Sydney Uni Women's rugby win against Merrylands
Uni travelled to Holroyd Sports Centre, the home of Merrylands Rugby, to take on third placed Merrylands under lights. The women's match followed the 1st grade Merryland's men's dust up of the Hills club by 46 to 12. The Hills team still formed a tunnel to cheer on Syd Uni women onto the field hoping the scales could be balances with uni win.
The start was promising with Uni resisting sustained pressure from Merrylands for the first 8 mins. Merrylands crashed down like a cyclone driven king tide pounding the uni defensive line. Finally a breakout by Uni Sal Carter, launching form inside our 30m and sprinting like a hundred metre champion past the 1st line and 2nd lines of Merrylands defenders, passing the opposition 20m with the tryline beckoning until the exocet missile of the Merrylands fullback loomed out of the darkness for the first of a few shoulder charges. As Sal tumbled, rolling her ankle, she passed inside to but the Uni winger Layo who had done well to position herself to take the pass juggled the ball but was unable to hold the pass. The rest of the first half proved fruitless for Uni with some other promising breaks by no 8 Danni Cromican, breakaway Amy Robertson, full back Kristi Beynon crushed under the weight of the Merrylands forwards sealing off the ball.
Merrylands countered with relentless and consistent attacks which did create rewards and at halftime Merrylands had put on 3 solid tries and one conversion to be up 17 v 0.
Uni came back in the 2nd half with renewed vigour, with Ash Hewson roosting a counter kick from inside our 30m line to the opposition 20m and a scrambling and gutsy pickup by winger Layo Aromire almost led onto to a runaway try. But it was not long in coming with 3 forward hit ups positioning the five eight Rachelle Pirie, who not for the first time raced to the advantage line, sold Merrylands on the dummy pass and scootered over for the first Uni try. Ash Hewson followed up receiving the kick off , counter kicking from the halfway line and with the ball landing scooping up juggling the ball but unable to hold on knocking on over the tryline. Ash was not to be denied soon after hitting the line with high acceleration leaving 5 Merryland defenders swatting imaginary flies and powered under the posts unopposed. Rachelle converted to have Uni at 17 v 12 behind. Again from the kick off Uni broke out like a fire front with Danni Cormican making 40m down the sideline.
Uni consolidated with three hit ups to within 15m of the tryline . Halfback Faz Hayati capitalised on a gap and offloading an inside pass to a rampaging Sal Carter who with knees up, head down charged over the top for the tryline and with the conversion by Rachelle putting Uni ahead 19 v 17 and setting up for an exciting last 5 minutes.
But the momentum as well as possession and territory was all with Uni. Good lead up work by the forwards set up another pass on the blind side for captain Jaie Thomson to carry a few Merryland players with her and the ball over the tryline for her drought breaking first try of the season. Uni finished with an attacking flurry over the last few minutes to go out winners 24 v 17 after being behind 17 v 0 at halftime. Uni stays on equal points with Warringah on top of the table but Warringah keep front spot with a better for and against.
With three matches to go before semis the no 1 spot is open to the team with the best for and against so the hunt for points will be on this weekend for Uni against Waverley on St John's oval at 10am.
