The opening five minutes of Sunday’s rugby league game against Wellington looked promising as the home side posted first points with Riley Cape diving over beside the posts after strong lead-up work by Mick Clarke. However that was to be the last time in the first half that the Jets crossed the stripe.
Wellington ran in five tries to lead 26-6 at the break. The visitors were on fire with their quick backs wreaking havoc as they kept the ball alive. Narromine, on the other hand, despite the players not lacking in effort, could not contain the ball for complete sets.
The second half commenced with another Jets’ try when Chad Jacobson scored under the posts but Wellington hit back with two quick reply tries. Fifteen minutes into the second half Trent Jacobson fired a superb pass to Tim Walker’s chest who, in turn, offloaded around the corner as he was being tackled and Jordan Richardson was there to receive the ball and score.
Minutes later the Cowboys were awarded another try despite their pass being five metres forward right in front of the touch judge. With two minutes to go Riley Cape picked up his second try when he exploited the Wellington players being well offside which caused a gap and he planted the ball between the posts. Wellington had the final say on the bell for a 50-22 win. Chad Jacobson converted three from four.
The score could have been very different if the home side had held the ball.
With a number of first and reserve grade players still sidelined with injury Jets’ reserve grade were always going to struggle.
It wasn’t long before the young and fast Wellington side started to exploit gaps and they ran away with the first half scoring five unanswered tries to lead 26-0 at half-time. The Jets however came out in the second half determined to redeem themselves.
They had a number of lost opportunities in both halves but did manage to keep the visiting side to a solitary try in the second half.
The injury toll mounted throughout the second half and the Jets welcomed the final whistle to a 32-0 loss.
The quick Wellington backs also played havoc with the Under 18 Jets running in five unanswered tries in the first 15 minutes of the game.
Then with 10 minutes to go, Mitch Sambrook made good yards to set up Ben Peters to offload to Alex Mallison and the home side were on the board.
In the closing minutes of the first stanza the visitors scored one last try to lead 34-4 at the break.
They scored again three minutes into the second half before Alex Mallison picked up his second try of the day scooting over from dummy half.
Dillon Anning added the extras. The young Cowboys then ran riot scoring another five tries over the remainder of the game. The final score was 64-10 to the visitors.
Despite being beaten week in and week out, credit must be given to the young Jets who turn up week after week and give their all for 60 minutes.
This Sunday the Jets take the long road to Cobar before returning home on the following weekend for their last home game of the season in a Sponsors’ Day match against Dubbo CYMS on the Saturday.