THE Bathurst Bushrangers Rebels kept themselves in the mix for a top two spot in the Central West AFL by beating the Bathurst Giants 5-16-46 to 3-7-25, but boy did they have to work for it.

Going into their showdown with the Giants at George Park on Saturday, Rebels co-coach Tom Regan said that he was hoping to earn a 10-goal win.

His aim was legitimate given some of the large winning margins the Rebels had notched up in their earlier games this season.

But a combination of wet weather and an ultra-determined opposition made sure that didn’t happen.

In fact, at half-time there was just a point in it as the Giants matched their higher-ranked opponent’s every move, trailing 2-7-19 to 2-6-18.

By full-time the experience and class of the Rebels was enough for them to ease out to a 21-point victory.

Straighter kicking would have enhanced the margin of victory, but the Giants didn’t exactly have their radar working either.

Regan stood tall for his side, kicking a couple of crucial goals and sharing best  on field honours with John Noyen, while key forward Jack Vogan was kept to two goals but they were worth a lot more in the context of the match.

Importantly, with Cowra suffering their first defeat at the hands of Dubbo on Saturday, the Rebels now sit just a win behind both the Bushrangers Outlaws and Cowra on the ladder. 

Meanwhile, Giants coach Mark Kennedy couldn’t have been prouder of his team’s effort.

The first quarter gave an indicator of the intensity they brought to the game, as they created as many scoring shots as their rivals. But poor conversion cost them, and the Giants ended the first term trailing 16-11.

The Giants won the second period, albeit by four points, before the decisive passage of play came in the third with the Rebels kicking 2-6 to stretch their lead to 18 points.

“It was a massive effort from our guys considering we lost a handful of our best players in the middle since our last game. We had to put some new guys in there around the footy and they were awesome,” Kennedy said.

“Andrew Nelson played the best match I’ve seen him play, Luke Macauley and Josh Broes were excellent. Luke did a good job nullifying Matt Griffin, who is one of those outside runners that can really hurt you. 

“At half-time we were a point down, I talked to the players about measuring their emotions and we broke off into little groups to discuss what we were doing, and about what it means to be competitive.

“We maintained the pressure around the football all game but credit where it is due, the Bushrangers were good enough to handle that and kick a winning score. They missed a lot of shots, but a fair bit of that was due to our pressure.”

The conditions worked in the Giants’ favour given the nature of the two teams, something Kennedy said his men tried to use further to their advantage.

“They have a lot of players who can take the pretty marks, who do a lot of fast outside work and run all day, so with our bigger guys we tried to make it a bit of a slog and keep the ball in the contest,” he explained.

“If there is such a thing as the good loss cliche, this was it. We learned three things about ourselves from this match.

“We learned that we can compete not just with the mediocre sides but with the better teams, we learned that we are starting to gel as a group across the field, and that we will never give up.”

BATHURST BUSHRANGERS REBELS 5-16-46 (Tom Regan 2, Jack Vogan 2, Michael Long) defeated BATHURST GIANTS 3-7-25 (Leigh Kingwell 2, Andrew Nelson)