Dear Editor, I write to express my disappointment at the Rarotonga rugby club competition.

With four senior teams, one would think that it would have been ideal for each team to play two rounds (six games each) plus the finals. No, only one round is played (three games) and rugby enters its finals this weekend. So the two finalists will get to play five games this season, and two of the teams only get to play four times. Last year (2022) there were only three teams in the competition, and the team that didn’t get into the final played five games. Work that one out!

I believe the rugby union is rushing the season so that it can host a club team from New Zealand on 10 August. So what? I also hear that preparation for the Pacific Games is being used as one excuse to get the season over and done with. So how many of the current crop of rugby players are going to the games? Are they just going to work out at a gym for the next four months?

In the 1970s and 1980s, a lot of the senior rugby players were playing at least twice a week, with Saturday club games and Wednesday shield fixtures. When teams arrived from New Zealand (and there were a lot of them in the 1970s), the players in local teams not involved in the mid-week shield clash, would be pulled together to play the visitors on a Monday or a Tuesday!

If your season is going to last only four weeks, why bother. 

Moana Moeka’a                                                                                                       

Ruatonga