Back to back champions

The Narrabri Junior Rugby Club’s under-14s team claimed a second consecutive premiership when it defeated Calrossy 32-15 in a come-from-behind win on Friday night.

The team finished first last year in the Friday night North West Regional Youth Rugby Comp season before going on to win its semi and grand finals.

After winning all 10 of its regular season matches this season before defeating Farrer in the semi-final on Friday, August 30, at Dangar Park, the stage was set for the side to secure another undefeated premiership.

It did so in style, producing a dominant second half display in the match played under lights at Scully Park.

Narrabri trailed 10-nil to opponent Calrossy in the first half after conceding an early penalty and an early try.

The Blue Boars hit back through Josh Briggs who scored Narrabri’s first try which made the half-time score 10-5 to Calrossy.

In the second stanza the Blue Boars outscored their opponents five tries to one and one conversion to none in a 27-5 rout to secure the 17-point win.

Josh Briggs scored three of Narrabri’s second half tries and teammate Don Watkins bagged a double.

Narrabri Junior Rugby Club under-14s co-coach Ken Campbell, who has coached most of the team’s players since they were eight-years-old, labelled Friday’s win as a special one.

“You could see during the game that Narrabri wanted it more and they were a tighter-knit unit, and that’s a credit to the boys,” Campbell told The Courier.

“They trained for six months for that and the best game they played all season was on Friday night, it was the most complete game they have played, it was pretty special.

“I couldn’t be prouder of them.

“At the start of the season Chris and I spoke to the boys about the season and we told them we didn’t care if we didn’t win a game, but we wanted to have a good strong culture, work hard for each other and be a team that other teams respect.

“Before we played the semi-final we spoke to the boys and said ‘relax, at the start of the year we said this and you guys have done it in spades’.

“The way the boys have carried themselves in a dominant season, they averaged about 48-and-a-half points over 10 rounds and one of those was a forfeit where we got no points, they never once carried on and they did it well.”

Campbell said that the boys did not panic despite going behind early in the match and battling a strong wind in front of a loud crowd.

“The guys were down 10-0 running into a strong wind but fought to be down 10-5 at half-time, and then just dominated after that,” he said.

“Down 10-0 they just kept to the game plan, kept the ball in hand and finally got the try, then with the wind they still kept to the game plan and were able to score some really good tries.

“Calrossy had a lot of support, the school was there with bagpipes and drums and there was a lot of chanting and cheering but our boys held their composure.”

Narrabri Rugby Club senior player and Narrabri Junior Rugby Club under-14s co-coach Chris Watkins said he could not have been more proud of his side’s season and grand final fightback.

“In the first 10-15 minutes Calrossy had us a bit worried,” Watkins said.

“They came out of the blocks firing and competed at the breakdown extremely well and stole a lot of footy from us.

“Our boys after a bit of a pep talk turned it on and turned the game around after about 25 minutes.

“They found another gear and got on with their job done.

“We really brought it home in the second half.

“I couldn’t be any more proud of this group of boys than what I am.

“The entire team worked hard all season, we started back in February with fitness and the boys just tirelessly worked at everything they needed to work on every week, their effort is what won them the season.”