After an accomplished win over Orange Hawks in round six of the Group 10 tournament, Lithgow Workies came crashing back to earth on Sunday, conceding a 46-14 loss to Blayney Bears in front of a home crowd.
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Led by doubles to Blayney’s Carter Hirini, Jacob Bell and Mitch Evers, the latter also booting seven goals to finish with a personal tally of 22 points, the Bears made short work of Lithgow who struggled to get over the line.
The fact it was Blayney’s first win in the premier league in two years only added salt to the wound.
The match opened with a succession of tries from the Bears, all but one converted by Evers.
Workies’ Jackson Dunn and Byron Wilson managed to hit back with four-pointers.
But with no conversions, Workies’ position was already looking bleak by the end of the first half at 22-8.
Within five minutes of the second half Blayney’s Carter Hirini was already over the line.
Workies bit back when Jackson Dunn broke away to score his second try with little resistance from Blayney.
Sam Elrefaai completed the momentary victory with a conversion.
That was the end of the good news for Workies.
Blayney scored their fifth try and Workies’ Matt Mizzi was sent to the sin bin.
Six minutes to go and Workies were behind by twenty points.
Blayney only widened that gap with two more tries before the end of the game.
The first was by Ben Pickering and the second by Carter Hirini, crossing the line with just seconds left. Blayney finished the match on a 32 point lead.
Workies coach Graeme Osborne said the locker room was silent after the game.
“They knew they didn’t perform well. It’s the quietest I’ve seen them,” he said.
“You’ve just got to re-group and make sure they’ll be a different team next week. They’ve got to be to go against the Panthers. Otherwise the score will be higher than 46.”
Mr Osborne said his team played “with a total lack of intent”.
“I could probably see a little bit of it on Thursday. They were off in their ball training on Thursday night.
“The intensity was just not there that has been there in the past three or four weeks.”
The match was Blayney’s first premier league victory since knocking off Oberon in round 16 of the 2016 season.
Mr Osborne said the drought-breaking win was contributed to by Workies’ poor performance.
“We gave them that amount of ball,” he said.
“But they completed their sets and punched holes through us.”
Blayney’s Tim Mortimer said he had anticipated a victory for the last couple of weeks.
“Workies didn’t play great but we were good enough to make the most of it,” he said.
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