Want to host the Chiefs for dinner at your place? Our local Super Rugby heroes are coming to Whakatāne as part of the Chiefs’ Summer Roadie 2016, and as well as being able to view an open training session, Whakatāne residents will have a unique opportunity to bid for and host a trio of Chiefs players for dinner.
The Chiefs will arrive in Whakatāne on the evening of Tuesday, 26 January, when they will be collected by their successful dinner date bidders. The following morning, the Chiefs will carry out an open training session at Whakatāne Rugby Park – from 9 am to 10:30 am – with an opportunity for the public to snatch a few autographs and high fives.
Bay of Plenty Rugby’s Eastern Bay of Plenty Regional Rugby Manager, Mark Seymour, says the Chiefs visit will benefit the community in more ways than one, with proceeds of the TradeMe auctions going to fund equipment for the Eastern Bay junior rugby clubs.
“This is a great opportunity to support our local junior clubs, as well as showing some good old Eastern Bay hospitality to our top rugby players,” he says. “We’ve got a strong and positive rugby culture here in Whakatāne, so our local clubs and groups might like to pool together to bid for the right to host players at their clubrooms and make an evening of it with a potluck or a hangi.”
There will be 12 ‘dinner date’ auctions running from 7:30 pm on Sunday, 17 January to 7:30 pm on Sunday, 24 January, with each auction offering three Chiefs players from 6 pm to 8:30 pm on Tuesday, 26 January.
Mr Seymour jokes that while some of the Chiefs players might look like they’d ‘eat you out of house and home’, their eating habits are fairly healthy during the pre-season, so it’s not all about the food. “The players know that it’s the people in towns and rural communities like ours that are backing them and supporting them when they’re on the field, so they’re excited to meet our people and experience our piece of paradise.”