden Jubilee Cup title, but Wainuiomata's Ben Tupuola had already wrapped up the 2014 Billy Wallace Best & Fairest competition after the semi-finals. Tupuola finished on 22 points, just ahead of Hutt Old Boys Marist left wing sensation Chase Tiatia on 19 points who scored his 20th try of the year in 21 games including HOBM's two pre-season Spillane tournament matches, in the final on Sunday.

Tupuola was awarded the three points for being Player of the Day on five occasions, including in four consecutive matches in the Swindale Shield in rounds 7, 8, 9 and 10, and in the Jubilee Cup semi-final.

Tiatia was awarded three points for being the Player of the Day four times, all consecutively as well, in round 11 of the Swindale Shield and rounds 1, 2 and 3 of the Jubilee Cup.

MSP's openside flanker Issac O'Connor finished third on 15 points, despite missing his team's last three matches with a broken hand, and Wellington Axemen lock/flanker Vaea Fifita was fourth on 14 points despite his side being awarded points for the first half of the season only. Hardham Cup side and points in the second round were only awarded to ‘top eight' sides as only one Hardham Cup fixture a week was covered by Dominion Post reporters.

Based entirely on the order of finishing of the Billy Wallace Best & Fairest competition that has run over the past few months, we have named our second annual Billy Wallace Team of the Season.

In naming this team it is important to note that weight is given to players who have been selected in the position that they played most of their games in. Licence could have been made to list players here out of position or to move more players around (such as loose forwards). Indeed Fifita could have been named at either lock or blindside flanker. But he's at lock as he started there 11 times this season and seven times at flanker. Wainuiomata's Josh Robertson-Weepu is on the right wing despite playing games including Sunday's final at fullback. Similarly players in teams that finished higher on the points table are picked first in those incidences.?

In specific examples where two or more players have finished on the same points, James Proctor (Ories) is selected ahead of Greg Mullany (OBU) at first five-eighth as this pair both earned 11 points but Proctor played more matches at first five-eighth than Mullany (also a second five-eighth), and also because Ories finished higher than OBU.

At halfback, Johnsonville's Jack Taulapapa and Petone's Jared Kahu were two halfbacks that both finished on 6 points, but Taulapapa - the second Hardham Cup player in this selection - gets the nod as he started 14 matches at halfback and Kahu eight (also played at first five-eighth).