THE BOOMERANGS have reasserted their Group 19 dominance on Group 19 with a resounding 60-18 victory over Inverell Hawks 60-18 at Varley Oval on Saturday.
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The reigning G19 premiers were having their first game of the new season after last week’s opener against new team Goondiwindi was postponed.
It was also Inverell’s first hit-out after getting a first-round bye.
Rangs coach Chris Binge said the game was good to blow some cobwebs out and he was more than happy with the performance.
“In the first half we executed really well and stuck to our structure,” Binge said.
“We put the game to bed in the first 15-20 minutes.”
The start of the second half saw the Rangs lose a bit of structure and miss a few opportunities.
“We played a bit patchy and bombed a few chances,” Binge said.
“We played 60 minutes of good footy and 20 minutes of patchy stuff.”
The coach was also happy with the defensive effort, which was scrambling at times, to keep the Hawks out.
“Our defence is structurally a lot better than last year.”
Dillon Walford was the standout player of the game at fullback.
“Dillon is a class above most of the players in the competition,” Binge said.
“He had a great game.”
The usual suspects in the Rangs forwards – Luke Raveneau, Mundarra Weldon and Warren Cain – had them on the front foot from the opening whistle.
“Those blokes and Lloyd Munro Junior had us going forward and then we have plenty of quality out wide to finish,” Binge said.
The signs look ominous for the other sides in the competition as the club that dominated last year never missed a beat in the first game back.
The Rangs have already won the Domestic Violence Cup and the G19 Gala Day this season and have their sight set on another club championship.
It is no big secret they are the team to beat and will be targeted by the other clubs this year, but the coach sees that as a positive.
“We know we are going to be chased. It just means that we have to do everything a bit better than we did last year. We compete against ourselves every week to be better.”
Inverell Hawks coach Peter Stevens said the Boomerangs were the benchmark and his side was way off that at the moment.
“We were down 18-nil after eight minutes and 36-6 at half -time,” he said.
“We were poor in the first half but had a few positives.
“We scored a couple of tries early in the second half and bombed a couple too but the Rangs also took their foot off the pedal.
“They showed us where we need to be and we’re a long way off the pace.”
He thought Moses Briggs, a Kiwi import, was his best.
Briggs started in the centres and then moved to second row.
Prop Mick Duncan was the players’ player award winner while Mick Hodges and Brendan Critchlow showed they will be handy later in.