“Life is good,” Coleambally coach Michael Griffiths said on Saturday night, after his side produced one of the upsets of the year against North Wagga.
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The Blues made the most of Saints’ misses early but had to show plenty of character late to grab a stunning 9.6 (60) to 7.14 (56) victory, just their third of the season.
“I think it’s our best win for the year,” Griffiths said. “With the position we’re in and the position they’re in, to take a scalp like that…
“And to be 10 or 12 points down in the third quarter, we could’ve thrown it in. Credit to the boys, they kept hunting, kept tackling, kept being first to the ball. It served us well and it was a good win. When the siren went, I was pretty pleased.”
The Blues kicked 4.1 to North Wagga’s 2.8 in the first half but trailed by nine points at three-quarter-time.
But, a week after copping an 84-point hiding from Barellan, they produced a stirring final term, scoring 21 points to eight, to become just the third team to beat North Wagga this year.
“We pretty much played a four-quarter game,” Griffiths said.
“Our tackle count was up and our pressure acts were up. If we do that every week, we’re in the game.”
Billy Cerato and Tom Morton had big games while the return of more experience in Carl Pound and Graham O’Connell helped. But they were still without Josh Hamilton (ill) and a host of others injured.
No less than four under 17s backed up to play two games, with Griffiths praising the “gutsy” efforts of Chris Hayes, Ryan Mannes, Harrison Tooth and Jack Cullen.
“By far the most pleasing thing was our attack on the ball and we pretty much out-wanted them,” he said.
“We wanted it more.”
The Blues are eighth but only two wins outside the five.
“The run might be too late but we can finish off the year strongly and at least make the top teams go in a bit sore, or shake it up a bit for the five,” Griffiths said.
They say winners are grinners and Jackson Painting made sure of that, even celebrating his own moves in a tense period of the game.
“Jack Painting did a triple pirouette in the third quarter and got a handball away over the top and started commentating mid-play – ‘how good was that?’
“I couldn’t help it, I just started laughing,” Griffiths said.
