In our selection of responses to the Chiefs selection, you may recall a point by point "discussion" of the selections also sent to the Chiefs website by Mafia members C & A. Below is the response they received from Chiefs Marketing Manager Pat Mellsop. For some reason we have decided in some vague sense of balance and fairness to include them... but couldn't resist the odd comment in bold...  

Interesting observations and obviously ones that I would not entirely agree with.

The Chiefs have probably been the most regional of any Franchise and has worked its butt off to include all.  This partly came out of the launch with Harbour involved and the fact that Waikato never has, and still doesn't dominate the Franchise. We are the only Super 12 team where the host Union can be out voted on the Board and where the Chairman is not from the base - he is from BOP, the previous one from King Country.

Selections of teams is always tricky with all the 'experts' never agreeing. What some of the Bay supporters seem to have overlooked is the fact that four senior Waikato Players - Rhys Duggan, Greg Smith, Chresten Davis and David Briggs all lost their contracts. (Mafia note: And were replaced by Byron Kelleher, Tom Willis, Dave Duley and Simms Davison. Three out of four are new or recent arrivals for whom?)

Ultimately it is the coach who will lose this job first if the team doesn't perform and as another Waikato coach has said regularly and shown in his action, loyalty and emotion are not part of the selection policy, the best team playing and winning is.

In response to the reasons I would note.

1 Yes you did finish 5th and had a great season.  Tauranga does not have a facility that can accommodate a Super 12 games so of course never got one. They have hosted pre-season games for the last 6 years (the Chiefs opened up Bay Park as a rugby venue) and are in line for another one this year.

Rotorua has hosted over a dozen Chiefs games and we continued to run games there for the last 2 years (3 games) despite it costing the member unions a fortune in lost revenue.  If the people do not turn up and the council or businesses are not prepared to share the risk why should our member unions, who we pay profits to, to run grass roots rugby, take the loss?

2 Waikato finished second, hence why they hosted one of the semis, 17 of that squad made super 12, 2 are new transferred players - Willis & Kelleher, Holah is back from the AB's, Randle & Ranby back from injury.

The Bay got 4 players from NPC.

Reasons covered above why Hamilton was the best venue for the 6 games. Not necessarily where we want to ideally play the games but realistically, commercially and responsibly the only choice we ended up with.

3. Dave Duley was obviously not one of the first locks picked and he will be one of those who people will always debate.  Davis missed out, Royce Willis is gone and very debatable who is the next best.

4. Last year when the team was announced, Nick was still injured. He had had a great 2001.  Ranby and Randle are both former ABs, world class (Now who  is throwing opinion around, 'world class', pass the sick bowl please), proven players and will be 100% ready for Feb 21 and round one.

5. Obviously Grant's form was not good enough according to the coaches. He is a great guy and had a very good season, even if he went missing in the Bay v Waikato game. A bit like the Duley  call.

6.No agreement existed between Waikato and Bay on transferring players, you have to watch what you read in the paper!

7.Aleki again probably unlucky but that is the nature of professional rugby.  How do you think Greg Smith feels?  (grateful he got to play S12 as long as he did?) Interesting that none of the other bases rated him in the top 10 hookers. (And the Crusaders somehow rated Jamie Nutbrown over Kevin Senio too in terms of top 10 halfbacks. We're not suggesting that the other franchises are any better)

8.Andy Miller and Clayton are class players but this is what happens in this industry.  We (Waikato & Chiefs) lost Bruce Reihana as he got no indication of opportunities higher up, Royce Willis and Deon Muir made career decisions to move on when both had a few years of top  class NZ footy left in them.  That's how professional sport works.

9 Kevin again had a great year, the coach has the job, has done the analysis and its his head on the line.  You are probably right that Gordon is thrilled to get Kevin for 7's and might not be as interested in Isaac.

10.Derek is a very good player and at a guess it would have been a close call between him and Grant.(Grant wins hands down by all accounts except those of  Waikato supporters if thesilverfern message boards are an indicator) David Briggs may feel the same way about the young props who made it at his cost.

11.The Chiefs have finished 6th, three times, not just the year they were based in Vegas.

Thanks for taking the time to write your message, nice to see you are hard core Bay supporters but this does not preclude support of the Chiefs, even if in this one year you are unhappy. (the Mafia will be releasing our policy on this in coming days)

Many of your calls are opinion calls, a bit like Mitch, if Fozzie has got them right he will be a hero, if wrong he will have plenty of people telling him and ultimately will lose his job.

We will see what happens.

Cheers
Pat Mellsop