Randwick flexed their premiership muscle in the late stages of last week’s local derby against Eastern Suburbs, reminding the competition of the defending premier’s class and showing Easts that they still have a bit of work to do before finals time.
Elsewhere, West Harbour upset Eastwood, Gordon beat Manly, Norths held off a spirited Souths outfit, Western Sydney belted Hunter and Warringah put 50 points on Sydney Uni
With the match in the balance in front of a big crowd at Woollahra Oval, Randwick kicked up a gear against Easts and scored 13 unanswered points in the final 10 minutes to claim an impressive 50-37 win.
The poise of Andrew Deegan was evident for all to see at the backend of the match and while Easts again showed they have plenty of points in them, it wasn’t enough in a high-scoring affair.
This week, they face Western Sydney, who arguably have more attacking strike power than Randwick. They must tighten their defence to challenge the Two Blues at The Eric.
Is there anything better than watching big men in space?
West Harbour hooker Albert Alcock scored one of the best tries you’ll see in his side’s win over Eastwood on Back to West Harbour Day at Concord.
With the match in the balance, Alcock received the ball near the sideline and 30 metres out from his own line from a kick off. He beat a halfback with pace, a fullback with a bump and a winger with a palm and out sprinted the rest of the Woodies to the try line.
Make sure you check out this week’s tries of the week to watch the big man in full flight.
After weeks of rain in Sydney, we finally got some sun on a Saturday and it appeared to be a bit of a relief for some frustrated Shute Shield players who scored 66 tries collectively across six games on Saturday.
Sure, defensive coaches have had a tough start to this week, but after so many tight games played in miserable conditions in recent weeks, it was great to see teams release the shackles in round 12.
After winning five of their last six matches, Manly were really disappointing against Gordon at Chatswood Oval on Saturday.
The Marlins conceded nine tries in arguably their worst performance of the season.
They’ve got just a week to turn things around before they travel north to play a red hot Warringah team who are scoring tries for fun at the moment from just about anywhere on the park.
Northern Beaches local derbies are typically tight affairs, but that won’t be the case this Saturday if Manly defend like they did against the Stags.
No one enjoyed watching Kurtley Beale get carried off the field at Woollahra Oval last Saturday just minutes after coming on from the bench.
But it was positive to see Joe Schmidt release Beale to play in the first place and showed the new Wallabies coaches intent. He clearly wants to see his players playing rugby and there is is no better place for fringe squad members to do so then in the Shute Shield.
It sounds simple, but we haven’t seen it anywhere near as often as we should have in recent years.
On the other side of the coin, it was great to see Joey Walton receive a call up to the Wallabies squad as an injury replacement after impressing for Gordon in recent weeks.
If we isn’t wearing gold, let’s hope he’s back playing with the Stags in their run towards the finals.
