A new format competition is giving West Auckland rangatahi the opportunity to play both tag and touch across a six-week competition.

Late last year the challenges for students wanting to play both tag and touch were recognised by Touch NZ, which was experiencing declining numbers in secondary school entries for touch, namely due to students being pulled between touch and tag.  Adding to this was the demand on many teams needing to travel which was further restricting access to play.

Sport Waitākere’s Regional Sport Director Casey Redman says that a united approach between Sport Waitākere, College Sport Auckland, Touch NZ and Tag NZ, is now giving students greater opportunity to play both codes.

“As a group, we developed a proposal for schools that shaped a new competition structure that could better meet the needs of local rangatahi. The process to create the structure was completed in early 2021 with a pilot model of a six-week competition, 3 weeks of touch followed by 3 weeks of tag with emphasis on participation and inclusion.

“The teams were mixed, all of our single sex schools teamed up with another to create a team and all games were played at school venues. By doing this we could eliminate cost and excess travel and make this an accessible opportunity for our schools,” adds Casey.

Ten teams entered the competition in term one and the new format has attracted positive feedback from across the schools involved.

Director of Sport at Rutherford College, Gill Bloxham comments: “It was so great to see so many students involved that probably wouldn’t be playing otherwise.”

Maia Lewis from College Sport adds: “This is a great structure and has increased the number of kids that are participating who usually wouldn’t.”

While the COVID alert level changes impacted the ability to complete the season, Casey says the learnings have been invaluable and help cement a strong future for both tag and touch within secondary school sport.

“Unfortunately Covid impacted on the ability to complete the season but the teams managed to fit in one round of each code this term. They hope to try again next year with the same model – we’ve now got a great foundation in place to continue next season.”

Article added: Wednesday 24 March 2021