Hopes of decent-sized crowds for club finals dashed

The Dunedin club finals for rugby and netball are going to be played in front of one man and a dog.

After the Government decided to leave the rest of New Zealand, excluding Auckland, at Alert Level 2 for at least another week, the club finals in Dunedin for two of the most popular sports are going to go ahead with zero or very limited spectators.

Level 2 allows gatherings of 100 or fewer.

The Dunedin premier club netball final will be played on Saturday between College and Southern at the Edgar Centre.

Dunedin Netball Centre operations manager Lee-Anne Anderson said it was disappointing to not have a crowd but rules had to be followed.

Many of the games had been live-streamed and that had proved to be very popular as they could be watched by family and friends around the country.

The Dunedin Metropolitan rugby competition was set to have a big finals day at Forsyth Barr Stadium with games set to start early in the morning going through to the premier grade final between University and Taieri in the middle of the afternoon.

The Otago Rugby Football Union and the council of rugby clubs were due to make a decision last night but it appears unlikely any games will be played at the stadium.

Most games will simply be switched to club grounds with the home ground of the highest qualifier hosting the game. The premier club final is most likely to take place at University Oval No6, near the Caledonian Ground.

The Otago primary schools cross-country championships had been postponed from last week and was scheduled for this Friday but has been canned.

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