After drawing 3-all with with East Armidale on Saturday, Companions looked to have the points sewn up against South Armidale on Sunday up 3-1 with about five minutes to go. But the Scorpions slotted two quick goals to make it 3-all.

Looking like having to settle for a second draw, Companions made one final play for the points, and after a little interchange of passes, as coach Gavin Thompson described it, King got free and slammed the ball home for his third.

“We were lucky to get away with the win,” Thompson said.

That said, they probably shouldn’t have been in that position.

“We totally dominated. It should have been 10-nil at half-time. We missed countless one on one’s, hit the crossbar,” he said.

They led from virtually the fifth minute of the game, and always, Thompson felt, had the game under control. At least until those final few minutes, when he was admittedly thinking ‘how on earth did we let this slip?’

“It was a great effort by Souths,” he said.

Most of them were playing their fourth game for the weekend after backing up from reserve grade both days.

King had on Saturday scored the equaliser for Companions, and was one of their best over the weekend along with Jake Thompson.

“It was a game in patches we did good things, but just not through the whole game,” Thompson said.