Flyhalf Jai Ayoub scores in Eastwood’s 41-24 win over Warringah. Photo: Karen Watson

by Brendan Bradford –

Eastwood closed the gap on second placed Warringah with a 41-24 defeat of the Rats at T.G. Millner on Saturday. The six try to three result leaves the Woodies in third place on 41-points while the Rats remain second on 43. Manly’s big win over Randwick at Coogee Oval sees them extend their lead at the top of the ladder while Uni beat Southern Districts to secure their fourth spot.

After a 20-point loss to Manly last weekend, it was a much more refined performance from the 2013 Minor Premiers.

“It was always going to be a tough block of three games with Uni and Manly and we were a little bit slow out of the blocks today but the first try really gave us a bit of momentum,” said Eastwood coach John Manenti.

‘The Brick with Eyes’ Warringah flanker Sam Ward scores on his return from injury. Photo: Karen Watson

“At halftime I thought we had a bit of ascendancy and we probably should have put some more points on them. They came back after the break and you don’t expect a team that’s only lost one game all year to lie down on you, so it was good we were made to fight for it.”

Eastwood’s ten point lead should have been a bit more at the break and the Rats did well to respond, but Manenti had the luxury of bringing Mick Snowden and Jared Barry off the bench for their first appearances since going down with injuries earlier in the season.

“It was good to bring those blokes off the bench for a bit of impact after they’d been injured for a while and they helped a lot with fresh legs because it was heavy ground out there,” Manenti continued.

“Snowy’s a very different player to Shanin (Proctor) who made a lot of opportunities in the first half, but Snowy’s speed was really handy late in the game.”

The big scoreline didn’t reflect the true nature of the tussle as a never-say-die Rats outfit fought back from large deficits several times in the second half but were held at bay by their own mistakes.

“First half, we were dominated and I was happy with the way the guys responded in the second half, but again, too many errors and the inability not to get out of our own half cost us,” said Rats coach Haig Sare.

“You just can’t give these good teams a start like that and allow them to control the game.”

Going into the match, Sare said the Rats had still been able to record the wins even though they hadn’t been playing to their potential, but against a quality Eastwood side keen to rectify last week’s performance, it wasn’t enough on Saturday.

“Just the ability to put pressure on pressure – we seem to score points but then allow the other side back in the game,” said Sare.

Rats flyer Harry Jones continued his try-scoring First Grade career with a classy second half finish. Photo: Karen Watson.

“That’s why we have a lot of close results because we can certainly score points, but we need to focus on our defence, cutting down the errors and some of our exit plays.”

The Rats dominated the early proceedings and hit the front with a Hamish Angus penalty ten minutes in which merely served to waken the sleeping Eastwood giant.

Winger John Grant took the resulting kick-off on the full and scored on the left before a simple one-two on the right saw Nick Batger dot down behind the posts. Brother, Ben could only convert the second try and Eastwood had a 12-3 lead after 20-minutes.

The Woodies’ third came when flyhalf, Jai Ayoub sliced through the defence on the 20-metre line and off-loaded to captain, Hugh Perrett for a 17-3 advantage.

Warringah were heavily penalised as the half wore on and a Batger three-pointer after half an hour gave a 20-3 scoreline at the break.

It’s the Warrignah backs who get most of the plaudits, but their forwards made a contest of it after halftime. Winning a succession of penalties that saw the Rats fans baying for a yellow card, the pack kept it close, muscled-up, rumbled on and openside flanker Boyd Killingworth eventually barreled over the line. Hamish Angus converted for a 20-10 score and suddenly the visitors had their tails in the air.

“We went that first little block after halftime without any ball,” said Maneti.

“We needed to defend a bit better and I think it was the situation where if we scored next it would’ve been floodgates, but credit to them, they scored a couple of tries.”

Dominating territory for once, the Rats scored a second try when young tyro Harry Jones busted through some scattered defence. Angus’ difficult conversion narrowed the gap to two with less than half an hour to play.

Mick Snowden scores Eastwood’s sixth on the stroke of fulltime. Photo: Karen Watson

Mick Snowden’s long awaited return from injury was met with instant reward as the Eastwood halfback made a break from an attacking scrum to set up Ayoub on the other side of the pitch. Batger slotted the conversion from out wide for a ten point advantage with 20-minutes to play.

Warringah have been in some tight ones this season and showed their fighting spirit with a well worked try to Sam Ward in his comeback from injury. Affectionately known around Pittwater as ‘The Brick With Eyes’, hard-man Ward made a bone-crunching tackle on Ben Batger as the Woods hit the attack again, but it wasn’t enough to stop Ayoub off-loading to Pat Sio for a fifth try to finally put the game away.

All that was left for the Rats in the dying minutes was to attempt a couple of losing bonus points but it was Mick Snowden who sniped over for another Eastwood five-pointer in the shadows of fulltime for the final 41-24 scoreline.

Next weekend, Eastwood are away to Norths who are coming off a loss to Penrith while Warringah host Randwick at Rat Park.

Eastwood 41 (Grant, N Batger, Perrett, Ayoub, Sio, Snowden tries; B. Batger 4 con, pen) bt Warringah 24 (Killingworth, Jones, Ward tries; Angus 3 con, pen)