Shield draws crowd in resort

Magpies are attracted to shiny things, which is why it may come as no surprise a Hawke’s Bay hand managed to touch the Ranfurly Shield in Queenstown yesterday.

Injured Otago flanker James Lentjes told them to relish the moment — "I told them it’s the last time they’ll be touching it for a while, but they’re pretty adamant they’re going to get it this weekend".

The log o’ wood continued its tour of the south yesterday, making a quick stop in the resort — the first time it has been there since 2013.

Just one super-fan, 11-year-old Arthur Lund, turned up to see it at the Wakatipu Rugby clubrooms yesterday morning, before it started grabbing more attention outside Speight’s Ale House.

But, when it made its way down The Mall to the waterfront, the Shield was mobbed almost instantly by residents and visitors from all over New Zealand, keen to have their photo taken with it, including Gisborne’s Glenys Openshaw — whose cousin is married to Ian Foster.

Lentjes said the Shield tour, which had included stops in Balclutha, Roxburgh, Alexandra, Wanaka and Ranfurly, had been well received, particularly by the older generation who better understood the significance of last Sunday’s win over Taranaki.

"The kids come down, but I don’t think the kids know too much [about it], it’s more from the older folk that know it took so long to get here.

"The people that hadn’t seen it for 57 years, until 2013, they always come out and see it and they’re happy to because they know sometimes it goes away for a long time."

Otago will first defend the shield this Sunday at Dunedin’s Forsyth Barr Stadium against Hawke’s Bay — a team that took it from them in 2013 after just nine days.