With just a few minutes to go Macquarie had taken the lead and it was down to the wire.

Forbes scored an equalising try in the dying minutes, but missed the conversion to see the game end in a 24-all draw.

"The boys were disappointed they let the game slip," coach Cameron Greenhalgh said.

The hosts struggled through the first half: excellent in defence but needing to go on the attack.

That came in the opening 20 minutes of the second half, when the hosts pushed out to what looked like a convincing lead.

Still, they only had the ball 11 times in that half, Greenhalgh said, scoring from four of those.

Some of it came down to referee calls the coach admits had him shaking his head.

"We had to defend on our line too much," he said.

In the other grades, reserves defeated Macquarie 28 to 6 and our league tag had an 8-0 win.

The under 18s rebounded from their first loss in 18 months the week before to secure a solid 70-4 victory. They remain top of the juniors table, one point ahead of Dubbo CYMS.

This Saturday the Magpies head to Narromine. While Forbes is well ahead of Narromine on points - in equal fourth with nine ahead of the Jets' five - we won't be underestimating them.

"Narromine at Narromine on a Saturday are tough," Greenhalgh said. "But we're just about back to full strength. There's no excuses."