Scotty Stevenson's must-watch sports events this weekend

Scotty Stevenson pores over the weekend ahead to bring you his top five sports events to sink your teeth into.

It’s another weekend of early rises and late good nights but there is more than enough to reward sleep deprivation in this week’s buffet of Kiwi sporting endeavours. So here’s what you need to be across over the next few days.

The Ranfurly Shield was once the most coveted piece of lumber in New Zealand sport, and nothing could more accurately articulate how far provincial rugby has fallen down the pecking order of priorities than the fact it is on the line once more on Sunday and barely a word has been written or spoken about it.

For the record, Wellington will line up for a seventh defence of this current shield reign against North Harbour. The Lions are unbeaten in the NPC this year and will be favourites to extend their lifetime tally of shield defences to 43. North Harbour have only once held the Shield, defending it twice in 2007 before Waikato snatched it off them.

These matches used to be something rugby fans always looked forward to. That they now sail by largely unnoticed is as sad as it is shameful.

The White Ferns warmed up for their six-match tour of South Africa with a savaging of a local selection in Benoni overnight. With the appetiser out of the way, the main course is served on Sunday night with the first ODI against the Proteas in Potchefstroom.

I know what you’re asking: Where on earth is Potchefstroom, and what would one do there? It is 120 kilometres south-west of Johannesburg and, according to that august source of crowd-sourced knowledge, Tripadvisor, the number one attraction is the Mooirivier Mall.

Unfortunately, Tripadvisor user Skyliz has offered this review: “Mooirivier Mall is just another mall like any other, the only thing that's make it any different is the big waterwheel at the front of the main entrance.”

The White Ferns will be far more interested in wagon wheels than water wheels and there were plenty of encouraging signs for the batting line-up this morning. Brooke Halliday top scored for the Ferns with a well-paced 87, while there were also significant contributions from Maddie Green (63) and Hannah Rowe (48). Youngsters Izzy Gaze and Georgia Plimmer also showed significant improvement with the willow.

The 232-run victory is a good dress rehearsal, but the full-strength Proteas will be a level up for the White Ferns. Starting well will be crucial, and to that end all eyes will be on a re-jigged pairing of veteran Suzie Bates and debutant Kate Anderson on Sunday night.

As discussed earlier in the week the Springboks are the mad scientists of the global game right now, and they have once again packed the bench with seven forwards and just one back for Pool B’s crunch match against Ireland. The last time they tried this, they crushed the All Blacks 35-7 at Twickenham. Yikes.

What’s on the line? In all likelihood a quarterfinal showdown with New Zealand, instead of hosts France. It seems odd to be considering this the better outcome, and Antoine Dupont’s possible tournament-ending injury suffered in this morning’s match against Namibia may reconfigure that equation, but both Ireland and South Africa would fancy matching up with New Zealand more than playing the hosts in front of a partisan Parisienne crowd.

In yet another week of limited contests, this is the match with most riding on it from a New Zealand point of view. The All Blacks still must navigate their way through Italy next week to be assured of a quarterfinal spot but if that result is not as close to academic as they get, then the game here is in more trouble than Robert Falcon Scott’s return leg.

For the masochists, an honorary mention goes to Wales v Australia on Monday morning. Wales will essentially qualify for the quarterfinals with a victory, simultaneously sending Eddie Jones and his team home to face those ‘pessimists’ in the press corps who so unfairly sent the team off from Sydney on a flight of low expectations several weeks ago.

Liam Lawson’s ability goes head-to-head with Formula 1 reality this weekend in Japan. The 21-year-old Kiwi has been given another chance to impress for AlphaTauri with Aussie veteran Daniel Ricciardo still recovering from the hand injury that opened the cockpit for Lawson in the Netherlands.

Having finished P9 last weekend in Singapore (AlphaTauri’s best result of the season), Lawson has displayed an uncanny ability to take the bottom-placed constructor’s car to new levels. He knocked out reigning world champion Max Verstappen in qualifying last week, while simultaneously learning the art of Formula 1 driving. Lawson is very much the genuine article.

That’s the ability part. Now to the reality. Formula 1 is not exactly a meritocracy when it comes to the contracting of drivers, and the fact Lawson has earned points this year in just three Grands Prix while Tsunoda, in his third season as a contracted driver, has yet to score any does not necessarily mean Lawson will leapfrog his friend into a full-time drive. Teams do make other considerations around business relationships (Tsunoda has been heavily backed by AlphaTauri’s engine supplier, Honda) and marketing potential of nationality. Japan is a much bigger market than little ol’ New Zealand.

Most pundits are predicting Tsunoda and Ricciardo to be re-signed, possibly this weekend, but there is an intriguing battle looming between the hometown hero and Lawson, who has been driving this season in the Japanese Super Formula Series.

As Jolyon Palmer wrote in F1 Unlocked, “With Tsunoda not competing in the last couple of races we don’t know categorically the relative performance of Lawson still".

“In Monza Tsunoda broke down on the formation lap from a promising grid position and he was swiped off by Perez at the start in Singapore.”

There is no greater sports story in New Zealand this year than the resurgence of the Warriors. As much as the on-field performances have warranted the up-tick in attention, it has been the fans who have really made this a year to remember.

The scenes at Mt Smart last weekend, as the home side trounced the Knights to advance to the final four, were incredible to witness. Brandishing banners by the bootload, and launching into a full stadium a Capella rendition of the team song to wrap the evening, Warriors’ fans proved once again they are the most colourful, loyal, and joyful fans in the country, and there will be plenty of them singing their way into Suncorp Stadium on Saturday night.

Administrators of certain other sporting codes, in particular the one starting with R and ending in Y, must (and should) have watched Mt Smart shake with delight last week and picked their tightly clenched jaws off the floor.

The level of connection with the Warriors this year is a salutary lesson to all sports to get out of the fans’ way. Like it or not, and (weirdly) Warriors chief executive Cameron George didn’t seem overly enamoured of it during his last appearance on TVNZ Breakfast, Up Da Wahs is the kind of organic, fan-driven, abundantly resonant and cheerfully confident symbol of support we’ve seen in this country in decades.

Not for the Wahs’ fans the dour blackness and six-track playlist of certain other oval ball events. Not for them the price of admission and a digital ticket stub as flimsy evidence of deep connection. Warriors fans truly feel a part of something and – importantly – add so much to the fun of watching the team play.

The Warriors are no great winners at Suncorp Stadium, but if their fans have a say on Saturday night, we could be set to extend the run of New Zealand sport’s greatest show, for one more week at least.