Heading into a qualifying final against Manildra Rhinos, Brad Watt knew his Trundle Boomers side had to plug their leaky defence.
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The fourth-placed Boomers had conceded 280 points in the regular season, more than Orange United Warriors and Oberon Tigers who finished below them.
On Sunday August 6 they made the daunting trip to Jack Huxley Oval to face the minor premiers who had scored a competition-high 559 points.
But Trundle defied the odds, comfortably winning 32-14 to radically shake-up the Woodbridge Cup finals picture.
Watt said the performance was a shot in the arm for the club.
"Looks like we caused an upset," he said.
"We were quietly confident we could go there and do a job. I'm very proud of the boys for the way they just went out and did it.
"We've had a few battles with them there over the years so it was good to head over there and get the win. We took plenty of confidence out of that one.
"Our defence was probably the key. We haven't been the greatest defensive team this year and we are well aware of that so it was nice to hold them to only 14 points.
"As your defence gets better you grow in confidence and your attack comes after that."
Trundle are no strangers to the big dance, having made five straight grand finals between 2015 and 2019 for a return of three premierships.
Two of those came against the Rhinos with Sunday's match another storied chapter in their rivalry.
Watt said they had given themselves the best possible chance of ending a three-year drought.
"It's hard to get to a grand final so to get a shot at making one with a home game is always nice," he said.
"I'm pretty proud of the boys for getting the week off, we'll get stuck into training.
"I said at the start of the year if we could just aim to make the top four to get that double chance [we'd be good] so we were happy with where we landed.
"As they say it's a new season once you get to finals so we were happy with how we started it but the job's not done yet."
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