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Written by Mr BMR789
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Sunday, 09 March 2008 |
 The 2008 Air New Zealand Cup will kick off a five-day rugby feast in July with double headers on both Thursday and Friday nights of the opening weekend.
The Air New Zealand Cup starts on Thursday 31 July with the final on Saturday 25 October. The match schedules for the Air New Zealand Cup and AA Rewards Heartland Championship, which kicks off on Saturday 23 August, were released today.
Tasman will host Bay of Plenty and Northland will host Waikato in simultaneous matches on the opening Thursday night while Taranaki will host North Harbour and Wellington is away to Hawke’s Bay in simultaneous matches on the Friday night, 1 August.
The schedule leaves the opening Saturday night free of Air New Zealand Cup action as the All Blacks take on the Wallabies in a Bledisloe Cup Test at Eden Park, Auckland.
Both the Thursday and Friday night double headers will be televised live simultaneously on SKY Television on separate channels then repeated on alternate channels straight after the live broadcast.
Canterbury v Manawatu, Southland v Otago and Counties Manukau v Auckland complete the action in week one. Meanwhile, the draw for the 2008 AA Rewards Heartland Championship has also been confirmed.
2007 Meads Cup winners North Otago kick off their campaign against Horowhenua Kapiti in Oamaru on Saturday 23 August while last year’s Lochore Cup champions Poverty Bay travel to Te Kuiti to play King Country.
Teams will play in a five-week pool play round. Based on the points from pool play, the top six teams from each pool will go into the Meads Cup pool while the other six teams will go into the Lochore Cup pool.
The AA Rewards Heartland Championship concludes on 25 October with the Meads and Lochore Cup finals. Click here to see a PDF version of the 2008 Air New Zealand Cup draw
Click here to see a PDF version of the 2008 AA Rewards Heartland Championship draw |
