After beating Barker and Knox on either side of the school holiday break, Waverley are hoping to defend their way to the school’s first CAS title since 2020.

Waverley fought back from 26-11 down and kicked a field goal after the full time siren to sneak past Cranbrook in the opening round, then beat Barker and Knox to move one win clear of the rest of the competition with two matches remaining.

“We obviously learnt a lot from the trial period and that’s led to some really good performances against some really good sides,” assistant coach Lachlan Drew-Morris told Rugby News.

“As we spoke about previously, we wanted to build our game around our defence and that’s what we were able to do against both Barker and Knox. 

“But we’ve still got two games to go and we aren’t getting ahead of ourselves. We want to keep our destiny in our own hands.”

Returning from the school holiday break, Waverley tackled their way to an impressive 26-14 win last week against a Knox side who had scored on average just under 60 points per match in their last four outings. 

“We just absorbed pressure all game. We only had 35% of the ball and we were proud to come away with a victory despite having such little ball,” Drew-Morris continued. 

“Every time they threatened us out wide, our cover defence was great and we were able to shut them down. We were also able to match their physicality and their set piece which are their real strengths. 

“Then when we got opportunities in their 22, we made the most of them and came away with points and that’s what you need to do against good sides like Knox.”

Waverley also kept the scoreboard ticking over throughout the 70 minutes, limiting Knox’s opportunities to fight their way back into the match. 

“People like to think of us as a very attacking team but we’ve typically taken points when they’ve been on offer because we know that we’ll get the chance eventually to throw the ball around and try to score more points that way. 

“The pleasing thing though is that all of our attack comes off the back of our defence and the boys understand that if they work hard without the ball, then we’ve got the strike to score when we get it.”

Waverley host Aloys at Queen’s Park on Saturday, then travel to face Trinity in the final round and can secure the outright CAS title with two wins. 

But facing consecutive ‘banana-skin’ matches, Drew-Morris said his side knows they’ve still got a lot of work to do before they can begin to celebrate a title. 

“We’ve got to maintain what we’ve been doing all season and just focus on our defence. 

“Aloys play an up tempo game and like to take quick taps to catch you off guard. We’ll need to be wary of that. Trinity also have a lot of strike in attack. 

“We’ve just got to focus on staying connected in defence, communicating well and making our tackles and hopefully we can build off that like we have in other games this year.”

In the rounds other matches, Knox travel to Cranbrook and Barker host Trinity.