Front row: Tevita, Joe, Slade, Tony.
A few years back, if you'd told me that Slade would be on the bench because there were more in-form front-rowers in the Union, I'd have thought you were extracting the urine. But that's what happened this season. Tevita was dynamite. Some people were starting to think that the Islands' ability to produce props who possessed scrummaging ability, handling skills, ticker, consistency, and fitness to last a full game, had died with the retirement of Olo Brown. Tevita has proved them wrong. Naturally, with all these qualities and being quite possibly our most consistent performer of the year, he didn't get selected for the Tongan team and won't get selected for the Blues, either. Joe's leadership skills were required on the couple of occasions that Ronald Cribb extended the widely misunderstood Massey Hand and Boot of Friendship - and he fronted up. He will probably move to Wellington some time soon. Tony played as well as the season he got selected for the All Blacks but he lives about fifteen kilometres too far north at the moment. If he doesn't get a contract with Auckland expect to see him at Munster soon.

Middle row: Troy, Greg, Marty.
Our policy of importing players to compensate for being bent over and vigorously reamed by the transfer desires of the Big Five (The Scum, Bovine Erotica, Legal Limp-Dicks, Sheep-shaggers, and Lentil-munchers) has paid off once more. Van Humphries and Giacheri served us well previously and Rawlinson was better than both. Marty Veale shocked the rugby world by moving from Canterbury despite their generous offers of as many sheep in dresses as he wanted. He evolved as a rugby player and as a human being. We salute you, Marty. Troy had a storming second half of the season to be the form lock of the NPC, and he seems to have worked hard on his composure. Consequently, he was binned by a referee with no penis and overlooked as a back-up by John Mitchell in favour of Cantabrian Norm Maxwell - whom he stole four lineout takes from a couple of weeks ago.

Back Row: Craig, Matua, Ron.
Ron was very good. Apart from that, he loves playing for us and he wasn't lured to Canterbury a few years back. He could take a dump on my front porch and I still wouldn't turn against him. The others were okay in patches. They need to grow their dreads back.

Halfback: Chad, the other guy who wasn't very good.
Chad was an inspirational genius. Some tool on the radio who may have been Doug Golightly or Graeme Hill but may not have been said it was a shame that teams saw fit to import players, because it did nothing for New Zealand rugby. I say fuck New Zealand rugby. North Harbour comes first in my book and has done since the NZRFU decided to kill rugby in the provinces by making the five Super 12 bases so strong. Then again, I'm Scottish so I gave up on international rugby in 1991 (briefly flirting with it again in 1999). The other guy who wasn't very good, wasn't very good. I think he plays for North Shore.

Fly-half: Nick, Luke.
Lucky Luke was injured. (What a pun! I should be a rappa. I iz a lyrical gangsta. Word to yo Mamma, y'all.) This turned out to be a good thing because Nick Evans was sensational. He will move to Otago next year to cover Tony Brown. Luke will go wherever his manager can get him the best contract - possibly overseas. He might turn out to be the greatest genius we ever let go. Or he might stay and be average. This is known as the Willie Walker Phenomenon.

Centres (inside and outside): Andrew, Anthony.
We had the best defence in the division so these guys must have been okay. Andrew was evidence of what happens when a slightly-better-than-average club player has heart and tackling ability. He was my favourite player because he hurt people and he looked like he'd just been released early from a ten-year non-parole at Pare. I hope he doesn't read this. If he does, my name is Barry Shaun and my residential address is in Glenfield but I live in Forrest Hill. Tuitavake was exciting, despite the best efforts of Russell Jones to keep him off the field. He scored a few tries and made heaps of clean line breaks.

The Back Three: Tusi, Hosea, Rudi, Rico.
Hosea was frighteningly good. He will probably move to Canterbury. Rudi attacked well, looked pretty quick, missed a few too many tackles. Rico didn't play much but carved up in the last couple of games. Tusi had the best last three games of a season in his North Harbour career.

Administration: Plentiful and generally inept.
If they could get contracts signed as well as they can drink then we'd be champs. Probably. (For legal purposes, I have no idea if they drink a lot and if they do then I can assure you that the pot is having a yarn to the kettle about colour and shading.)

Coach: Russell.
We came third to last. I think he's from North Shore.