Air New Zealand Cup
The ITM Cup is the highest level of New Zealand domestic professional rugby union competition, contested annually from late August to early November. It was founded in 2006 with 14 teams, after the National Provincial Championship (NPC) was split into this professional competition and the amateur Heartland Championship competition. Managed by the New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU), the ITM Cup was named in 2010 for lead sponsor ITM, the trading name of Independent Timber Merchants Co-operative Ltd., a New Zealand building supplies retailer. The competition was originally sponsored by Air New Zealand, and from 2006 to 2009 was called the "Air New Zealand Cup".
Read more about Air New Zealand Cup: History, Current Teams, Champions, Ranfurly Shield, Squads, Broadcasting Rights, See Also
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“Oh none too soon through the air white and dry
Will the clear announcer’s voice
Beat like a dove, and you and I
From the heart’s anarch and responsible town
Return by subway-mouth to life again,
Bearing the morning papers,”
—Richard Wilbur (b. 1921)
“Teasing is universal. Anthropologists have found the same fundamental patterns of teasing among New Zealand aborigine children and inner-city kids on the playgrounds of Philadelphia.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“I believe that water is the only drink for a wise man: wine is not so noble a liquor; and think of dashing the hopes of a morning with a cup of warm coffee, or of an evening with a dish of tea! Ah, how low I fall when I am tempted by them! Even music may be intoxicating. Such apparently slight causes destroyed Greece and Rome, and will destroy England and America.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)