Well the first round is under our belt, comprising 4 blowouts on Friday night, followed by an expected tight encounter on Saturday.
Arana started the season well with a 48-4 win over Holy Spirit. Considering Arana only completed 15 of 28 sets, the score could have been much higher - an incredible 7 forward passed were pulled back, 5 of them with tries well and truly "on". The forwards laid a great foundation for this win with new recruits Rocky, Josey and Matt prominent early. "Old boys" Brent and Rob were also outstanding and Phippsy stood out as an "impact" player. Alex T scored a typical long range early try to get Arana on the board and with Luke Corley calmly knocking over the conversion from near touch the season was off to a good start. The only real blemish in the half (and indeed the game) occurred right on halftime when, ironically, a well placed Arana grubber into the in-goal was picked up 1 metre from the deadball line by the Holy Spirit centre - unfortunately the 3 Arana chasers fell over each other leaving the surprised Spirit centre with 109 metres to the tryline - despite a gallant chase by Brent, and Alex F dashing across from the other wing, the try was scored, Spirit's only points of the evening. Hooker Brendan exploded in the 2nd half, scoring a hat-trick within 10 minutes, erasing any possibility of a Spirit fightback from their 16-4 halftime deficit. The defence was solid throughout, and it was an impressive performance, given the trial win over Redcliffe was this team's only previous run. Stats in 14A Stats page.
The other 3 Friday night results went as expected (well, by "The Computer" anyway), but the margins of 48 or greater were not expected this early. Redlands and Redcliffe have signalled they will again be real forces in the competition this year, but it is Centenary who are really showing early that they will be a threat. Saturday's game was a much tighter affair with Logan Bros jumping away to a 12 point lead before Souths ran them down and got away with the points. Both teams will no doubt be keen to have a run against the 4 big winners on Friday night to gauge their standard, although, given the quality of players these 2 teams will certainly be finals contenders this year.
This week sees all games between winners and losers from the first round. Those who didn't pick up the points last week will be very keen to get some this week to avoid a gap opening up in the comp straight away. It is hard to see any loser from last week except Logan Bros having a realistic chance, although if Centenary's form is as hot as reported, Logan's big forwards may find the going tough, particularly if it is as hot this Sunday as last. Easts, would perhaps harbour thoughts of an upset over Redcliffe, but the Dolphins have heaps of experience and are very hard to toss at Dolphin. Arana, Souths and Redlands would all be looking to consolidate their good starts last week with wins over Slacks Ck, Brighton and Holy Spirit respectively, although these teams will have learned from their outings last week (particularly the 2 newcomers to the A comp) and will be more familiar with the pace of the play this week.
Game details on Upcoming events page - happy footballing!!
Brad T
19/3/2002
