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Darby Lancaster

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2024 Shute Shield Week 2 Finals at North Sydney Oval: Darby Lancaster’s last-minute TRY winner sends Easts to next Saturday’s Grand Final v Norths by four points 38-34

by Sports Benches

What a game that is to close out the 2024 Shute Shield Week 2 Finals at North Sydney Oval. We began the day with Northern Suburbs punching their ticket to the big dance yet again over Randwick 17-34 that marked the end of Stephen Hoiles’ two-year stint as the Wicks head coach and now they will be joined by the Eastern Suburbs who shut Warringah down in the dying seconds over by a four point gap 38-34. Heartbreak for the Rats who fired off well on what has been a good first half (17-22) thanks to some Easts ill-discipline but the game wasn’t over yet and Easts able to overcame their slow start with a series of tries before they proved to be the team to beat at the end of the day thanks to Darby Lancaster.

Now we got one more game to settle next Saturday between Norths v Easts at Leichhardt Oval where one of them will become champions with both teams having last celebrated their respective triumphs with Norths back in 2016 & Easts way back in 1969 other than a runner-up loss back in 2007 v Sydney University.

How good was Darby Lancaster as always on the left wing 11? Having made an immediate impact earlier this year for the now-defunct Melbourne Rebels team in Super Rugby, made his Wallabies debut last month v Georgia, and now he’s back in Sydney full-time since he will be playing for the Waratahs next season. Love how he deflected that Warringah kick earlier on before he unleashed his best beast with pace and that’s where he scored a hat-trick of tries including the last-minute that broke the (Warringah) Rats’ hearts. Keep an eye out on him next weekend v Norths.

Teddy Wilson is another Easts player to keep tabs on as their main half-back 9 following his excellent attacking performance in the way he gets them out of trouble on the counter while he’s able to make that attack expansive thanks to the Easts’ patient play. We know he has some Super Rugby experience under his belt with the Tahs over the last 1-2 years, so safe to say Teddy built another great personal achievement at Shield level in season 2024. He’s the future we got here in Daceyville as a Grand Final win next weekend would reflect his high standards before Teddy go on to achieve something special from here in the years to come.

Yes, Easts experienced some ill-discipline for sure where most of the pie went to the Rats. But their unbeaten run in 2024 proved how much physical and mental toughness Easts can pull off until the very end and yet they’ve done it with one more task to go – that final task will be up against the Northern Suburbs who has been great at Finals in recent years but haven’t yet won a Grand Final since 2016.

And Kiwi Coby Miln did the best he can to push Warringah over the line on top of the top-notch Easts side at 10. Pretty sure his kicking game never gets tired after he collected all nine conversion kicks including penalties while Coby doesn’t hesitate doing this via open-play to get his Reds side out of trouble. Gotta credit his side’s forwards pack with the winning penalties/turnovers/line-outs so he can make make that attack work via the channels or short side where they were oh so close before Lancaster broke their hearts with the team’s exit last minute. 

Gotta feel sorry for the Rats but the loss of Komiti Tuilangi to injury straight after an early 1st half TRY hit the Rats hard & that’s where the backline group began to struggle unfortunately. That’s how Easts got their way when they played catch-up and not having the same functioning backline to make the most out of the Rats attack ultimately sealed their fate – both with the Week 2 Finals loss & elimination. 

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Rugby

2024 Super Rugby Season Week 8, Melbourne Rebels’ explosive backline & attacking pace ran the Highlanders ragged with the big win

by Sports Benches

It was a huge scoring game at AAMI Park in Melbourne tonight with Highlanders unpacking the brawns of physical strength thanks to their good start or early lead while picking up some good points along the way, but then the Melbourne Rebels outsmarted them with an abundance of pace, accurate passing and communication and an unreal backline that got way with another win in front of their home crowd. Rebels responded well to the Highlanders opening converted TRY with two Darby Lancaster tries on top of their 1st minute opening score account where they were leading 26-10 at half-time. Highlanders thought they’re beginning to close in after the break but nowhere close enough as the Rebels went on to extend their lead further afield with a Carter Gordon scoring double followed by another Darby TRY that sealed the hat-trick to close the match his way and the Rebels way, 47-31. Rebels will take the well deserved rest next week before they travel to Christchurch on Friday 26th for R10 v the under fire Crusaders & Highlanders head off to Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Friday v the Reds.

Andrew Kellaway was outstanding by leading the Rebels backline who made his side’s attack so much better that gifted them tries at No.15. He absolutely knows where to find his man where he is right on the money with the ball on hand through the counter-attack as long as the numbers are there like Darby Lancaster’s first-half double TRY on the left-wing as well as No.10’s Carter Gordon’s first try of the match when the Rebels extended their lead in the 2nd-half. Then tough to say who is 2nd best as discussed between Darby and Carter – both of whom are exceptional Rebels youngsters – but gotta say Darby made a huge name for himself with a hat-trick of tries, having established himself in the World 7s circuit for Australia before and now he continues to cause opposition players carnage in the 15s and Super Rugby level. This Melbourne Super Rugby team is high flying right now in 4th amid financial problems but surely they have a really great squad with Kellaway being an established Wallaby while Gordon earned some stripes last year & surely Darby will be fast-tracked soon enough under Joe Schmidt.

And Sean Withy never stopped working hard in order for the Highlanders to keep the Rebels in check whose physicality and application on the blindside (No.6 flanker) opened up plenty of opportunities that went his side’s way. His opening TRY puts them up front for a short time while he adds so much pressure to make that brick wall against the Rebels so they don’t steal it under his watch including at scrum and mauls, even though the Highlanders were trying to play catch up in a race against time after losing the lead for the majority. But what really let him down tonight is that his side’s so scared of attacking earlier on despite winning a few penalties yet the defense is so poor while the backline weren’t simply up to the Rebels’ standard; Okay, some late changes might have helped but it still puts them at odds as the clock ticks down & sadly it was too late.

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