West Harbour openside Cohen Masson has been a standout for the Pirates this season. Photo: Jeremy Brennan.

by Brendan Bradford –

The unfamiliar setting of Drummoyne Oval will be the venue as the Pirates attempt to atone for a 37-29 loss to Parramatta last week in a match coach Matt Briggs described as one of their worst performances of the year.

Despite nabbing a four-try bonus point, West Harbour were out-gunned in the high-scoring encounter and are left in eighth place on the ladder with 22-points, five behind Southern Districts in seventh and Randwick in sixth.

“Our set-piece was pretty poor and we made 240-odd tackles in the game, so we learnt a hard lesson in terms of possession and put ourselves in a tough position,” said Briggs.

“We’d won three out of four games but dropped another one last week and we need to start building that momentum with a few wins, because we don’t just want to scrape into sixth position, we want to be a top side.”

Every point is vital for West Harbour who will play Easts and Randwick in coming weeks – two sides who are both hovering in the middle of the table. But 11th placed Gordon have nothing to lose and the Pirates will need to be on form in a match that is the Saturday evening showpiece of the City of Canada Bay Council Rugby Festival that lasts the whole long weekend.

Highlanders back Xavier McCoy will be one to watch this weekend. Photo: Karen Watson.

“There are fantastic new facilities, new lighting, some Subbies matches and juniors matches too, so it’ll be an exciting night and we’ll need to be at our best to beat Gordon who are putting up some good performances,” Briggs enthused.

“They’ll go into the game with the attitude that they have nothing to lose and everything to gain, so if we’re not committed to giving our all, we’ll be in the same position as last week and that’s simply not acceptable.”

Despite only playing a couple of minutes for the Melbourne Rebels over the past few weeks, Jack Debreczeni won’t be permitted to play, meaning the only changes to Briggs’ side sees forward Harrison Orr and halfback David Osafua joining the starting team.

Osofua was Briggs’ first choice halfback last year but has been out injured with a broken arm he sustained at the Kiama Sevens while Orr has put in some stellar second-grade performances recently.

Gordon are also coming off one of their worst games of the year, with coach Geoff Townsend saying it’s time for his players to shape-up or ship-out after a 44-15 loss to Norths last week.

“We’re trying to keep the team together as much as possible, but if we put in another effort like we did on the weekend there might be some changes,” warned Townsend, who said there were no excuses for the loss which comes off the back of some promising signs over the past month.

“We’d done reasonably well in the preceding weeks against three of the top teams in the competition but couldn’t find anything on the weekend, which is unfortunate,” he said.  

“The guys need to be able to obtain a level of consistency each week and at the moment we have good moments but also periods where we just aren’t able to play. That’s experience at times, but execution on the weekend was poor.”

If the Highlanders want any chance of making the finals, they need to start winning this weekend and will benefit from the inclusion of playmaker Henry Carmichael who returns from concussion and prop Tobias Gukibau who was voted the second toughest forward in the competition.

“It’s good to have those two back, but West Harbour have some big forwards and a touch of unpredictability about them,” said Townsend.

“They’ll consider themselves a play-off side and will be very hard to beat.”

West Harbour v Gordon at Drummoyne Oval 5:15pm

West Harbour: 1. Michael Ala’alatoa, 2. Ryan Dalziel, 3. Dave Lolohea, 4. Chris Simons, 5. Harrison Orr, 6. Tom Games (c), 7. Cohen Masson, 8. Matt Coles, 9. David Osofua, 10. Dave Harvey, 11. Tito Mua, 12. Rory Sidey, 13. Usaia O’Sullivan, 14. Joel Brooks, 15. Dylan Taikato-Simpson.

Gordon: 1. Nick Fraser, 2. Ron Hobden, 3. Tobias Guikabau, 4. Ruiraidh Wilson, 5. Jack Maguire, 6. Malelili Vukinamualevu, 7. Mitch Greenway, 8. Johnno Broome, 9. Terry Preston (c), 10. Henry Carmichael, 11. Brandon Quinn, 12. Tom Matthews, 13. Matt McDougall, 14. Sione Ala, 15. Xavier McCoy. 

Referee: Tim Wills