Playing for their place in the finals, Junee went toe-for-toe with the premiers before falling just short.

It wasn’t until the dying stages the Bulls kicked clear with a 36-24 victory to seal the minor premiership.

Scores were locked at 18-all at half-time and Hayden Diggins scored with 12 minutes left to level things at 24-all.

However Southcity had a mountain of possession in the last five minutes and finally cracked the Diesels line when Steve Tracey scored. 

His younger brother then iced the win with a 50-metre effort.

Southcity captain-coach Kyle McCarthy was pleased to come through the tough game with a win, but was disappointed by how many errors his team produced.

He likened it to their first half effort in the win over Brothers last week.

“It was just deja vu with errors in our own half,” McCarthy said.

“Giving a good team ball in their own half and of course they are going to score points.

“We were a little bit soft in defence at times and they found their front a lot which got their roll on.”

McCarthy believes there a lot to work on one week out from finals.

One thing he wants to focus on is playing a more controlled game.

“I think it might be a curse scoring early and we get a little bit overconfident and try to play like the Globetrotters, spread the ball early in the tackle count and force ourselves to make errors,” he said.

“If we just play basic footy and complete we could probably beat everyone but we have so much flash around the park we try to score off every play.

“It is our downfall at times.”

Southcity scored after two minutes when Tim Jones scored off some nice work from McCarthy at dummy half.

However after an error from the restart Junee hit back through Rusiate Kaliseiwaqa.

Jake Dooley backed up a break from Luke McBeath to put the Bulls back in front but the Diesels levelled after 12 minutes when Timoci Vatubuli scored and then went in front as Pat Sweeney capitalised on another error to put his front.

Jack Lyons scored just before half-time and the Bulls found the front when Mitch Bennett went over 14 minutes into the half.

Junee responded but couldn’t contain the Bulls attack to leave their finals place in jeopardy.

However other results have gone the Diesels way with Cootamundra and Junee playing out a draw and they remain in fourth place.

It means both sides are a point adrift heading into the final round.

Junee will secure a finals berth if they can beat Young on Sunday but if they slip up Cootamundra and Tumut can move around them with wins over Temora and Southcity respectively.

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