The Norths Devils were able to claim back-to-back wins for just the second time this season with their impressive victory over the Mackay Cutters 40-28 on Saturday night.
Devils coach Mark Gliddon said the boys played in a similar way to last week with high completion rates ensuring they had great control of the game.
“We had 19/20 completions in the first half. If you control the footy, you are going to win games,” Gliddon said.
With the score at halftime 28-6, Gliddon said he emphasised the length of a footy game as he knew their opposition would fight back.
“The Cutters came back into the game in the second half when we let the ball go, but we held and got back in the back third of the game,” he said.
The damaged was well and truly done in the first half however, with big Devils prop Dylan Smith crashing over twice to bag the opening two tries of the match for an early 12-0 lead.
Cutters fullback Sam Clune soon got the Mackay side on the board – but that was all they could manage in the half.
Twice in the half the Cutters were pushing hard at the Devils line, only for a wayward pass to be picked up firstly by Rogan Dean and later by Michael Lucas to run the length-of-the-field to score.
The Devils travelled to Dalby for this Country Week game and Gliddon said the Dalby community were fantastic and that it was great to be taking footy out to rural towns.
“The Dalby Devils and the community were fantastic the way they had the local kids involved,” he said.
“They held the boys hands when running onto the field and it was just a great atmosphere.
“(Some staff) went down a few days before and did some coaching drills and training with the local kids.
“We also had some of the kids and coaches in our sheds and was great to have those local kids involved.
“The country round is a brilliant idea. Its good to get out to towns who don’t get to see much of this level of footy and the country round can have them involved within that.”
NORTHS DEVILS 40 (Rogan Dean 2, Dylan Smith 2, Michael Lucas, Joel Bailey, Dan Murphy tries; Liam Tyson 6 goals) def MACKAY CUTTERS 28 (Sam Clune 2, Buchanan Rawhiti, Aleki Falepaini, Tyson Martin tries; Liam Taylor 4 goals) at Dalby Leagues Ground, Dalby.
Final Teams:
Norths Devils: 1. Luke Pollock 2. Michael Lucas 3. Joel Bailey 4. Ryan Millard 5. Rogan Dean 6. Dan Murphy 7. Liam Tyson 8. Matt Mizzi 9. Byron Creighton 10. Billy Solah 11. Kristian Wanka 12. Brett Greinke (c) 13. Krys Freeman 14. Will McNee 16. Rhett Webster 20. Dylan Smith 17. Josh Afoa
Mackay Cutters: 1. Sam Clune 2. Jordan Pereira 3. Ben Jones 4. Zac Walker 5. Buchanan Rawhiti 6. Andy Gay 7. Liam Taylor 8. Sam Hoare 9. Josh Chudleigh 10. Brad Lupi 11. Brenden Treston 12. Chris Gesch (c) 14. Aleki Falepaini 17. Tyson Martin 18. Joss Boyton 19. Ryan Kinlyside 20. Pulou Vaituutuu
