A PERFECT season. That’s the prize on offer for Goulburn rugby if they can claim victory in both ACTMonaro grand-finals tomorrow afternoon at Poidevin Oval.
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To do so will be history in the making. The club has never gone a season undefeated, let alone in both grades in the same season.
For first grade it’s a date with the Cooma Red Devils.
Both teams have met each other on four occasions this season with the Dirty Reds coming up trumps every time.
For reserve grade they take on the Hall Bushrangers, who earned their finals spot by defeating Cooma reserves 32-0 last weekend.
It’s a tough assignment in both cases. Despite Cooma making their way to the grand-final through an RMC forfeit, the side will be arriving in Goulburn with the belief they can cause an upset.
It’s the same for Hall, who on the previous two occasions with Goulburn, fell by no more than five points.
But Darren Solomons, first grade coach of the Dirty Reds, is well aware of the pressures and expectations on his club.
“When you’ve beaten everybody and beaten everybody well, there’s that expectation to run away with it,” he said.
“You have to live up to expectations, you have to go out and execute, you have to complete your set tasks.
Because if you don’t, the team’s not going to lift. And adrenaline is a wonderful thing, Cooma could sneak up on us and we lose our first game of the season.”
He’ll be relying on his boys to do what they’ve done all year – play a high-intensity brand of rugby, powered by their notoriously powerful forwards. “They (Cooma) are spoilers.
They’ll put hands in the ruck and they’ll do any little trick to slow the ball down,” key forward Jack Brims said.
“If we can play quick football like we’ve been playing all year, just a quick high-brand entertaining style of football I think we’ll come out victors.”
Jordan Wilcox agrees. He is another who has had a break out season, rewarded with first grade co-captain duties along with stalwart Boyd Newby.
“Our attack has come off the back of our defence so if we can stick with that we’ll have them in good stead,” he said.
Cooma Red Devils coach Sean Neilson is wary of recent history and knows his side will have to dig deep when they arrive at Poidevin tomorrow.
He told the Post Goulburn have been the bench mark all season. But he believes his side is capable of an upset.
“We wont be going there thinking that we’re already defeated, we’ll make them work for it,” Neilson said. “I think we’re a chance. I think if we can turn up with our full strength team and everybody is 100% committed to the cause then I think we can cause an upset.”
Hall Bushrangers coach, Pat Gallagher on the other hand, knows his reserve grade grand-final clash will be tough and close. The last time his side met with the Goulburn reserves they lost 7-5 after leading the majority of the match.
“We feel for us it was good preparation last week coming into Goulburn,” Gallagher said.
“The games we’ve played in Goulburn there’s been nothing in it, and it’s been very close on the scoreboard, all of them have been close hard games.”
“They play really tough up the centre… We’re looking to win the game with our defence. If we can keep your boys quiet…”
Goulburn reserve-grade vs Hall Bushrangers grand-final kicks off at 1.15pm at Poidevin Oval tomorrow.
First grade Goulburn vs Cooma kicks off at 3pm.