The Wellington Redbacks went within a whisker of upsetting the defending premiers the Dubbo Rhinos in a thrilling Graincorp match at Kennard Park.
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The desperately unlucky home side were the better team in many moments of the match losing 27-26.
The Rhinos opened the game powerfully and were in control of the early stages but the Redbacks against the run of play scooped on some loose ball and centre James Cusack shot through the Dubbo backline and once he completed a dashing 40metre run he was over.
Mitchell Stubberfield potted the extras.
But the strike back was immediate second rower Jordan Davis on the back of a surging move on the far left barged over.
7-5 and on fifteen minutes the Redbacks rolled down field and centre Steve Matheson slipped through some rather poor defence to score brilliantly.
At 14-5 both sides coughed up possession at vital times but the Rhinos were not finished with Bryce Adamson stepped over. The hooker taking full advantage of good rolling phase ball. The halfback Chris Hobson converted and he made it a 5 point ball game when he raced over for the Rhinos to lead at the break 19-14.
The Redbacks were showing signs of what they would look like in the Graincorp Cup and they were excellent, twice the gritty forwards winning scrums against the head and when a forward pass disallowed them an equaliser and the referee and the linesman didn’t award a controversial try Wellington could consider themselves very unlucky.
The Redbacks had momentum and plenty of football and when Sam Troth stormed over it was 19 all. It was worthy and payment for their efforts which were withstood by the Rhinos defence previously.
Dubbo hooker Bryce Adamson did have a big game he grabbed a double scoring his second with only minutes remaining but Redbacks winger Ben Power stepped around the Rhinos to score dynamically with to level the game.
Mitchell Cusack got the Redbacks into the lead 26-24 with the conversion.
A penalty not far from the posts was the difference and Chris Hobson delivered the death knell to Wellington 27-26, the Rhinos wouldn’t have expected the Redbacks to play this well and now Wellington is on its way.
In other matches : Geurie fell to Trangie 26-7 while Yeoval beat Coonabarabran 10 -0
Junior Results :
UNDER 13s
SCORE
- BAT v PKS 61 – 7
- EMU v WEL 53 – 10
- DUB BLUE v ORC 56 – 0
- NAR v DUB RED 19 – 5
- MUD v BYE
UNDER 15s
- DUB BLUE v ORC 20 – 12
- NAR v DUB RED 45 – 0
- MUD BLUE v MUD RED 55 – 10
- DUB H’QUIN v WEL 10 – 21
- FBS v PKS 0 – 73
UNDER 17s
- DUB BLUE v ORC 14 – 19
- FBS v PKS 24 – 14
- MUD v DUB RED 24 – 24
- EMU v WEL 14 – 14
