Eden Tigers Brand Sun

Reserves Rock Premiers
Eden 18 Bega 6

August 15th 2011 by Dave Evelyn

The Tigers John Michelin and Son sponsored reserve graders ran on looking a very imposing side against Bega on Sunday, with several big names returning to the side. In particular the reappearance of the inspirational Zac Robin had the crowd buzzing. Tyrone Thomas and Ryan Walker also made welcome reappearances. Ryan celebrated his return with a good try to open the scoring after five minutes, and the Bowes conversion took Eden out to an early 6-0 lead.Bega are the proud defending premiers and refused to give up, and they were rewarded with, firstly three quick penalties, and then a try, scored by Kiluan and converted by Heffernan to level the scores. Some poor handling saw Eden on the defence for a prolonged period before the break but the Eden line proved impregnable and the score at half time was 6-6.

Coach Kevin Campbell was effusive in his praise for the team at half time and encouraged them to continue in the same vein. The second half began with livewire half Mick Schelfhout splitting the defence on a searching run, and a couple of minutes later scoring a fine team try out wide which was not converted. A penalty to Eden put them back on the attack and it was Tyrone Thomas's turn to touchdown for another unconverted try to take the Tigers to 14-6.

The Eden side appeared to be well in control with all the forwards driving ahead and the backs putting together some impressive raids. Bega made a mistake in kicking out on the full, and from the restart Eden hooker and captain Matt Evelyn split the roosters up the middle and sprinted away for what was the decisive try, taking the score to 18-6. That finished up as the final score, with no more points scored, however there were some late highlights with big jock Owen hitting up the middle, and the Wheelers- Dylan and Reece- putting in huge efforts in both attack and defence.Andrew Evelyn also did a lot of hard work in defence.

The Club has high hopes for this reserve grade side and if we can get some consistency in our lineup and get some good training runs under our belt they will be very hard to beat in the finals.