Champions!

The most important game in New Zealand Rugby history was about to begin. The game that would really show who was the the real number one team in the world. The All blacks were in the final showdown with the very fortunate French side. The All Blacks were heavy favourites with undefeated streak, while France had already lost two pool games against New Zealand and Tonga!

I was watching the event on tv. The atmosphere was huge! Even I was getting nervous just watching the crowd build! The crowd roared before and throughout the game. The game was about to begin. The two teams were about to jogg onto the field. They came onto the field and sang their national anthems (I stood up and sang it too!). The All Blacks performed their fearsome haka and the match was about to begin.

France came out flying quickly getting the ball into their possession. Surprisingly the French were not kicking the ball away as they normally did in their recent games. Instead they were using the ball spreading it quickly around the park trying to counter the might of the All Blacks defence. France were on the front foot in the first 20 minutes, dominating the set pieces with strong scrums and decisive line outs.

The All Blacks needed to establish themselves as the dominate team in this game. So they capitalized on a chance close to the Frech try line with a beautiful set piece move ending up with the prop Tony Woodcock cashing in for the first points. This was a big kick coming up, Weepu was given several chances to take the lead for the All Blacks but was denied both times. This kick would give the All Blacks a bit of breathing space but unfortunately Piri Weepu failed to convert. They went to halftime with the lead being 5-0.

The All Blacks were struck with yet another injury to young gun Aaron Cruden forcing Stephen Donald to come on and make his debut in the World Cup! Fortunately Donald stepped up to the challenge and converted what would be the winning penalty! I was ready to faint in the dying minutes of the game with the clock ticking and the French behind by 1 but having the ball inside the All Blacks half. I nervously watched on as the clock ticked....... YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The All Blacks were given a penalty, all they needed to do was win the line and hold onto the ball. YEEEEAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!! THE PLAGUE IS FINALLY OVER!!!!!! 24 YEARS OF WAITING HAVE FINALLY COME TO AN END!!!!!!!!!

by Tanielu

Term 2 Highlights

Man,what a term it’s been! I mean it’s been one of the hardest term’s I’ve gone through! There were so many trainings I had to attend for the schools sports teams, designing signs to go around our school, producing PENN and much more.

One of the many highlights for me this term was participating in the schools Rugby team. I really enjoy training with my mates and we are doing really well this year and are hoping that we can go all the way. So far we have won the Auckland East tournament and are heading into the Auckland champion of champions tournament this Wednesday! Another thing that was related to Rugby throughout the term was some of my friends and I making the Bill Mclaren East Auckland team. I have really enjoyed the trainings and cannot wait for the tournament to come up!

Being able to go to the annual ‘I am making movies 2’ awards at the Auckland Museum was another highlight, making the actual movie was a highlight but making the finals for best documentary is a true honour. It was a wonderful experience especially getting to listen to an awesome all men choir! They were outstanding and really set the night!

Although this term would be the term where I was challenged the most physically it was still an enjoyable one. It was an amazing experience for me, especially sports. It’s been a term that I will never forget when I go onto college.

Immersion: Creativity with Ms Tito

For this term our theme is “Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger”. In other words we are studying how technology has changed over the years. To help us out with what we have to learn, we have immersion classes. The first rotation activity our class did was “Creativity”. Ms Tito was the teacher for this activity so I was sure that this would be fun!

As part of our task we had to create a way of creating our name in anyway possible. The whole senior team could enter this competition and the prize would be to throw water balloons at your class, including the teacher!!! I looked around the classroom seeing many cool designs. I knew that this task was not going to be easy!

When I was thinking about some ideas I looked around the class room and saw people already starting! That showed me that I really needed to pick up before time ran out! I had an idea but it was quite complicated. In the end of the session I had just finished in time, I don’t think it was my best work that I have done but I just hope it would be good enough to be a contender at least.

At the end of the day I really enjoyed the activity and I would like to do it again!

By Tanielu