ORANGE CYMS captain-coach Mick Sullivan described it as “ugly” but his side managed to get the win in their Skilled Challenge match on Saturday night.
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Playing at Manildra’s Jack Huxley Oval, Orange CYMS downed Dubbo CYMS 18-12 in a nail-biter.
The Orange side were trailing 6-nil at the break before they tied things up at 6-all and then again at 12-all with 10 minutes to go.
A memorable try to Brad Parker with four minutes left in the game gave the Group 10 premiers the victory.
Sullivan was happy to take the two points from Saturday’s match.
“We’ve still got a lot of work to go,” Sullivan said.
“We’re winning and we’re winning ugly at the moment but a win is better than losing ugly.
“The spirit’s still there and they’re a good bunch of blokes and they keep turning up in defence for the whole 80.”
Dubbo opened the scoring in the 18th minute when Joe Williams put fullback Blake Tremain-Cannon through a gap to dive over.
Williams converted to give Dubbo a 6-nil lead which they carried through to the break.
Orange CYMS couldn’t bust through the Dubbo defence and missed a few scoring opportunities through handling errors.
Thirteen minutes into the second half Orange lost centre Kyran Bubb with a suspected back injury and he was stretchered from the field.
A few minutes later Orange put their first points on the board when Kurt Beahan intercepted a pass and ran 95 metres to score.
Five minutes later Orange was leading 12-6 after Sullivan put Garrett Field through a gap to score.
Dubbo hit back with a try to Matt Naden making it 12-all with 10 minutes remaining.
Williams missed a field goal attempt in Dubbo’s next set.
Orange scored the winning points in spectacular fashion when Sullivan sent the ball left to Beahan who sprinted down the side before kicking, winning the chase and regathering the ball and then throwing a no-look pass which Parker caught and ran in the try.
Sam Hill kicked his third conversion for the night to give Orange the win.
Sullivan said he was happy for his boys to get the win but there was still plenty of work to do.
“We need to attack with a bit more depth. We keep going shallow,” he said.
“We’ve got a good bunch of blokes so it’s more just getting everyone pairing up and getting our lines. As long as the hard work’s there we’ll keep coming out with the right result.”
Dubbo CYMS co-coach Luke Jenkins praised his players for a tough game.
“That was a big effort by the boys,” Jenkins said.
“We’ve come here with 16 boys tonight so it was a big effort. We were probably a little bit unlucky.
“We’ve put a lot of pressure on ourselves by handing over the ball but to our credit we kept turning up in defence. It was a team effort tonight.”
n ORANGE CYMS 18 (Kurt Beahan, Garrett Field, Brad Parker tries, Sam Hill 3 goals) def DUBBO CYMS 12 (Blake Tremain-Cannon, Matt Naden tries, Joe Williams 2 goals).
