Marshall's own classic Canterbury tale

Canterbury Crusaders captain Aaron Mauger admitted his team's 16-13 National Provincial Championship (NPC) win over Otago at Jade Stadium in Christchurch yesterday was a "struggle". The victory ensured the Crusaders will have a home semi-final in the NPC play-offs and, just as importantly, ensured that the Ranfurly Shield stayed in Christchurch for another summer.

"We were lucky, this was a great Otago performance and it was a struggle," Mauger said after the match. And Otago deserved better than they ultimately ended up with.

Canterbury's only try, to scrum-half Justin Marshall with 15 minutes remaining, was dubious to say the least – hooker Mark Hammett running interference on the Otago defence.

Referee Paul Honiss, controversial at the best of times, was checking the offside line out wide and totally missed the infringement.

It was a body blow for Otago, who had led 13-6 after quarter of an hour of the second half and missed a long-range penalty just minutes before. The match had started with an intensity which reflected the stakes. Both full-backs were tested early with high kicks, the packs interrogated each other in the set pieces and the defence was brutal, especially from Otago forwards Taine Randell, the former New Zealand captain, and Filipo Levi.

Andrew Mehrtens opened the scoring for Canterbury with an 18th-minute penalty, Otago then hitting the lead at the half-hour mark through inside-centre Seilala Mapusua's thrusting attack across on the blindside. Marshall's late dropped goal closed the gap to 7-6 at half-time and concluded a feisty opening period.

The rain came at half-time but did nothing to quell the fires, both sides going at each other mercilessly. Feeney kicked penalty goals after two and 15 minutes of the second half for a 13-6 lead, but it was his miss that gave Canterbury a sniff of victory. And, like the champion team they are, the Crusaders seized the opportunity with Marshall's suspect try, which was converted for a 13-13 deadlock.

With the scores level, the shield would have remained with Canterbury, but for good measure Mehrtens kicked a sideline penalty with 10 minutes to play for the eventual winning score of 16-13.

Otago pounded the red-and-black line for much of the remaining time with a plethora of scrum and ruck ball. But the Canterbury defence held and, with Otago knowing a penalty goal would not be enough, the blue-and-gold faithfuls' hopes went down the drain.

Randell, reported this week to have been asked by the All Black coach, John Mitchell, to lead the end-of-season touring side, was outstanding with his tackling, running and reading of the play. Levi and flanker Kelvin Middleton weren't far behind their skipper. For Canterbury, Marshall pulled off a number of telling tackles – and then there was that try.

Canterbury's win lifts them to second place and a home semi-final against Auckland next Friday, while Otago's consolation point did not change their fourth placing and they have the unenviable task of flying to Hamilton for Saturday's match at Waikato. Otago did beat Waikato earlier in the season, the only side to do so in the round-robin phase, but that match was at Carisbrook.