GUNNEDAH Bulldogs swept away any Oxley Digger aspirations of playing Group 4 first grade semi-final football in a blazing 40-minute demolition at Scully Park on Saturday night while West Lions might have secured the minor premiership after beating North Tamworth 33-30 at Jack Woolaston Oval yesterday.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
While the Bears were missing four of their squad and ran into sin-bin trouble, with Shane-Leigh Wadwell spending 10 minutes off the field in the second half, the Lions recovered from a thrashing in their last encounter to claim the outright lead with just two rounds remaining.
“We play Gunnedah in two weeks (after this weekend’s general bye),” West coach Phil Beaton said.
“We need to win or that will undo all the hard work today.
Gunnedah will be lying in wait for West after finding their best form of the season in the first 40 minutes of Saturday night’s 66-20 win over Oxley Diggers.
The young Bulldogs led 42-4 at half-time after an eight-try onslaught in the first 40 minutes for the “bullpups” co-coached by Wayne Griffith and Trent Hilton.
Hilton was also making a comeback from a long-term shoulder injury suffered in the first Greater Northern Tiger win at Bathurst.
He admitted to feeling “sore and leg-weary” but was delighted with how his young side has fought back the last few weeks.
Away wins over Narrabri and now Oxley Diggers have almost certainly assured the side of third or fourth.
They went into Saturday night’s game two points ahead of the Diggers and equal third with Narrabri.
However the game was good as over at half-time after the Bulldogs crossed eight times, Hilton snaring a double, centre Chris Rolinson also scoring twice and winger Kih McDonald snaring a first-half hat- trick.
McDonald added a fourth in the second half as well as turning provider for five eighth Shannon Swan who also claimed a second-half double.
“That gives us a lot of momentum,” Griffith said.
“They (Diggers) had a lot to play for but that just about knocks them out.
“We had a really good first half.
“We’ve had a lot of injuries but have started to get a lot back now even though we still had a couple out tonight.”
He said the “very quick backline” tore the Diggers apart.
“They are all very quick.
“Kih McDonald is lightning and we have two halves (David ‘DJ’ Smith and Shannon Swan) who challenge the line.
“They mix it up too.”
The best part of the win was that Griffith could look around the celebrating dressing room after the game and see just how many local juniors were involved in the win.
“They are all good young kids. Six or seven played in the super Under 18 side I coached a few years back that beat Farrer.
“And all of them have jobs locally.
“We can keep them together and build on it.”
Diggers president Mick Schmiedel was deeply disappointed with his club’s first half.
“We saved our worst 40 minutes for tonight,” he said.
“On that performance, Gunnedah deserve to be in the semis.
“Mathematically we can still make it but not on that effort.
“It took us 60 minutes to get a bit of mongrel from Timmie (Walsh) but it was too late.”