The Cobar Roosters Under 18s Castlereagh Rugby League match against Gulgong at Tom Knight Memorial Oval on Saturday was a spirited game which the Roosters narrowly won 16-14.
The match eventually boiled over in the second half and resulted in two Cobar players and one from Gulgong being sent to the sin bin for fighting.
The game was also marred by an injury which held up the match for a short time just before half time while a Gulgong player was taken from the field by ambulance with a suspected neck injury. (He was later released from hospital with ambulance staff praising the precautionary efforts of the league’s first aiders on the field.)
It was 15 minutes into play before Gulgong opened the scoring with a try out wide and it wasn’t until 10 minutes later that the Roosters replied with their own sideline try to Brad Davies.
Braith Good’s conversion found its mark to give the Roosters a narrow 6–4 lead.
After the restart, Good extended the Roosters lead after taking a quick penalty.
He found the Gulgong defenders napping and strolled over to score next to the posts.
His subsequent conversion pushed Cobar’s lead out to 12-4.
After the three players were sent from the field and, with Gulgong having the advantage of an extra man over Cobar, it was only time before the Terriers crossed to close the margin to 12-8.
Shortly after Davies returned to the field, he stepped around three defenders (who didn’t lay a glove on him) to score.
Good’s conversion attempt was just wide of the posts and Cobar was looking confident with the score at 16-8 with just six minutes left to play.
Shortly after a converted try brought Gulgong back into the game but the Cobar side showed great tenacity to hold on and finish with a 16-14 win.
Tyson Brilley was named the Roosters’ Players’ Player with Best and Fairest points going to Paddy Hallcroft (3), Wyatt Proudlove (2) and Michael Manns (1).
