A field goal in the final minute by half Ben Hudd gave the Windsor Wolves the Sydney Shield upset of the season to date with a 19-18 win over the Peninsula Seagulls at Windsor Sports Complex last Saturday.
Windsor made the most of reshuffling their playing roster to improve their Sydney Shield outfit - a side that had not won a game for the season until Saturday.
The Wolves also made the most of easily the Seagulls’ worst performance of the season so far that was riddled with dropped balls, turnovers and penalties.
Windsor came out firing against the flat Seagulls and got the first two tries of the match to centre Abraham Murdoch to lead 8-nil after 18 minutes - both of which were not converted.
Then the Seagulls clicked into some sort of gear with tries to Izaiah Phillips and workaholic back-rower Todd Wilson in the space of 10 minutes to lead 12-8 in the shadows of half-time. Half Luke Martin converted both tries to give the Seagulls the lead for the only time in the match.
Windsor got a third unconverted try from another Seagulls turnover before the interval - this time to fullback Tori Willie as the half time siren sounded - to have the scores locked up at 12-all at the break.
From another dropped ball on half way, the Wolves - who struggled for long periods in the second half themselves - made the most of their opportunity in the immediate set of six from the turnover.
Wlves winger James Goring scored to give the home side the lead, which was extended with Wolves halfback Ben Hudd's conversion to give Windsor an 18-12 lead with 15 minutes left.
As time ran down - and almost against the run of play - some neat work down a short blind side by Martin sent Seagulls winger RIchie Goodwin to dive over in the corner to score with three minutes left.
Martin nailed the conversion from touch to level scores at 18-all with just on two minutes on the clock when play restarted.
Sure enough, the Seagulls coughed up the ball one more time from the set of six after the restart to give WIndsor the feed and field position to 'ice' the game.
Hudd slotted the field goal from close range with under 60 seconds left to give the Wolves the lead at 19-18, before Windsor regained the ball from a last desperate short kickoff by the Seagulls to seal their first win of the Sydney Shield season.
Mounties took advantage of the Seagulls slip up when they were too clinical for the young Guildford Owls outfit 26-14 at McCredie Park last Sunday.
Mounties led 16-10 at half time with tries to class half Jake Horton as well as wingers Allen Malea Malau and Maika Sivo. Michael Markus and Anthony Layoun got replying tries for the Owls in the first stanza.
Mounties fullback Finlay Dibley extended the Mounties lead just after half time before winger Kelepi Manu scored wide out to keep the Owls in the contest midway through the second half.
A Brad Speechley try was enough put the game to bed in the last 10 minutes and send ‘The Mulga’ to sole leadership of the Sydney Shield.
The remaining three weekend matches saw three high scoring ‘shootouts’.
The most significant result of these ‘tryfests’ was Blacktown Workers’ 43-38 win over East Campbelltown Eagles at Waminda Oval last Sunday.
In an even greater reshuffling of playing rosters than at Windsor 24 hours earlier, the Workers made the most of their bye in Ron Massey Cup by playing over half of their Massey squad against the Eagles to give their Shield side a badly needed boost.
The match was tight early with the Eagles more than matching their higher graded opponents. The Workers led 16-10 at half time with winger Will Butler scoring the first of his two tries in the first half to help secure the visitors their lead.
The match opened right up in the second 40 minutes as both sides went try for try.
Workers forwards Max Napa and Jerry Key appreciating the drop back to Sydney Shield with tries to lock the game up at an incredible 38-all with under five minutes left.
Just as he did the previous week in Ron Massey Cup to sink Mounties, five eighth Tiger Vatuvei slotted a close range field goal to give the Workers a 39-38 lead inside the last 90 seconds.
Workers skipper Jake Attard then scored off a counter attack from the short Eagles restart right on full time to seal the eight tries to seven win – and send East Campbelltown crashing to their fourth straight loss.
Defending Premiers Wentworthville held off Western Suburbs 46-34 in another 15 try contest at Campbelltown Stadium last Saturday.
Wests started off with a full head of steam with tries to winger Obed Kharwin and half Daniel Roberts for an early 10-nil lead, before ‘Wenty’ struck back with three tries in six minutes of their own attack to Douglas Faai, Joseph Pouhila and Michael Lekkas to give the visitors a 16-10 lead.
Niall Walker scored from a Jai Doolan pass to bring Wests back to within two points.
‘Wenty’ interchange forward Stephen Howard then crashed over from close range to again extend the ‘Wenty’ lead, before Lekkas scored his second try two minutes from the break for a 28-14 half time lead after Kamren Cryer’s conversion.
‘Wenty’ then won the match in the first 10 minutes of the second half with converted tries Keehan Diamond and Zac Nicholls to blow the lead out to 40-14.
Despite Wests’ comeback midway through the half – which included Doolan’s 14th try from the season following a rare mutual infringement involving referee Darren Burtenshaw – ‘Wenty’ steadied with Wallace Tangiiti ‘icing’ the match with a converted try with seven minutes left for a 46-24 lead.
Wests made the score more respectable with the last two tries of the match in the closing stages.
Finally, Cabramatta shot back up into the Top Eight on percentages with a thumping 50-28 win over Auburn Warriors at Lidcombe Oval last Saturday.
13 tries were scored in this match where the Two Blues were rarely threatened by the young Warriors outfit.
Josh Elmer and Daniel Ascoli bagged two tries each out of Cabramatta’s eight majors, while Warriors hooker Connor Jones was outstanding in a losing cause with a hat trick out of the their five tries posted.
Mounites are now sole Shield leaders on 16 points ahead of the Seagulls, Belrose and St Marys all on 14 points.
Windsor’s win now sees Asquith as the only winless team across all of the NSWRL Senior all age competitions at the bottom of the Shield ladder.
This weekend sees a return to a full round with one match on Saturday and a bumper six games on Sunday. St Marys take on Belrose at St Marys Leagues Stadium in the Match of the Round
Triple H FM goes back to Storey Park this Sunday for the match ups between the Asquith Magpies and the Windsor Wolves – with the Sydney Shield kickig off at 1:00pm and the Ron Massey Cup kicking off at 3:00pm. All the Sunday action can be heard on 100.1FM, or via live streaming at www.triplehfm.com.au, or on the tunein app.
