A COMBINATION of poor handling and dubious refereeing decisions late in the second half and at the wrong end of the field, ended any hope for the Forster Tuncurry Hawks in their brave six point loss to the Wauchope Blues on Sunday.
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A Wauchope try five minutes out from the siren saw the Blues out to a 32-26 win in an entertaining Group 3 clash played out at Wauchope’s Lank Bain Oval.
Related: Ladies League Tag continue winning ways...click here
Darren Pettet’s troops lifted their game after last week’s fumbling display and were unlucky not to leave with the two points.
Beau Lowry opened the days scoring when he ran onto a well-timed Chris Simon pass for five eighth Blake English to convert for a six point lead before Wauchope rattled in two quick tries leaving Ben Murray to round off the first half scoring when he latched onto a towering crossfield kick from in form halfback Byram Stewart to send the teams into the sheds with the scores locked at ten apiece.
The second half started much like the first, Brayden Wynter touched down in the corner after backing up a searching Lowry run and the conversion from English saw the Hawks take the lead briefly before, again, The Blues scored two unanswered tries to regain the lead at 20-16.
A short kick off from skilful lock Simon saw him regather the ball and three tackles later it was Simon who crashed over to level the scores at 20 all before Lowry scored his second for the day and yet another sideline kick from English saw the team from the coast head out to a 26-20 lead.
Wauchope, however found touch from the restart and scored soon after to again gain parity. The visitors were unable to clear their own danger zone and spent the remainder of the match having to do a mountain of defence. Wauchope crossed for the winner late in the match to close out a quality match.
Team captain Matt Kirkland, second rower Luke Ross and lock Chris were strong in the forwards while Stewart, English and Wynter played well in the backs. Beau Lowry on the right wing was excellent all game and played his best ever game in the green and gold of his local side.
The Hawks are at home next Sunday against the Port Macquarie Breakers in what is a game they need to win to keep in touch with the top half of the competition.
The Ladies League Tag side will kick off the day’s proceedings at 11.30am with the 18s at 12.30pm, the Reserves at 1.40pm and First Grade take the field at 3pm.
