By MARK CASHMAN

You find out things about footy teams when times are tough and that’s what Eastern Suburbs coach Pauli Taumoepeau did on Saturday at Woollahra Oval.

The Beasties scrapped their way to 31-29 win over the previously unbeaten Northern Suburbs in their Round Nine Shute Shield fixture, the victory dragging them up into third spot on the competition table with 30 points.

A penalty try in the 83rd minute from a rolling maul gave the home side the victory but it was the willingness to hang in the contest that most pleased Taumoepeau.

“We needed to have a decent showing against an elite team,” Taumoepeau told Rugby News.

“Our error rate was still a little high and Norths made us pay almost each time we made an error.

“But the most pleasing thing was the obvious – that we kept fighting. You can’t coach that, that’s just up to the individual.

“On this occasion we happened to have 15 guys willing to do the job well after the siren had gone.”

The penalty try was one of two given against Norths on the day by referee Thomas Nicholl, a late replacement for Amy Perrett, and the merits of both would have been debated long and hard in the bar after the game at Woollahra.

The first was from a messy looking scrum earlier in the contest.

Still it was what it was and that was the attitude of Norths coach Zak Beer as he mulled over the Shoremen’s first loss of the season.

“Look you’ve got to give Easts a lot of credit for how they went about things and got themselves up for this game,” Beer said.

“Easts treated it like a finals game and gave us a bit of thick lip and in the end that will narrow our focus to get better.

“In many ways we shouldn’t have allowed the officiating to come into play which was disappointing.”

Norths actually led 21-10 at the break and were nicely positioned after the full time bell at 29-25 but the Beasties lifted and got themselves into the right areas of the field.

James Turner was the outstanding player on the field scoring two tries and making numerous metres after contact every time that he got the ball.

Beer is an obvious Turner fan but Taumoepeau gave the Norths No.14 a special wrap.

“James Turner is a freak. So strong in contact and fast through space,” Taumoepeau added.

“He’s a special talent and a dangerous player to have at the end of a decent backline.”

Norths were hoping to welcome back Angus Sinclair at No.10 but he wasn’t quite right and that gave Max Burey more exposure at flyhalf.

Burey once again did very well against the vastly experienced Rohan Saifoloi and when the Shoremen return from the break they will certainly have options.

For the home side outside centre Sam Fogarty did very well scoring the first try and working hard in defence while Teddy Wilson continued to look very comfortable at this level.

IMAGE: EASTERN SUBURBS RUGBY