THEY might have cost themselves with handling errors, but the defensive effort from the Panorama Platypi under 16s in Saturday's 18-4 loss to the Castlereagh Cougars made coach Mick Roels proud.
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Hosting the undefeated Cougars at Jack Arrrow Oval in round three of the Western Women's Rugby League competition, Panorama pulled off solid hits and beautiful covering tackles as well as showing determination on their own line.
They were efforts which fatigued Panorama and Roels admitted contributed to his side's large count of knock-ons in the wet conditions. But they were efforts which were still worthy of praise.
"We are defending well, just can't hold the ball. That has been the case in the three games we've played," Roels said.
"They defend set after set after set on their own line, then when they get the ball back they are just fatigued."
Fullback Charlie Fox and lock Annie Craig both got through a mountain of defensive work as well as being two of the biggest contributors to the running metres earned by Panorama, while centre Paige Lowe pulled off more than one try-saver.
But Cougars still managed to find space on the edges which they exploited.
Cougars centre Charlotte Eather scored after four minutes when the visitors created an overlap on the left wing, while in the second quarter after Panorama had failed to find touch with a penalty kick, five-eighth Shakaye Walker scooted down the right flank to cross.
That made it 8-0 at half-time and when Eather nabbed her second just before three-quarter-time as she worked a nice wrap-around play, the visitors pushed further ahead.
With eight minutes left Panorama finally got on the board as Fox made a strong run, drew in the Cougars defence, and got an off-load away to Rani Johnson.
That made it 12-4, but the Cougars had the final say when Walker scored with 35 seconds left on the clock. Ashanti Pennell iced the win by kicking the conversion.
"It just took that long for us to start the game, it was gone before we could make any difference. But I'm really proud of the girls, they are putting in every week in defence and that's the biggest part of this, if you can't tackle you are going to be left behind," Roels said.
"It's just our ball work that let us down and it's funny because that is what we practice at training.
"Take nothing away from Castlereagh, those girls have improved out of sight from last year when we put 40 on them to this week when they beat us."
