One of Pakuranga’s finest home-grown talents, Tom McCartney, was a key figure in the 2013 Gallaher Shield winning team.

Nearing the end of his professional career in New Zealand, Freak (as he was affectionately known) had wracked up almost 100 NPC appearances and more than 50 Super Rugby matches and brought all that experience home to Pakuranga on the way to the championship title.

Freak said the result in 2013 was many years in the making.

“It was built on the back of the culture and hard work of the coaches and players from the previous three or four years leading up to 2013.

“We had a great team culture and a good mixture of pure talent and experienced hard workers,” said Freak.

Speaking of pure talent, Freak mentions Malakai Fekitoa as an obvious stand out that season, in particular the Final, “he was running through their team at will.”

And the experienced hard workers include the likes of Dave Whitcliffe-Davies and Kirk Eveleigh.

The week before the Final, the play off against Grammar at Bell Park was a highlight for Freak in the green and orange.

“They were a stacked team full of Super Rugby and NPC players and it felt like the winner of that game was going to go on to win the Final.”

Freak said in the Final itself, the forwards were on a rampage, “we dominated them physically and smashed their scrum.”

The highlights continued after the final whistle.

“Returning to the club on the bus with the Gallaher Shield and seeing the packed crowd waiting and cheering is one of my favourite memories.”

Unfortunately for Freak, celebrations were short lived.

“I was told by Wayne Pivac I had to sit on the bench the next day for an NPC pre-season trial game but he said ‘don’t worry, you won’t need to play’ – I ended up having to play 50 minutes because of an injury!”

Freak, who went to Howick College, played 100 NPC matches; six for North Harbour in 2007 and 94 for Auckland over the following eight seasons. He debuted for the Blues in 2008 and played in 63 matches across seven seasons.

In 2014 he moved to Ireland and played 112 matches for Connacht, winning the PRO12 title with the side in 2016. He finished his professional career in 2020 and currently works as a real estate agent for Ray White, while the next generation of McCartney (Freak’s son) plays junior rugby for the Ranga.

Article added: Wednesday 14 June 2023