The 12 competing schools from last season all confirmed their entry at the end of 2020 and as was highlighted in 2019, the OSSRC and the school’s committed to the format for at least two seasons.

Format: Premiership/Championship double round-robin with 6 teams in each, based on 2020 rankings (see below). At the conclusion of the first round-robin, teams ranked 5^th/6^th are relegated to the Championship and teams ranked 7^th/8^th are promoted to the Premiership for a second round-robin., with all teams starting again on zero points. Teams will then split into 3 groups of four (top, middle, and bottom) to contest for the respective trophies. The ODT Cup will remain the pinnacle competition silverware and last year’s winners Otago Boys 1^st XV will be wanting to repeat again. aiming to secure their fourth consecutive title.

Changes from 2020 see St Kevin’s College starting in the Premiership and Mt Aspiring in the Championship and confidence will be high from both John McGlashan and Wakatipu after winning their respective sections last season.  A feature of the first round draw is the incorporation of 4 interschool matches amongst the boys’ schools, 3 of which will be played in Dunedin.

The competition kicks off the 15^th of May, the second weekend of Term 2 which is later than previous years to align with Sport NZ’s Balance is Better approach. Rugby, along with all winter and summer codes and Sport Otago, have committed to ensuring participants can fairly compete in their chosen summer sport and enable clear space between summer and winter codes. The OPS draw can be found at ORFU website HERE

OSSRC Chairman, Greg Heller, welcomed the later start “it is great that all rugby players can enter the season refreshed and energised and we are committed to working alongside all other codes to give our participants a quality experience”. All remaining boys secondary school rugby will start on the 15^th of May and the OSSRC Match Committee will soon ask for expressions of interest for team entries from school’s over the next few weeks.

Heller again expressed gratitude to those who support secondary school rugby “As a Council, we are hugely appreciative of the support from our loyal group of sponsors and grants providers, which helps to ensure that all teams are able to regularly travel widely to compete”.

For further comments please contact Greg Heller, 027 418 4032

Article added: Friday 05 March 2021