Despite the cold, wet conditions down at Eridge Park, Bowral Blacks received plenty of home crowd support to finish the day with two wins.
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First grade bounced back on Saturday after its poor performance last week to win by the narrowest of margins.
Up against a tough Vikings team that featured in the 2017 decider, Bowral claimed a 32-31 victory.
After giving up a big lead in last week’s match against Campbelltown, Bowral proved it had learnt its lesson. When Vikings got a run of play and scored a few successive tries, the Blacks held on and refused to let this game slip away from them.
“We had a time in the match where we could have switched off,” Blacks director of rugby Peter Burt said.
“They’re a strong team and to come away with a win at home was very important to us.”
Henry Yuill crossed the try line twice for Bowral with Harry Parson and Tom Mooney also getting tries for the home side.
Burt said the Blacks put in a strong defensive effort and good line speed put continued pressure on Vikings.
“We got up in their faces and shut down their opportunities to move the ball.”
Despite difficult conditions, the Blacks were able to move the ball wide which their wingers capitalised on with a few tries.
In the first match of the day third grade continued its winning form with an 18-5 win. James Bayliss scored for Bowral thirds in Saturday’s match.
Having shown strong form in the opening rounds of the Illawarra competition, the energy and effort from all players on the field remained high as the Blacks continued its unbeaten streak.
Burt said the team’s defensive effort was again impressive.
It was however, a different story for second grade, after it went down 5-3.
In a much anticipated grand final rematch, the result did not go the way of last year’s decider.
Vikings were hungry for revenge after losing in last year’s grand final and while it was a close loss, Burt said the result was more disappointing than last week.
“We let the niggle get to us,” he said. “We were coming in from the side of the ruck and going off our feet which you just can’t do. Our defence was good but our attack was a bit disjointed. We need to get more fluidity in our offence.”
