A WIN over Blayney on Sunday would all but ensure Orange CYMS claim the 2016 Group 10 premier league minor title and with it a week off come finals, although captain-coach Mick Sullivan knows just how motivated the Bears will be.
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Sitting sixth, Blayney is in the midst of a thrilling battle for fifth with the Mudgee Dragons, while the top four is virtually set but for a couple of potential positional changes.
“With the old affiliation our two clubs have these games tend to be a bit like local derbies, I know the Blayney boys treat them that way,” Sullivan said.
“I think they’ll be a bit like Manly [was on Thursday night], they needed to win and threw everything into it.
“With the position they’re in I’m sure they’ll be pretty fired up to come over to Wade Park and beat us but we are pretty confident of getting the job done.
“[The minor title] is definitely in the back of our minds, we’d prefer to (all but) wrap up the minor premiership this weekend rather than be needing to beat St Pat’s in Bathurst next weekend.
“We should have a dry track this weekend and who knows a week on, we could be going down to Bathurst playing in the wet.
“So we’d rather get the job done and be able to focus on working on a few things next weekend we’ll need to be doing really well come that first finals game.”
Coming off an 88-0 rout of Orange Hawks and then last weekend’s bye, Sullivan said he’s sure those couple of weeks without a tough hit out won’t impact his side.
“No, I don’t think it will [stifle momentum] we’ve been playing pretty sharply and running pretty sharply too (at training),” Sullivan said.
Prior to last weekend’s bye, the Bears scored a gritty 22-18 upset win over Oberon. Blayney won that game through the middle and Sullivan said he’s expecting the visitors to play a similar way on Sunday.
He did acknowledge the dangers they have out wide though, like rugby code-chameleon Carter Hirini.
“Big forward pack, that’s their strength, we’d expect them to try and come through the middle which I’m confident we can defend,” Sullivan said.
We'd prefer to (all but) wrap up the minor premiership this weekend rather than be needing to beat St Pat's in Bathurst next weekend.
- CYMS captain-coach Mick Sullivan
“They probably have the points in terms of speed out wide, in their centres, but our centres are very sound defensively and I’m pretty confident they’ll get the points.
“Brock (McGarity) might not be the quickest, neither is Jerome (Harrison), but they’re good defensively and very smart players.”
CYMS welcome back Tim Mortimer for Sunday’s clash.
The two sides do battle at Wade Park from 2pm.
ORANGE CYMS (TBC): 1 Ben McAlpine, 2 Semisi Katoa, 3 Jerome Harrison, 4 Brock McGarity, 5 Todd Murphy, 6 Dom Maley, 7 Mick Sullivan, 8 Simon Osborne, 9 James Wynne, 10 Mitch Davis, 11 Larsen Marabe, 12 Brenden Cousins, 13 Ryan Griffin; Interchange: 14 Cam Jones, 15 Sam Hill, 16 Kyran Bubb, 17 Tim Mortimer
Matt Findlay
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
