Shute Shield: It wasn’t perfect but Easts get upper hand on West Harbour

By | Jul 27 2020
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By MARK CASHMAN

Eastern Suburbs recorded their first win of the 2020 Shute Shield competition with a solid 36-10 win over West Harbour in the TV match of the round on Saturday.

The Beasties jumped out of the blocks early with tries to Charlie Smith and Richie Woolf and actually led 15-3 at the halftime break.

Like last week backrower Sam Shires, new to Easts this year after having the previous two seasons at Manly, was the pick of the bunch showing the way with good carries and solid, bruising defence.

Centre Henry Paterson was another to do well on the artificial surface at Woollahra which can take time for teams to adjust to early in the season.

Shires had been hampered by a broken foot towards the end of his time at the Marlins missing the last 10 games of 2019.

He made the most of the truncated and Covid-19 affected pre-season and has started this year well.