Mid Canterbury Combined’s Cory Adams takes the ball to the St Thomas of Canterbury defence during his side’s loss on Saturday. Photo Heather MackenzieTheir second half was probably the best they’ve played all season, but it wasn’t enough to save Mid Canterbury Combined from another loss in rugby’s UC Championship on Saturday.

They hosted a big and physical St Thomas of Canterbury side at the Ashburton College field on Saturday in the latest round of the Crusaders region secondary schools’ competition and went down 40-15.

Their winless season may have continued, but coaches Brent Middleton, Andrew Morgan and Warren Donald felt their young charges could well and truly hold their heads up high after the match.

St Thomas’ dominated proceedings in the first half, leading 26-3 at half-time, with Mid Canterbury Combined’s only points coming off the boot of Sam Ree.

“In the first half we turned over a lot of ball to be honest.

“Our ball retention … we were pretty disappointed in that,” Middleton said.

But, things changed in the second half.

“They played probably some of the best football they had played in the second half,” Middleton said.

Mid Canterbury Combined scored 12 second half points, to St Thomas’ 14.

“Against a side like St Thomas’, that beat Christchurch Boys, they played really well,” Middleton said.

“As we said to them, if they had held the ball in the first half all of a sudden it would’ve been a totally different game.”

Mid Canterbury Combined crossed for two tries in the match, with one going to Mark Gabriel and the other to Bob McDonald, while Ree added a conversion.

Middleton said the score wasn’t a true reflection of the game.

“If they can play that way for a full 70 minutes you never know what could happen.”

The Mid Canterbury Combined boys have a particularly tough ask in front of them in the next round though, in the form of competition leaders St Andrews, who they played pre-season in Methven.

St Andrews were the only unbeaten side after seven rounds of this year’s competition, with Nelson College currently sitting in second after handing Christchurch Boys’ High School their third loss of the season on Saturday.

By Erin Tasker © The Ashburton Guardian - 17 June 2019

Taonga Mbambo is off to university in America on an athletics scholarship. Photo Erin TaskerHe made a name for himself as a long distance runner here, but soon Taonga Mbambo will be footing it with some of America’s best.

Erin Tasker reports.

When it came to deciding where in the world athletics would take him next, Taonga Mbambo was spoiled for choice.

The 18-year-old former Ashburton College student – who has made a name for himself as both a long distance and cross-country runner – had four American universities approach him, wanting him on their athletics teams.

But one stood out above the rest, and that was La Salle University in Philadelphia, and in a couple of months Mbambo will pack his bags and board a plane bound for America, and the university that he will call home for the next four years, God willing.

La Salle is a private Christian university which was founded in 1863, and it is a National College Athletic Association (NCAA) division one school – the highest level of inter-collegiate athletics in the USA.

When Mbambo was in Denmark for the IAAF World Cross Country Championships last year, La Salle’s athletics coach approached Mbambo and spoke to him, and it was that personal contact which led to him deciding on La Salle as the place he wanted to study and compete out of.

La Salle offered Mbambo an academic and athletics scholarship which will start in August, and as the days tick down, Mbambo is a mixture of nerves and excitement.

It is hard to believe how far he had come in such a short time. Mbambo’s running career only started a couple of years ago, when he decided that after years of playing football he wanted a change.

He started running, and while he wouldn’t call himself a natural, found he loved it.

“It’s been a fun road, but it’s also been a long road,” Mbambo said.

Giving up football, which he loved, had been hard but it is a decision that he doesn’t regret.

He’d played football since he and his family moved to New Zealand from their native Zambia 11 years ago, when he was just seven years old. The family lived in Dunedin for the first seven years and moved to Ashburton four years ago.

Pretty much all Mbambo remembered, was life in New Zealand. He has few memories of life in Zambia, and leaving all he knew behind was daunting, but the move to America was something he knew he had to do.

It is a goal he’s had for a long time, and now that the dream is about to become a reality he is determined to live it, and make the most of every opportunity that comes his way.

“It’s like passing a test I already knew I was going to pass,” Mbambo said.

Although he’ll be living on the other side of the world, Mbambo still wants to represent New Zealand if selected for future cross-country and long distance track events, which would be his specialty at La Salle. He’ll run cross-country in the fall and winter, before moving to the track – both indoors and outdoors – over summer.

When it comes to his studies, Mbambo hopes to study business management or sports psychology, and maybe even do a double major. While he wants to go as far as he can with his running, he also knew the importance of an education.

Ideally, the Mbambos had been looking for a smaller university in a smaller city, so that Mbambo didn’t get lost in the crowd academically. They got half of what they were looking for.

La Salle is a smaller university, with only around 4000 undergrad students, but it is in a big city.

It has proven to be the perfect fit for the family, though.

Mbambo has put in the hard yards over the years, and at La Salle he’ll only go from strength to strength, literally. There will be so many opportunities to race, and the kinds of facilities many could only dream about at his disposal.

Until he leaves, he will continue to go to Timaru every week to train with his coach Craig Motley, who Mbambo said he was grateful to for everything he’d done to enhance his talent, to ensure he hits the ground running when he arrives in the US.

Mbambo said he is also grateful to the wider Ashburton community for the support and encouragement he’s received over the years, and particularly those from the St David’s Church community.

His mantra is ‘I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me’, from Philippians 4:13, and Mbambo’s father Henry – the minister at St David’s – is confident that his upbringing would set him in good stead for the future.

By Erin Tasker© The Ashburton Guardian - 15 June 2019

Ashburton Squash Club members (from left) Karlie McQueen, Brooke Cornish-Madden, Darnell Lima and Katrina Palmer are in Dunedin playing for the Midlands Squash team this weekend. Photo supplied.When the Midlands District representative squash team takes to the court in Dunedin this weekend, it will feature a strong Ashburton presence.

Four women from the Ashburton Squash Club made the cut for the team, which – on paper – looked to be a strong side which could well come up with the goods.

The tournament in Dunedin this weekend is the South Island teams event, where Midlands, Canterbury, Otago and Southland battle it out on court, with each district selecting three juniors, three seniors and two masters.

The four Ashburton players selected are Katrina Palmer, as the side’s number one senior, Brooke Cornish-Madden as the number one junior, Darnell Lima as the number three junior and Karlie McQueen as the number two master.

The Midlands district runs from Rakaia to Oamaru and inland to Methven and Waimate, so for the Ashburton Squash Club to have four women selected is an awesome achievement, Palmer said.

The tournament forms part of what is shaping up to be a big year for Cornish-Madden in particular, who has recently made the New Zealand under-15 ranking list at 16th, and is rapidly improving.

This weekend’s full-on competition will see three games played today and tomorrow, and Palmer said the Midlands men’s team was looking strong this year so they would be gunning for the title.

Mid Canterbury’s top two men – Lee Barker and Steve Leckie – were unavailable to play this weekend, while Agustin Maunier, who upset Barker at last weekend’s Methven Squash Open, had left his run of form too late to make this team but was likely to be a contender when it came time for the national teams event in Christchurch later this year.

The Midlands men’s team is this weekend headlined by Patrick Mulvihill, with Kediah Bungard at two and Thomas Pickles at three.

This weekend’s tournament is being hosted by the Otago Squash Club.

The full Midlands team competing in Dunedin this weekend is: Dave Laughton, Wayne King, Aaron Bungard, Patrick Mulvihill, Keidah Bungard, Thomas Pickles, Stephen Garner, Connor Bolitho, Liam Direen, Leanne Spite, Karlie McQueen, Sherry Howard, Katrina Palmer, Lily Rae, Stephanie Chambers, Brooke Cornish-Madden, Ashlyn Fenwick, Darnell Lima.

By Erin Tasker © The Ashburton Guardian - 14 June 2019