North Harbour too strong for Japan in PNC warmup

The Pacific Nations Cup tournament kicks off this coming weekend, involving Fiji, Samoa, Tonga, and Japan. The latter played a warmup game against New Zealand province North Harbour in Albany, but went down 23-19 despite a comeback.

North Harbour had led 16-0 at halftime on Friday, and had a 23-7 lead in the second half, but Japan came back late to score two tries in the last 12 minutes as they kicked into gear with their tries scored by Shota Horie, Alisi Tupauailei, and Koji Wada.

North Harbour were pleased with the international scalp as they beat the Japanese side, Asian Five Nations champions, in their first game ahead of the domestic season.

Unforced errors stopped both sides from capitalising on good chances throughout the game, but the local side, who were outscored by three tries to two, came out on top in the end.

Japan play Fiji in their opening Pacific Nations Cup match in Lautoka this weekend. Coach John Kirwan hopes to bring a positive style to the game, and make sure his side put in the same effort as was seen against North Harbour.

"There will two different styles on display that will make for good rugby," he said. "Everyone went away from last year's game satisfied that the two teams played rugby.

"Obviously, we lost but if we can play right there to the very end and everyone plays to their ability then the result does not really matter."

After posting a poll on the Facebook Page, the majority of users said they’d like to see highlights from this game, so here they are. It’s a short clip, but includes the tries. To see what else is taking place this weekend, have a look at the fixtures here.


Time: 01:56

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