John Fitzgerald

Last weekend’s Woodbridge Cup elimination finals games saw the end of the season for Orange United and Cowra Magpies.

On Saturday Canowindra Tigers came back from the previous week’s drubbing at the hands of Oberon to defeat Orange 24-20.

The Tigers, down 16-nil at halftime, regrouped to score 24 second-half points to overthrow the Orange side and keep their premiership hopes alive.

On Sunday at Cowra the Molong Bulls overcame the Magpies’ home-ground advantage to take the game 28-24.

It took only two minutes for Molong to score first points with a try to Kade Barrow, converted by Sebastian Backhouse for a six-point lead.

Inspired by their early try the Bulls strongly attacked the Cowra line and had the best part of 10 minutes inside the Magpies’ half of the field.

Cowra withstood Molong’s barrage, and now down to 12 players with a sin binning for a tackle above the horizontal, still managed to score next via a Josh Weston try when they worked their way out of their own half.

Down 4-6, it took another 10 minutes of grinding play for the Magpies to regain the lead with Weston’s second, this time converted by Ricky Whitton for a 10-6 scoreline.

With the first half coming to a close Barrow scored again for Molong, chasing a fifth-tackle kick to score close enough to the posts for Sebastian Backhouse to convert and the Bulls to take back the lead 12-10.

With halftime looming, Cowra, following a penalty 20 metres out from the Molong line, picked up another two points, and the sides went to the sheds at 12 points apiece.

As in the first half, Molong scored early in the second, a try in the corner to Tim Rapley, unconverted, for a 16-12 lead.

Cowra hit back with two converted tries in five minutes, to Jayden Williams and halfback Whitton, to take a good 24-16 lead, with 27 minutes remaining.

Into the last 20 minutes Molong came back into the contest when Ben Blimka scored near the posts for his side to get within two points of their rivals 24-22.

At this point the game began going pear shaped for Cowra, the Magpies players giving away penalties, possession and field position.

Their fullback was dismissed for dissent, and from the ensuing penalty Molong’s Backhouse successfully kicked the goal into an even-up 24-all scoreline.

Cowra were barely able to get out of their own half in the latter stages due to their constant infringements and lost their third player to the sidelines, leaving the Magpies now with only 11 players to finish the match.

The final 10 minutes were scrappy and slowed down by the flow of penalties against the home side which Molong took advantage of to break the deadlock with an unconverted try to Jake Morgan with five minutes to go and a winning 28-24 scoreline.

Without detracting from the victors, Cowra beat themselves, giving away too many penalties and losing players through their indiscretions.

In the upcoming third round of finals games Manildra will host Canowindra on Saturday, and Oberon are at home to Molong on Sunday.