News

Counties Manukau Rugby is excited to unveil the Counties Energy Heat Squad for the upcoming Farah Palmer Cup season presented by Bunnings Warehouse.

 The team has already begun preparations, with the Wider Heat squad completing four training sessions in anticipation of their first of two pre-season matches against Auckland on July 27 at 2:00 PM & away to Northland on 3 August in Whangarei. These matches will provide invaluable experience for the squad as they head into the Farah Palmer Cup.

Peter Shaw, Women’s High Performance & Pathways Manager says,“On behalf of the Counties Energy Heat I congratulate this squad for 2024. A genuine mix of youth and experience whom we believe will complement and learn from each other as we navigate an exciting 4 week pre-season.

Our pathways program is continuing to provide new faces into Farah Palmer cup and I’m excited to continue to see the growth of our program, welcoming six from the 2024 academy into Farah Palmer Cup.

The management are proud and excited to be working with a very strong and experienced leadership team of Utu Atonio and Rebecca Burch in 2024. They both live the values of Counties Manukau Rugby on their sleeve. The news of their appointments was extremely well received by their peers.  

An exciting coaching staff who bring a huge amount of respect and experience in their respective areas. Richie Harris has been such an asset to this group of women, they love the way he is connecting with them and guiding their tactical development to date. Sione Sione comes back and leads our set piece where we grow off the back of the work done in 2023. Glen Sharpe, a very experienced coach joins the Heat from the Canada U20 program, to work alongside Hazel Tubic who is in a groundbreaking player coach role at FPC level. Grace Gago who sadly is ruled out of rugby for the remainder of this year is also on the coaching team. Her leadership, mentorship and Pride in the Hoops is second to none. We are grateful to keep her involved with this playing group in a coaching capacity, she will work closely with Sione with our lineout.

We look ahead now to the 2024 Campaign, there’s a lot of work to do over the next month to be where we want to be at Round 1 at home v Canterbury.”