Ranfurly Shield
Encyclopedia
The Ranfurly Shield, colloquially known as the Log o' Wood, is a trophy in New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

's domestic rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 competition. First played for in 1904, the Ranfurly Shield is based on a challenge system, rather than a league or knockout competition as with most football trophies. The holding union must defend the Shield in challenge matches, and if a challenger defeats them, they become the new holder of the Shield.

The Shield is currently held by Taranaki, who won it from Southland in Round 12 of the Round Robin in the 2011 ITM Cup
2011 ITM Cup
The 2011 ITM Cup is the 35th provincial rugby union competition in New Zealand, the sixth since the competition reconstruction in 2006 and the second under the new sponsor of ITM ....

.
Although the professional era of rugby has seen competitions such as the National Provincial Championship
National Provincial Championship
The National Provincial Championship, or NPC, is the major domestic rugby competition in New Zealand. The NPC has seen many alterations to its format and brand. Since 2006 the National Championship has been split into 2 competitions, the ITM Cup and the Heartland Championship...

 and its successor, the ITM Cup, and Super Rugby
Super 14
Super Rugby is the largest and pre-eminent professional Rugby union competition in the Southern Hemisphere...

 detracting from the pre-eminence of the Ranfurly Shield, many still regard it as the greatest prize in New Zealand provincial rugby, thanks to its long history, the fact that every challenge is a sudden-death defence of the Shield, and that any team, no matter how lowly, has a chance to win.

History

In 1901 the Governor of New Zealand
Governor-General of New Zealand
The Governor-General of New Zealand is the representative of the monarch of New Zealand . The Governor-General acts as the Queen's vice-regal representative in New Zealand and is often viewed as the de facto head of state....

, the Earl of Ranfurly
Uchter Knox, 5th Earl of Ranfurly
Uchter John Mark Knox, 5th Earl of Ranfurly GCMG, PC was a British politician and colonial governor. He was Governor-General of New Zealand from 1897 to 1904.-Early life:...

, announced that he would present a cup to the New Zealand Rugby Football Union, to be used as the prize in a competition of their choosing. When the trophy, which actually turned out to be a shield, arrived, the NZRFU decided that it would be awarded to the union with the best record in the 1902 season, and thenceforth be the subject of a challenge system. Auckland, unbeaten in 1902, were presented with the shield. The shield was also designed as a trophy for football, not rugby. This was because the picture in the centrepiece was a football one. The picture was modified by adding goal posts on the football goal that comprised the picture, to create a rugby scene.

Auckland were on tour in 1903 and did not play any home games, and thus did not have to defend the Shield. Their first defence was against Wellington
Wellington
Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...

 in 1904, and was unsuccessful.

Since the introduction of the National Provincial Championship in 1976, all home games a Shield-holder plays in the NPC or its successors, the ITM Cup and Heartland Championship
Heartland Championship
The Heartland Championship New Zealand Division One competition, known for sponsorship reasons as the AA Rewards Heartland Championship, is a domestic rugby union competition in New Zealand. It was founded in 2006 as one of two successor competitions to the country's former domestic competition,...

, are automatically challenge matches.

Auckland hold the record for the greatest number of consecutive Shield defences which stands at 61 matches between 14 September 1985 and 18 September 1993. During this period Auckland took the Shield on tour to provincial unions that, mainly for financial reasons, would be unlikely to be able to mount a challenge for the trophy. While dismissed by some critics, usually because of the one-sided scores, it was widely regarded as a success by those involved.

In 1994 when Canterbury wrestled the Shield from Waikato, the shield was in battered condition, with large cracks, chips and peeled varnish. Nearly a century of use had taken its toll. Canterbury player Chris England, skilled in woodwork, fully renovated the Shield, bringing it back once again into pristine condition.

Challenges

The Shield holder at the end of each season is required to accept at least seven challenges for the following year. All home games during league play, but not during knockout playoffs, in the ITM Cup or Heartland Championship
Heartland Championship
The Heartland Championship New Zealand Division One competition, known for sponsorship reasons as the AA Rewards Heartland Championship, is a domestic rugby union competition in New Zealand. It was founded in 2006 as one of two successor competitions to the country's former domestic competition,...

 are automatic challenges. The remaining shield defences must be made up of challenges from unions in the other domestic competition. For example, since North Harbour, an Air New Zealand Cup (now ITM Cup) team, held the Shield at the end of the 2006 Cup season despite losing their home quarter-final to Otago, they were forced to defend the Shield against Heartland Championship teams during the 2007 pre-season. Having successfully done so, all their home fixtures in the round-robin phase were Shield defences until they lost the shield to Waikato.

The Shield-holder is never forced to defend the Shield in an away match, although they may choose to, as Auckland, for example, did on a number of occasions during their record tenure as Shield-holder between 1985 and 1993. More recently, Auckland played both their mandatory defences against Heartland teams in 2008 on the road.

If a challenger successfully takes the Shield, all of their home matches for the rest of the season are defences of it.

Proposed rules changes

In August 2008, the New Zealand Rugby Union released a competitions review that proposed dramatic changes to the Ranfurly Shield rules:
  • Once a team has successfully defended the Shield four times, all of the holder's subsequent matches in league play would be mandatory defences, whether home or away. The Shield, however, will not be at stake in semifinals or finals.
  • If an Air New Zealand Cup team holds the Shield at the end of the league season, that season's winners of the Meads Cup and Lochore Cup, the two trophies contested in the second-level Heartland Championship, will receive automatic challenges in the following year.


The changes were not implemented, but did receive support from Auckland, which held the Shield when the NZRU released its report.

Past shield-holders

Union Won Successful Defences
Wellington 1904 4
Auckland 1905 23
Taranaki 1913 6
Wellington 1914 15
Southland 1920 1
Wellington 1921 2
Hawke's Bay 1922 24
Wairarapa 1927 2
Manawhenua 1927 2
Canterbury 1927 1
Wairarapa 1928 8
Southland 1929 3
Wellington 1930 1
Canterbury 1931 15
Hawke's Bay 1934 2
Auckland 1934 1
Canterbury 1935 4
Otago 1935 8
Southland 1937 0
Otago 1938 5
Southland 1938 11
Otago 1947 18
Canterbury 1950 0
Wairarapa September 2, 1950 0
South Canterbury 1950 0
North Auckland 1950 2
Waikato 1951 6
Auckland 1952 0
Waikato August 23, 1952 6
Wellington August 1, 1953 5
Canterbury 1953 23
Wellington September 22, 1956 4
Otago August 24, 1957 1
Taranaki September 28, 1957 13
Southland 1959 0
Auckland 1959 2
North Auckland 1960 1
Auckland 1960 25
Wellington 1963 0
Taranaki September 7, 1963 15
Auckland 1965 3
Waikato August 27, 1966 0
Hawke's Bay September 24, 1966 21
Canterbury September 27, 1969 9
Auckland August 28, 1971 1
North Auckland September 18, 1971 6
Auckland August 26, 1972 0
Canterbury September 5, 1972 2
Marlborough July 28, 1973 6
South Canterbury August 17, 1974 1
Wellington September 3, 1974 1
Auckland September 21, 1974 10
Manawatu August 21, 1976 13
North Auckland 1978 5
Auckland 1979 6
Waikato September 7, 1980 8
Wellington August 1, 1981 4
Canterbury September 18, 1982 25
Auckland September 14, 1985 61
Waikato September 18, 1993 5
Canterbury September 3, 1994 8
Auckland September 23, 1995 3
Taranaki August 24, 1996 1
Waikato September 8, 1996 1
Auckland October 4, 1996 6
Waikato October 5, 1997 21
Canterbury September 23, 2000 23
Auckland October 11, 2003 2
Bay of Plenty August 15, 2004 1
Canterbury September 5, 2004 14
North Harbour September 24, 2006 3
Waikato August 25, 2007 0
Canterbury September 1, 2007 1
Auckland September 29, 2007 5
Wellington September 20, 2008 6
Canterbury August 29, 2009 4
Southland October 22, 2009 6
Canterbury October 09, 2010 2
Southland July 23, 2011 2
Taranaki August 24, 2011 1

Total number of successful defences

Team Successful
Defences
Auckland 148
Canterbury 129
Hawke's Bay 47
Waikato 47
Wellington 42
Taranaki 36
Otago 32
Southland 22
North Auckland 14
Manawatu 13
Wairarapa 10
Marlborough 6
North Harbour 3
Manawhenua 2
Bay of Plenty 1
South Canterbury 1

Number of times the Shield has been Won

Team Shield Wins Average
Successful
Defences
Auckland 16 9.25
Canterbury 14 9.21
Wellington 10 4.2
Waikato 8 5.88
Southland 7 3.14
Taranaki 5 8.75
Otago 4 8
North Auckland 4 3.5
Hawke's Bay 3 15.67
Wairarapa 3 3.33
South Canterbury 2 0.5
Manawatu 1 13
Marlborough 1 6
North Harbour 1 3
Manawhenua 1 2
Bay of Plenty 1 1

External links

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