The past year has been another incredibly difficult one for almost everyone but particularly for those in local sport as the pandemic continues to force restrictions upon us.

The latest outbreak saw the Counties Manukau Steelers and Heat forced out of their respective national provincial competitions and created major headaches for the Counties Manukau Rugby Union as they faced full expense bills but without the income to offset them.

Pukekohe Netball Centre completed all but the final week of their season, meaning the final in each grade was never played. Club rugby league was forced to cancel their season at the playoffs stage – meaning a whole season of slog was for nothing. The local football season was halted over 80 percent of the way through the regular season – just enough to expect promotion and relegation to take place but not enough to ensure the right clubs were the ones moving.

Lockdown pushed the start of the club cricket season right back and meant we lost the Spark Regional Competition involving Hamilton and Waikato Valley teams.

No club sport was possible from mid-August until early December – and both winter and summer sports were impacted.

The second edition of the popular Battle of Jacks Ridge was cancelled while many other events were similarly impacted.

Now that we have moved into the traffic light system, the hope is that local sport can continue. I have my concerns as we see the impact the new Omicron variant is having around the world, and it will certainly impact teams and athletes that would normally compete offshore.

Despite the challenges it has been heartening to see local sport come up with novel ways of navigating COVID and there have been plenty of good moments to go with the bad.

I am a judge of the Counties Manukau Sporting Excellence Awards and this year’s list of entries, and the quality of the finalists is the strongest I have seen in the five or so years I’ve been involved. It was a real challenge separating so many sporting achievements.

A little over a year ago when we started Counties Sports Hub I hoped it would have some impact on local sport. The plan was that its emergence would be noticed by sports and that we’d be on a path to our goal of being the voice and mouthpiece for local sport.

It is fair to say my expectations have been well exceeded.

I cannot thank enough the sporting organisations that have shown faith in what we are trying to achieve and that have come with us on the journey. There are numerous other sporting organisations that are currently working on ways to be part of it, and that is very encouraging.

We wouldn’t be doing any of this without some key support partners – Dean, Gary, Michael and the crew at Mitre 10 Mega Pukekohe, Caley and his Blinder team, contributors like Richard Spranger, Geoff Ridder, Michael Bradley, Hatton Photography and Andy Baker, who have all provided services free of charge because they want to see our sport grow.

I need to thank my partners in Counties Sports Hub – Ian Hepenstall as well as Craig, Tom, Ram and Andrea from Gorilla Marketing that helped me create this concept and turn an idea into reality.

Finally I want to thank our followers – the people that ultimately read and consume our content. I hope you have enjoyed what we’ve done so far, and I want you to know that we are only scratching the surface with it. There are many ideas and new initiatives that we hope to roll out in the New Year and I am super excited about the impact they will have.

Counties Manukau is an amazing region with so much sporting talent and so many stories to tell.

I look ahead to the next 12 months and wonder where we will be this time next year. I do that with a sense of pride in where we’ve come and with excitement about what lies ahead.

Merry Christmas and a happy and safe New Year from our small team here at Counties Sports Hub.

Take care,

Budgie