Cover Photo: Tahlia Crane Photography

Tallon Smith

Three weeks after breaking a 771-day win drought, Wagga Brothers doubled their success to all but realistically end Albury’s first grade finals chances with a 22-20 win at Geohex Park on Sunday.

Holding a 22-10 lead with nine minutes to play after Marley Saunders scored in the corner, Brothers withstood a late challenge from the Thunder to cap off a strong month of football with another victory.

Brothers coach Blake Dunn said it was a nerve-wracking final 10 minutes as Albury scored twice and almost had a third if not for some incredible scramble defence.

“There was plenty of nerves towards the end,” he said. 

“We got to a lead that meant that they needed to score three tries and I feel like, hopefully down the track they are games we will close out quite well.

“We are still learning how to win football games, so I think it’s a step forward and some more lessons there for the team, if we are willing to learn them, because it probably was a game that we should have put away.

“To Albury’s credit, they threw some good shape at us towards the end of the game and we did find it hard to contain.”

It was the home side which opened the scoring in the eighth minute when Cohen Benson sent a rampaging Cleve McGhie down a right side channel, opening up an early 6-0 lead until Albury replied seven minutes later through Siale Lavulavu off a Lachy Munro grubber.

Brothers then added a penalty to take an 8-4 lead into half time, though that lead was overturned on the other side when Munro went over for a simple show and go try early in the second half.

Facing a deficit for the first time seemed to spark Brothers, who replied with the next three tries, the first to winger Luke Anderson off an Albury error, followed up by efforts from Xavier Williams-Byers and Saunders to give the Wagga outfit a 22-10 lead after 71 minutes.

However, an error off the kickoff gave the Thunder good field position, and they made the most of their attacking chance with Lavulavu going over for his second.

Back rower Hugh Duncan followed suit for Albury in the following set, and the Thunder looked set to steal the win when Munro made a break and linked with co-captain Nathan Darby, but a clutch trysaving tackle from McGhie and the ball rolling dead off an ensuing kick saw Brothers hang on for their second win in a month.

Overall, Dunn said he was “really happy” to achieve the result, with the side continuing to improve every week despite the performance lacking some polish in certain aspects.

“There were many parts of our game today that we didn’t execute as well as we have over past weeks, but there’s other parts of the game that were much better,” he said. 

“We completed much higher today, particularly in that first half, and I feel like that gave us a chance to stay in the game.

“Even going back to Cootamundra, our completion rates haven’t been anywhere near high enough for us to be able to win some of those games.

“If we had got some of that stuff right in [those] past two against Young and Tumut I feel like we could have come away with some points.

“Today was good to get that aspect of our game much better.”

As for the side’s standout player on the day, Dunn couldn’t go past the side’s skipper Cleve McGhie, while also acknowledging the efforts of his hooker Zac Riley and winger Anderson.

“I think Cleve was a standout, he has been fantastic all year,” he said.

“Zac Riley our hooker once again was great for us, and Luke Anderson got our players’ player, the winger that plays under 18s usually, he had a great game outside Cleve.”

Next up for Brothers is a clash with fellow round 11 winners and Geohex Park stablemates Wagga Kangaroos on Saturday, while Albury will host ladder leaders Gundagai at Greenfield Park the following day.

WAGGA BROTHERS 22 (C. McGhie, L.Anderson, X. Williams-Byers, M. Saunders tries; C.Benson 3 goals) DEFEATED ALBURY THUNDER 20 (S. Lavulavu 2, L. Munro, H. Duncan tries; N. Broekman 2 goals) at Geohex Park, Sunday July 12.