The Yass Rams returned to the winner’s list on Saturday with an impressive 36-23 win over Cooma Red Devils, while the Yass Ewes fell to ADFA 38-7 in Canberra.
The Rams were away on Saturday to play the Cooma Red Devils in a game that not only decided the Gordon Litchfield Trophy, but also attempted to answer the ongoing question of who the best Roach brother is.
With a strong wind in their faces and thoughts about the bus trip home on their minds, the Rams battled through the first half and went to the break narrowly trailing their hosts.
A much better performance in the second half saw Yass pull ahead and eventually close out the game with a well-deserved 36-23 victory.
Points for the Rams came from tries to Mitch Stevens, Harrison Locke, Paul Watson, Declan Kain and Aidan Kain. Mitch Stevens also had a solid day with the boot slotting four conversions and a penalty.
Fortunes weren’t as good for the Yass ladies on Saturday, as the Ewes travelled to ADFA to take on the Australian Defence Force Academy ladies.
ADFA are known for their fitness and this was again the case.
The home side started strongly and took advantage of some lacklustre Yass defence to take hold of the game and go to the half-time break with a handy lead.
The Ewes fought back vigorously in the second half and scored first but were unable to claw their way back into the match and eventually went down 38-7.
The try scorer for Yass was Lia Gaspari with the boot of Tayla-Jayne Stevens adding the extras.
Ewes Coach Nathan Cooke said the slow start from his side proved costly as ADFA piled on the first four tries and knocked the wind out of Yass’ sails before they could get a grip of the game.
“I think we probably started a little bit slow, either that or ADFA came out firing in the first half. They had scored four tries to nil in the first half and it took us a little bit to get started and wake up,” Cooke said.
“We regrouped in the second half and were winning the second half for nearly all of it, but then ADFA scored a runaway try at the end of the game to make it 12-7 in the second half. It was a much improved second half for the Ewes.
“There were a few small things that I said at half-time that we needed to focus on. ADFA were very good at moving the ball. As soon as our girls were getting to the ground, ADFA were straight over attacking the ball.
“We just needed to polish up on our clean out skills and put them into play. We train it and pride ourselves on our seal, unfortunately we were just that little bit slow on the weekend for half of the game and picked it up when we held on to the ball a little more in the second half.”
Next week the Rams have a bye, while the Ewes are off to Phillip Oval to take on Royals at 10:55am.
“It’s an early game this weekend. I’m hoping it’s competitive and we know there’s a few girls that we won’t have from our normal team available this weekend, but we’re hoping to put a strong side together and get across to see how we fair.”
Tim Warren
