North Coast (Zone 14) didn't start the Senior Inter-Zone Sides Championship the way they wanted but their finish went perfectly to plan.
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The Zone 14 outfit took out the championship on Wednesday by defeating Illawarra (Zone 16) 66-43 in the final.
It came after Illawarra scored an eight-point win over North Coast in the opening round.
Athol Grogan, who was serving as North Coast's team manager for the first time ever, said the team "performed very, very well throughout the carnival" to break through.
"We've been a runner-up a couple times but this is our first win," Grogan said.
He added: "The score was 66-43 so it was a comfortable win, they had a big win yesterday [Tuesday] afternoon to make the semi-final this morning [Wednesday]."
Four of the senior North Coast players will be sticking around to compete in the open sides championship and Grogan said fatigue won't be too much of an issue.
"They're pretty good, actually. They're pretty fit old fellas," he said.
The North West (Zone 3) side missed out on finals for the senior tournament.
They scored one win, 59-54 over Zone 13, and two losses in the round matches including one defeat by just one point.
The Open Inter-Zone Sides Championship started on Thursday at West Tamworth, Tamworth City and South Tamworth bowling clubs.
It will run through to Saturday where the finals will be played at South Tamworth from 12.30pm.
Ben Jaffrey
Ben is a content curator and journalist for The Land. He has been with ACM since 2015 and first worked at The Area News and then at the Northern Daily Leader. Ben first joined ACM Agri as a digital journalist for all seven agricultural mastheads in 2022 before shifting to The Land full-time in 2023.
Ben is a content curator and journalist for The Land. He has been with ACM since 2015 and first worked at The Area News and then at the Northern Daily Leader. Ben first joined ACM Agri as a digital journalist for all seven agricultural mastheads in 2022 before shifting to The Land full-time in 2023.
