Redemption for Bears SG Ball Against the Central Coast

The North Sydney SG Ball Cup have overcome a devastating loss last round toughing it out in wet weather at Morie Breen Reserve on Saturday.

“We had a pretty good week at training after the Balmain match, and we went up there feeling good,” said under eighteens representative coach Shaune Wiffen.

The Bears under eighteens now play host to the Illawarra Steelers at TG Milner Field Saturday, March 4th at 11:15 am.

The newly named Central Coast Roosters scored first with two quick tries after twenty minutes and a third at the thirty-third minute making them 16-NIL in the lead.

Similar to last round errors and poor ball control cost the Bears in the first half which gave the Roosters the 16 points.

But hope came in the thirty-fifth minute as Bears centre Arisento Bou-Sleiman scored out wide.

The difficult conversion attracted high praise from the Coach.

“Jeremy Gibson kicked a cracker from the sideline to have us go to the break 16-6.” claimed Shaune, clearly impressed with Jeremy’s long range kick.

“The boys were in good spirits at halftime, and we knew what we had to do to get the win.”

“Unfortunately we couldn’t execute properly. This was compounded by poor options which cost us in the end.”

On the good side, the Bears toughed it out and kept the Roosters scoreless in the second half obliterating any memory of the round two loss to the Tigers. With Norths winger Kiaanu Ashby getting a try and Jeremy Gibson again converting, the Bears effectively won the second half.

Not surprisingly Shaune was impressed with his young teams’ defensive effort. “Special mentions go to Jayden Griffin with thirty-five tackles and nine hit-ups, Matthew Hammond with twenty-three tackles and ten hit ups, and Lachlan O’Riley with twelve hit ups.”

The Bears under eighteens now play host to the Illawarra Steelers at TG Milner Field Saturday, March 4th at 11:15 am.

Refecting Coach Shaune Wiffen said, “As long as we learn from this experience and remain upbeat we will put on a good show against Illawarra next week for our first home game.”

 

CENTRAL COAST ROOSTERS 16 (tries: Tallis Angianga, Mokena Moeke, Elih Jackson, conversions: Blake Taaffe 2),
defeated NORTH SYDNEY BEARS 12 (tries: Arisento Bou-Sleiman, Kiaanu Ashby, conversions: Jeremy Gibson 2).

FINAL TEAM
1 Lachlan Daly-O‘Riley
2 Kiaanu Ashby
3 Arisento Bou-Sleiman
4 Sean Sabutey
5 Ali Saad
6 Jeremy Gibson
7 Dean Kammel
8 Matthew Hammond
9 Jayden Griffin (C)
10 Dante Taliai
11 Kyle Mccudden
12 Reece Christodoulou
13 Zac Borg

Interchange
14 Matthew French
15 George Yarak
20 Jonathan Papantoniou
18 Leonardo Frustaci

Coach: Shaune Wiffen

 

The SG BALL CUP is a 17-team under-18s Australian Rugby League competition conducted by the New South Wales Rugby League.

The competition includes both junior representative teams of National Rugby League and Intrust Super Premiership New South Wales clubs that do not field a team in the National Rugby League competition.

The SG Ball Cup is named after SG “George” Ball, one of the five people responsible for the formation of the South Sydney Rabbitohs, and who was club secretary for more than fifty years.