JOB’S NOT DONE: Blues turn their attention to the final round after scoring their first win of the year

There was an overwhelming sense of relief, excitement and pride at Collins Park yesterday when the Narrabri Blues scored their first win of the year as they beat the Gunnedah Bulldogs 44-30.

But for captain-coach Josh Trindall and his playing group, their focus has quickly shifted to the final round of the season.

They definitely did celebrate among themselves and alongside a mixture of family, friends, club officials and supporters after they held onto the John Dallas Donnelly Cup, but they are not going to be satisfied with just one win this year.

They travel to Werris Creek in the 14th and final round of the campaign this Sunday, where they will run out determined to play their way off the bottom of the ladder.

They are now level on two points with the Bulldogs, but the Gunnedah men have a superior for and against difference by 42 points. Regardless of Gunnedah’s result at home against Boggabri on Saturday, the Blues have a chance to rise up to seventh and avoid the wooden spoon in their final game.

It is definitely going to be an uphill battle, but it is one that Trindall and his men are certainly up to. They proved that yesterday when they produced their best game of the season during their final home game of the year at Collins Park.

A huge crowd turned out to watch the John Dallas Donnelly Cup match, which coincided with the Narrabri Blues’ Indigenous round.

Gunnedah went into the half-time break ahead 18-16, but Narrabri came out firing and outscored the Bulldogs 28 points to 12 in the second stanza.

Trindall told The Courier that he was proud of his team.

“It’s a bit of a relief,” he said.

“I’m over the moon to get the win and it was good to keep the cup too.

“We knew we were playing for it, and from the start, we were looking at the game like it was our grand final.

“I’m so happy for all the young boys too, to get a win. It’s good for them to get a little reward for the year because they deserve it.

“The last four or five games, we could feel it was coming. We could see we were getting better and playing for a lot longer.

“At half-time, we knew our contact was a bit off. We weren’t sticking as much as we’d like. Then we had too many silly errors and our discipline was pretty poor.

“We said that if we could fix that all up, we could really put ourselves in a position to win. To the boys’ credit, they went back out and executed.

“We did score some good team tries too.”

The Blues’ coach said that he and his side’s goal for the past few weeks had been to avoid the wooden spoon, and they have the chance to do that this Sunday.

“That’s been our goal the past three or four weeks,” Trindall said.

“We know where we’re sitting and we wanted to knock Gunnedah off.

“Now we are going over to Werris Creek to finish the season on a high and get off the bottom of the ladder.”

Regardless, Trindall said it was an unreal feeling to win his first game as a coach, and what made it even more special was the character that they showed in the second half when they were under the pump.

“There was a stage there some time the second half that Gunnedah had five sets on our line and we ended up holding them out,” Trindall said.

“That shows a good attitude and that the boys really wanted to win.

“It was tit-for-tat at that stage, and then they had that raid on our line, but after we held them out, we went down and scored ourselves.”

Gunnedah started on the front foot when Charlie Lawrence crossed in the fourth minute and Dylan O’Brien converted it to make the score 6-0. However, Narrabri struck back when Aiden Butcher went over for the Blues in the 11th minute.

Chris Clark and Jeff Harvey went on to score in the first half for Narrabri, and the Bulldogs also scored three tries in total but led 18-16 as they kicked three goals to Narrabri’s two.

The Blues hit the lead early in the second half when Kalab McMillan crossed for a try, but Gunnedah got back in front with a try of its own.

Butcher scored his second try of the game before the hour mark and then Jess O’Neil crossed for a four-pointer in the 62nd minute to give Narrabri a 32-24 lead.

However, Gunnedah was not going down without a fight and was able to score again in the 68th minute to make the score 32-30.

Narrabri regrouped and scored two tries in the final 10 minutes through Rob Condran and the side’s captain-coach, Trindall, as they ran away with a 44-30 victory.

It was an extra momentous day for the club, given that the under-18s side also won, meaning all four Narrabri teams have a victory to their names in the 2023 campaign.

The under-18s Blues boys beat the Bulldogs 34-32 in a close contest, during which Isaiah Cochrane and Josh Briggs bagged doubles, and their teammates Jacob Price, Brayden Collett and Luke Shields also scored tries. Cochrane also kicked three goals.

The Narrabri 18s can also avoid the wooden spoon with a win in Werris Creek on Sunday.

The other two games at Collins Park were won by Gunnedah as the Dogs prevailed 46-16 in the reserve grade game and 34-0 in the ladies’ league tag match.

The other round 13 first grade games were won by the Moree Boars, North Tamworth Bears and the Kootingal-
Moonbi Roosters on Saturday. Moree came from behind late to win 38-34 away from home at Jubilee Oval against Boggabri Kangaroos, Norths won 20-12 away from home against Dungowan, and Kootingal prevailed 38-18 at home against Werris Creek.