Tahs beat Reds in front of a crowd of 3530!

[travelling_gerry]

The Waratahs have beaten Queensland Reds 17-5 in their first trial match

January 24, 2009 THE silky skills of New South Wales backs Sam Norton-Knight and Kurtley Beale backed by some tough defence have paved the way for a 17-5 win over Queensland in the Super 14 sides' opening trial match.
The Waratahs locked up the game with three tries before thunderstorms that had threatened all night finally arrived to drench the enthusiastic Toowoomba crowd of 3,530.

The match opened brightly with both sides showing they will look to attack under the ELVs in 2009 and Beale put newly-signed winger Peter Playford through a gap for the first of his two tries.

Then it was Norton-Knight's turn, putting on a "show and go" to create a break before putting Playford in the clear.

With the Waratahs ahead 12-0 after Beale's conversion of the second try, a yellow card for the Reds' hard tackling flyhalf Anthony Faingaa for an alleged shoulder charge forced the home side to work harder on a humid evening.

A try by replacement Dave Dennis stretched the Waratahs' lead to 17-0 as the downpour arrived.

Reds replacement scrumhalf Will Genia grabbed a late try for his side after neat work by outside centre Brando Va'aulu.

Reds league convert Mark McLinden was given plenty to do at fullback by the testing kicks of Norton-Knight and Beale, but gained a pass mark from coach Phil Mooney for his efforts.

McLinden came off with a slight head knock after being hit by the Waratahs forward pack as he tried to gather a ball at the tackle but was happy with his first game of professional rugby.

"That was good. I enjoyed it. I made a couple of errors but overall I was pretty happy," McLinden said.
AAP


http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,...-23217,00.html

[slomo]

its hardly all doom and gloom in the west with crowds like that....i wonder if firepower were to blame for the poor turn out at the above game?.....

[zimeric]

read it and weep Knuckles!!!

[travelling_gerry]

To be fair it was a long weekend in Qld.

[Swee_82]

To be fair it was a long weekend in Qld.

And in Toowoomba, but they'd still want to lay off about being the amazing 'foundations' of the established unions for a while.

[jargan83]

To be fair it was a long weekend in Qld.

and? The entire population of Perth usually migrates south on a long weekend and we managed "a few" extra people at MES

[travelling_gerry]

I was being sarcastic....

and yes...it was in Toowoomba..

[jargan83]

Toowoomba the Qld equivilent of Margaret River/Dunsborough??

[travelling_gerry]

hmm....Toowoomba would be the equilivent of ...Northam

[jargan83]

I was getting at is the place where people in Brisbane/Queensland go away for long weekends?

[PerthGirl]

Where's TOCC? he's very quiet!

[brokendown gunfighter]

hardly

oops I was referring to Jargs post

[no.8]

I thought that sounded like a big crowd for a Reds/Waratahs clash!

[tic]

Settle girls - Toowoomba is a country centre with 100000 people.

It was also hammered by thunderstorms....

..and it was a trial match.

etc etc etc

I must say, I'm impressed by your enthusiasm about trial matches, but let's be honest, these trials are not exactly the real deal (hit and giggle really).

[brokendown gunfighter]

Settle girls - Toowoomba is a country centre with 100000 people.

It was also hammered by thunderstorms....

..and it was a trial match.

etc etc etc

I must say, I'm impressed by your enthusiasm about trial matches, but let's be honest, these trials are not exactly the real deal (hit and giggle really).

well,there was a lot of hitting,& not much giggling going on