'Old man' of the backline very thankful
4th August 2010 09:18AM
By Evan Pegden Waikato Times
But he was thankful for the young talent around him as the skipper and his team-mates celebrated their Waikato Breweries Shield victory over Morrinsville Sports at Waikato Stadium on Saturday.
The big second five-eighth, who is a key figure on both attack and particularly defence in the Tech backline, was the calming influence along with first-five Sam Christie, who is only 23.
"Right through our team we've got young ages from two young fellas there at 18 right through to 21.
"Being only young myself at 26 it's really hard but the young fellas stepped up and have really shone for us this year."
An extra year of experience after losing last year's final to the same opposition had made the difference.
"It's good to get one back on them.
"Last year hurt us quite a lot, we went away in the summer quite unhappy and came back this year and made up for what we missed out on last year."
But Child admitted it had gone right down to the wire.
"They got that last try with about two minutes to go and my heart was pounding, I thought I was going to have a lazy heart attack but the boys came through.
"Great credit to Morrinsville; they played well right to the last minute."
Child said the Morrinsville blitz defence had made things difficult for their attack.
"Everyone knows we like to play a nice wide, expansive game and Morrinsville found something to shut that down and made it quite hard for us.
"There's nothing you can explain about finals rugby. You've just got to get up and ride the emotions as best you can and the best team comes away with the win at the end of the day."
EVAN PEGDEN
