Forbes Platypi made a complete turnaround on the weekend, with all three grades winning against the Narromine Gorillas in front of a home crowd.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The first grade side defeated Narromine 24-7, second grade smashed the opposition 34-3, while colts also had a 24-7 victory against the Gorillas.
The convincing wins come after a three-grade loss to Mudgee the prior week and first grade coach, Heamani Lavaka, said playing in front of a Forbes crowd made all the difference, despite the weather.
“The thing that was different was the home advantage,” Lavaka said.
“I’m very happy...it’s good to have the four points but it would have been nice to get the bonus point [for scoring four tries].
“The weather was difficult - it started raining five minutes before first grade kicked off.”
Narromine scored the first try of the match off an intercept but the Platypi came back strong, scoring the next three tries.
Lavaka said credit should go to Narromine who played the majority of the game with only 14 players.
“They’ve played final footy in the last four or five years, except last year, so they’re always strong,” he said.
“They did really well to hold against us but we didn’t use their 14 players to our advantage.”
The Platypi were missing a couple of their strong players on Saturday but Lavaka said those who stepped up played well.
“Brenton Howarth stepped up to first grade and he didn’t let us down, he was very impressive,” Lavaka said.
“One of the good players for us was Steve Morris, who got three points for players’ player.
“He was really good all round the field as the five eight and gave Jack [Hammond] a lot of room to play in his position and we all know Jack is really good and very experienced.
“Jarrod Hall was again really good all over the field and so was Andrew Hubbard.
“Angus King came in and played winger and fullback and was very handy for us. He’s not available all the time but when he is...he’s really good.”
A Narromine player was sent off for a king hit on Jake Cutler who didn’t end up finishing the game.
Despite the win, Lavaka said the team played a messy game due to the weather and have a lot of things to work on for this weekend.
“We went away from the game plan and we made a lot of mistakes out of it,” he said.
“We didn’t play to the weather which was my plan.
“I think it was a bit messy but a very hard game of footy for us, we still had to dig in hard.”
Lavaka said they can’t afford to make those kind of mistakes this weekend when the Platypi take on Orange City.
“We have to work on our break downs and our line-ups and our defence,” he said.
“With Orange City, if you make mistakes you pay; they’re a well-drilled team and they play with a lot of discipline.”
This week the Platypi will have three training days - Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.
“If we want to be there with the best we have to work hard,” Lavaka said.
