Tallon Smith

The Border Bears remain in equal first place on the Goulburn Murray Premiership ladder after a late Blade Parker try sealed a 26-22 victory over the Corowa Cougars at Sarvaas Park on Sunday.

Leading 20-6 after 48 minutes, a Corowa fightback saw the Bears fall behind in the closing stages, until an opportunity created by a Cam Miller offload saw the Bears steal a late victory and remain level on points with the Wodonga Wombats after seven rounds.

After escaping with the two competition points, Bears coach Scott Smith said he felt “nothing but relief” when Parker crossed two minutes from full time.

“We were very lucky to get away with that one, and I’m proud of the boys that we just hung in there and didn’t drop our heads, that is certainly a positive,” he said.

“I was relieved because I think you could almost say today the better team got beat.”

Brody McCann-Dillon got the Bears off to the best possible start with an early try, before a quickfire double to Jacob Campbell extended their lead to 14-0 after 29 minutes.

Playing at fullback for a second straight week, Corowa star Emilio Leti struck back in the 33rd minute to reduce the margin to 10 points heading into the break, until Lachie Bishop cancelled it out with a four-pointer of his own for the Border outfit on the other side.

However, the Cougars’ fightback only went up a gear from there, with Leti fielding a ball in his own in-goal and racing 100 metres to score, before Abimelech Terry and Tamana Kirisome followed with crucial tries of their own to give Corowa an unlikely 22-20 lead with four minutes to play.

That left time for one final chance for the Bears, and after turning down the opportunity for a penalty goal from point blank range, prop Cam Miller found McCann-Dillon, with halfback Elijah Williams then feeding the ball to Parker who crashed over, leading to wild celebrations after McCann-Dillon’s touchline conversion.

Despite the incredible finish, Smith said that he was still disappointed that the Bears found themselves in that situation after dominating the opening half hour of the contest, with the side’s discipline an area identified as needing improvement.

“We shouldn’t have let ourselves get into that position, again it was our mistakes,” he said.

“We played tough, but we have got to get rid of the silly errors out of our game, because what we are doing is giving the opposition opportunities where we don’t need to.

“We have got to cut that out of our game, because a side like Corowa, the improvement in that team has been unbelievable and a credit to their coach Webby [Dan Webb].”

Asked for his thoughts on how the Bears are travelling at the halfway mark of the year, Smith said he is pleased with the side’s start to the season, but believes the team has plenty more improvement in store as the run home approaches.

“I’m certainly happy, I think we have got a stack of improvement in us,” he said.

“I reckon we are like a V8 running on six cylinders to be honest with you, there’s a lot more improvement in us, and when we start to fire, this side has got a lot of go about them.

“When we start firing on all cylinders, we will go deep into the finals.”

As for McCann-Dillon’s individual performance, Smith said the reigning league best and fairest has been a shining light for the Border club this season.

“Brody McCann, he’s a little gun, he’s as tough as they get,” he said.

“He is starting to look for some opportunities out of dummy half when our bigger boys are finding their front, which is good, and his goalkicking, he has kicked a couple from the sideline which is outstanding, because without those from the sideline, we don’t get the win.”

Meanwhile, Corowa coach Dan Webb said that despite the loss, he was pleased with the resilience his side showed after facing an early deficit.

“I think we get behind and we drop our heads pretty badly, but this is actually the first game we have seen something good happen, and [we] roll off the back of it,” he said.

“If we can learn from that and actually motivate ourselves along the way, it will be great.

“That used to be us, we always used to be behind and somehow come through, but we are starting to work with that, and if we can ingrain it, then we will be pretty good.

“It is our best game, we’re starting to put the little things together.”

Looking at other results, the Wodonga Wombats kept their noses in front of the Bears at the top of the table with a dominant 48-2 showing against an injury-hit Tumbarumba side, while the Albury Muddogs finished their home matchday in style with a 52-12 victory over Wangaratta.

In the Women’s League Tag competition, the ladder-leading Wodonga Wombats kept their undefeated record intact with a 36-0 shutout of Tumbarumba, while Ella Clark and Maddison Shaw scored doubles as the Albury Muddogs defeated Wangaratta 20-4.

The remaining game saw Tessa McCann-Dillon score two tries of her own for the Bears in a 24-12 victory over Corowa.