What a weekend of footy we had and a great way to wrap up the junior representative season for 2023! Four wins for the Bears, our Harvey Norman Women’s team moved into top position on the ladder after a dominate win over the Central Coast Roosters, our NSW Cup team beat the Roosters and climbed the ladder to now be sitting in second place, Harold Matthews Cup got their first win of the season defeating the Sydney Roosters 16 – 12, Tarsha Gale Cup beat the Panthers to end the season with two wins and two draws and all games went ahead even with some pretty intense rain.

We had a number of debuts across the weekend starting with local junior from Asquith Magpies, Grace-Lee Weekes who stepped up from Tarsha Gale to HNWP. Grace had a cracking debut game including scoring a try in the second half and contributing to the teams 30 – 10 win over the Central Coast Roosters. Watch Grace’s jersey presentation by Greg Florimo HERE. On debut in the Red & Black for the first time was NRLW and internationalist star, Jessica Sergis. Jess is a world-class player having played for Australia since 2017, starred in the NSW Blues side for five years and was the 2019 Dally M winner. Welcome to the Bears Jess!

Another strong on field performance by our HNWP team saw the ladies in the game from the kick-off and Rikeya Horne stormed across the line in the first few minutes. It wasn’t long before Nita Maynard added the four points and Kirra Dibb converted. The scores were close at the change of ends, 10 – 6 to the Bears, but the second half was where the Bears really shined. Immense defense in very slippery and wet conditions kept the CC Roosters to just one try per half and the Bears extended their lead with Teuila Fotu-Moala busting over, followed by local junior debut Grace-Lee Weekes in the corner and Rikeya Horne finished the game off with a fast-paced double. Unstoppable!

Our KOE NSW Cup game looked in doubt on Sunday morning as Wentworth Park was completely waterlogged. Some frantic phone calls later and the game was moved to Hills Grammar, the summer home of the Bears, and was underway at 3pm. Bears had another strong first half with Paul Momirovski taking the lead within 2 minutes of kick off, Ben Stevanovic followed with a quick double, Josh Bergamin and then Tui Katoa sent the boys to the sheds up 24 – 6. Roosters fought back in the second half but Bears retained the lead and took the win. Click image below to watch the NSWRL game highlights >>