James George still can’t really believe the year he’s had as a rugby coach.

“I’ve been involved in Rugby since I was five years old; I'm 42.

“And I've never been involved in a team that's got so much mana.”

He’s talking about the Whitetails, a team who started the 2025 season with no rugby knowledge, and ended it with two trophies.

How did Southern Rugby Football Club’s greenest team this year become such a force, both on the field and in their club rooms?

For team captain Liv Thomson, the story starts at preschool.

“I’ve always played rugby growing up, since I was about four years old.”

She moved to Mt Somers for work and joined Southern’s first women’s team three years ago.

Fast forward to 2025 preseason training. There’s a good turnout, some eager faces, but one concern: 12 trainees have never played rugby before.

“They didn’t know what phases or rucks were, anything like that,” Thomson recalled.

One such newbie was Connie Dallaway, an Englishwoman who’d moved from Dorset to Carew - a bit of a culture shock.

“At home you’re only five minutes away from your shops, whereas here, you’ve got to take half an hour out of your day to go shopping,” she said.

“And mountains, I had never seen a mountain before, so that was pretty crazy.”

Her partner Rob had made friends with some rugby players while at the pub one night.

“We hadn’t really made any friends, so I thought, ‘oh, I’ll give it a go, go down and get some exercise’.”

For Dallaway, who’d never played rugby, or any team sport, it was straight in the deep end.

The same could be said for head coach James George, who’d taken up the position just to help his club out.

“They knew nothing about rugby, like I'm talking nothing.

“So within our preseason, we had to get from probably a year four level of knowledge of rugby up to like a colts level of rugby, in six weeks.”

But George, with fellow coaches Travis Thompson and Moses Peauafi, realised that what the women lacked in experience, they had in hunger.

“We ran them really hard. We pushed them to their limits to the point where there were girls spewing. And they just keep on going.

“We thought, ‘Heavens above, they’re tough’.

“They were willing to put in as much as they possibly could. So we really became willing to coach them to the best of our ability.”

Training was first focussed around basic fitness, ball skills and tackling. Game plans were bought into play as the competition approached.

The preseason games were tough - Pleasant Point beat the women in their first match by 40 odd points.

But persistence paid off and began to show itself once the Combined Senior Women's Club competition began.

According to the Mid Canterbury Rugby Union website, the Whitetails won their first match against Hampstead - also a new team to the roster - 24 to 5.

“It was definitely a journey;” Thomson said, “we just went from strength to strength.

“We’d take two things away from each game, and kind of master them, then move on to the next thing.”

The weather rarely held up when they played, she said.

“I think we only had one game where it was dry. So our game plan was kind of to use that to our advantage.”

When playing against teams like Geraldine and Pleasant Point, the team utilised their forwards.

As the season progressed, the Whitetails kept a clean track record, winning five of their seven games.

“Everyone put their bodies on the line, and everyone wanted to be there,” Thomson said.

“I think our coaches were quite surprised.”

Heading into the finals against Pleasant Point, the Whitetails were the underdogs. They had just beaten them the week before, so the team carried some confidence.

Despite everything - being newcomers to the sport, newcomers to the competition, and the expectations of those watching on - the Whitewails won 17 - 10.

“It was just unreal,” Dallaway said. “We were all pretty shocked.”

One not enough? Not for the Whitetails, who followed that up by winning the Mid Canterbury Competition against Celtic.

Life Southern Member Peter Lowe said the wins were an enormous achievement.

“It’s the first Southern team to have actually won two competitions in the same year.

“I think it needs to be recognised."

He had particular praise for Dallaway, who won the Club’s overall Player of the Year award.

“It’s her first year playing rugby, her first year playing a team sport, and she’s Southern Player of the Year.

“It’s a pretty awesome achievement.”

George said that the women had done more than win trophies - they’d changed the atmosphere of the club.

The coaches' kids and partners were welcomed to games and trainings by the tam, one of George’s girls becoming their “token manager”.

“It's super important to include them in our culture as well,” Thomson said.

“it’s a long season, and it's a lot of time taken out of their personal lives.”

The Whitetails made an effort to socialise with other club members too.

“We always made a point of bringing out the karaoke microphones.”

That energy was reciprocated as men in the As and Bs came along to support the Whitetails games from the sidelines.

“It really made our team feel welcome, our girls feel really part of the club.”

George said the club rooms are an entirely different place nowadays.

"They're full of laughter and music and singing.

“[The girls] are so welcoming, they’re standing with life members, guys who are 70 years old, and having a beer with them.

Eight of the Southern girls have joined ranks with the first ever Mid Canterbury Representatives women’s team, she said.

“It’s funny, our coaches keep saying to us, ‘oh, those girls are so lucky, it’s their first year, and they’ve already won two championships. So many people go their whole lives and don’t even make a final’.”

“We’re pretty lucky,” she agrees, “but it’s not down to luck. It came through a lot of hard work.”

Thomson hopes their winning streak will encourage young women to pick up local rugby.

“It's just the people that make it.”

By Anisha Satya