Roosters Given Reason to Crow

VALLEYS’ representative trio of Nathan Murphy, Justin McKellar and Eugene Seddon has helped the Roosters to a stirring premiership defence, thumping Brothers 42-18 before a big crowd in the Toowoomba Rugby League grand final.

The Chooks made it yet another lamentable decider for the Brethren, who finished bridesmaids for the third straight year at Clive Berghofer Stadium.

Queensland Rangers captain Murphy was at the heart of the victory, scoring two tries and setting up the other two as the Roosters established a 24-8 halftime lead.

The former Brisbane Broncos and Bulldogs lower grader then threw a great short ball for Dan Manley to score the first try of the second stanza and the game was effectively over.

All signs before the game had pointed to a Valleys victory and the minor premiers did not disappoint, backing up a season where the club lost just three games. The Roosters had only a fortnight earlier battered Brothers 52-18 in the major semi.

Indeed for Brothers the grand final could not have started any worse, losing prop Tim Hannant on the first tackle of the game with a knee injury, then allowing a line-break to the steaming Seddon on the second tackle.

Still, the Brethren were first to score in the fifth minute via centre Steve O’Leary, who slid over out wide after bursting into a gap.

Murphy evened the score eight minutes later, throwing a spiral pass left to David Dingwall and then backing up on the inside. The subsequent conversion by James Galligan from out wide put the Roosters in front and they never looked back.

Twice in the first half playmaker Murphy used a simple decoy play to send childhood friend and captain-coach McKellar into the clear. One break led to a try to centre Nat Volz, the second to McKellar himself.

The second period brought much of the same, with two late consolation tries to Brothers adding a degree of respectability to the score.

Valleys could sympathise with the men in the butcher stripes, having lost three straight grand finals in seasons 2001-03.

In fact, Valleys’ back-to-back titles help hide more than three decades of struggling for titles. Between 1973 and 2005 the Roosters won just two premierships.

Interestingly, after the Toowoomba Rugby League’s inception in 1919, the first 14 premierships were won by either Valleys or Brothers.



















A Grade: VALLEYS 42 (Nathan Murphy 2, Nat Volz, Justin McKellar, Dan Manley, Brendan Baillie, Wes Collins tries; James Galligan 6, Brendan Baillie goals) d BROTHERS 18 (Steve O’Leary 2, Terry Geary, Kristin Green tries; Steve O’Leary goal) at Clive Berghofer Stadium.

Reserve Grade: DALBY 30 (Clayton Coleman 3, Steve Brazier, Kieran Smallcross, Tony Carmichael tries; Tim Hart 2, Todd Hunt goals) d VALLEYS 28 (Sean Schwerin, Isaac Lappin, James Ellison, Will Chaplain, Nick Owens tries; Sean Schwerin 4 goals).

Under 18: SOUTHS 23 (Ben Ruwold, Andrew Gray, Michael Parry, Damien Mills tries; Ben Loxley 3 goals; Ben Loxley field goal) d DALBY 16 (Rohan Lloyd, Dean Wicks, Kyle Van Klaueren tries; Marc Potter 2 goals).