In a pulsating contest that, for the first 50 minutes at least, was almost worthy of a top grade match, a penalty goal to Tom Stonestreet in the last three minutes gave CYMS an eight-point lead and sealed the win.

It had been a tough battle and one that both sides had their chances to win.

“That first half was just fantastic. It was brilliant footy and both sides were just going at it, tit for tat,” defeated Pat’s player-coach Julian Stambe said.

“I think in the second we started to burn a few of our legs out a bit earlier than we wanted. It was a hot day and it was hard on the bigger guys out there in the middle.”

St Pat’s looked like a switched-on outfit early in the match and five-eighth Dylan Battersby put a good full-stop on the opening 10 minutes with a perfectly executed 40-20.

Moments later, Chris Boardman was on the end of a Cam Backhouse pass to open the scoring, though Battersby’s conversion was waved away.

A Pat’s error from the restart had CYMS on the hunt for an equaliser and they went close but were denied by some desperate goal-line defence.

Former representative half Warick Colley entered the game for the Orange team at the 17-minute mark and instantly began to give them some extra direction – but, for the most part, St Pat’s had things under control.

They extended their lead to 10-0 when Battersby strolled through some flimsy defence following a kick from Backhouse that was ruled to have touched a CYMS hand before going out on the full.

Unfortunately for the Bathurst outfit, they again shot themselves in the foot with a mistake from the restart, and it allowed Cameron Jones to charge across through a number of defenders to get his team on the board.

Both teams exchanged half-chances but couldn’t finish, and it looked certain that Pat’s would take a 10-6 lead to the break only for a penalty just before the siren which allowed Tom Stonestreet to slot a sideline goal.

St Pat’s completed 13 of 15 sets in a clinical half of football to CYMS’ 11 from 15, but their control of the ball and field position hadn’t translated to a bigger lead and it would hurt them later in the game.

Early in the second half, CYMS hooker Luke Morris found himself out of options on the last tackle and sent a seemingly harmless grubber into the Pat’s in-goal.

Somehow it went through two sets of legs and, after a desperate dive, Morris touched down with his fingertips.

A terrible conversion attempt from Stonestreet left CYMS leading 12-10, but their opposition were having troubles of their own, and didn’t complete a set until 10 minutes into the second stanza.

A game-changing moment came with 17 minutes remaining when a CYMS kick rebounded off a set of St Pat’s legs, before Battersby charged onto the loose ball and looked set to race 80 metres untouched.

He was ruled off-side, though, and the chance went begging.

Another pivotal incident came after a great interchange between Corey Averio, Backhouse and winger Kurt Norton which led to a 60-metre break, and on the next play CYMS looked shot on their left edge.

Backhouse, who was otherwise outstanding for his team, spilled the ball and that proved to be the last real shot they fired.

When they were penalised while in possession a few minutes later, part of a run of ball misuse that saw six errors in six minutes, things were beginning to fall apart.

CYMS took their lead out to 16-10 when Scott Sullivan found Epa Navale with a great pass, and Stonestreet’s penalty a few minutes from full-time sealed the deal.

For Pat’s, Backhouse always looked his team’s most likely, while Averio was another good contributor.

AJ Piper and Navale staged an entertaining battle that saw the Pat’s winger repeatedly gamble on coming out of the line to shut his opposite number down.

He was enjoying a points victory until Navale’s try.

ORANGE CYMS 18 (Epa Navale, Cameron Jones, Luke Morris tries; Tom Stonestreet 3 goals) defeated ST PAT’S 10 (Dylan Battersby, Chris Boardman tries; Battersby goal)