ST Pat’s went into Sunday’s match against the Orange Hawks at the Sportsground with an opportunity to jump their opponents on the Group 10 premier league ladder.
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Instead the Saints copped a 56-12 shellacking from the visitors, who broke the Pat’s defence to pieces in a second half bombardment down the middle of the park.
Hawks had gone into break only up 16-12 over the hosts but three tries in the space of just six minutes shortly into the new half showed what was to come for the remainder of the match.
In all, the visitors amassed 50 unanswered points.
“I could see the early of this at the 30 minute mark of the first half. We were in front 12-10 but we kept turning the ball over, giving away penalties and doing a lot of defending,” Pat’s coach Kurt Hancock said.
“Fatigue makes you do funny things, and when we're fatigued we try and solve things as individuals and not as a team. When you start doing that then everything snowballs.”
Hawks coach and five-eighth Willie Heta is hopeful his team can use the decisive victory as a stepping stone for the remainder of the season.
“What a turnaround from last week. We’ve just got to find some consistency. One week we’re up and another we’re down. Hopefully we can turn it around for here,” he said.
“It’s been attitude all along for us. We needed to start strong, and we did that. We stayed in the contest early on and we knew we had the attack, so if we defended well we could plays together and get points on the board.”
After a back and forth start Pat’s opening the scoring through Matt Ranse in the 10th minute.
Hawks responded soon after through Sione Tongia who somehow found a way to ground the ball with six defenders hanging off him.
Tyson Medlyn and Caleb Lewis scored for the hosts and visitors respectively before Sandon Gibbs O'Neill got Hawks in front just two minutes before half-time.
A depleted Pat’s defence soon suffered a triple blow through quick fire Brett Morgan, Nathan Potts and Tongia tries.
All three tries came off line breaks through the middle of the park.
Bobbie Brown and Kyle Robbins then picked up tries for the visitors.
The following Saints kick-off went out on the full, perhaps summarising their second half performance.
Hawks continued to dish out the pain through Jedd Kennedy, Jake Blimka and Ethan McKellar tries.
Pat’s will look to regroup over the bye week before they face a stern test against the unbeaten Orange CYMS.
Hawks will have a tough opponent in Bathurst Panthers this Saturday at Carrington Park.
