BLOWOUTS GALORE
FOR all the pre-season talk of Gold Coast District Rugby Union being set for the closest competition in years, it has taken just two weeks for the usual three-horse race to emerge.
Regular frontrunners Surfers Paradise, Griffith University Colleges and Helensvale all belted their respective oppositions into submission on Saturday, leading to concerns there could be many more lopsided scorelines in the weeks to come.
Most notable was Helensvale’s 94-0 annihilation of Bond Pirates at Pizzey Park.
The Hogs scored 14 tries in the romp, including a hattrick for winger BJ Doyle.
The Pirates, preliminary finalists last season, are yet to score a point this year and are struggling for depth.
It is understood they had just 23 players to cover two grades against Helensvale.
In other games, Surfers Paradise defeated Gold Coast Eagles 31-0 and Colleges beat Coolangatta Tweed 38-0.
The Knights managed that GCRU ROUND 1
Surfers Helensvale Colleges Coolangatta GC Eagles Palm Beach Bond Pirates
W 2 1 1 1 1 0 0
D 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
L 0 1 0 1 1 1 2
B PD BP 0 50 1 0 75 1 1 38 1 0 -4 1 0 -4 1 1 -27 0 0 -128 0 Pts 9 5 5 5 5 0 0
despite 12 of their top-line players being away attending a wedding.
Several coaches have predicted the top three sides to dominate yet again, with Helensvale mentor Tonga Lea’aetoa labelling the situation “worrying”.
Lea’aetoa moved from Surfers, who have now won their past 39 games, to the Hogs during the off-season in a bid to strengthen the wider competition.
With a three-week break for the Commonwealth Games to follow next round, Gold Coast District Rugby Union chairman Kim Bending is hoping to see clubs return stronger by April 21.
“I would hope so, that’s for sure – otherwise it will end up a three-horse race again,” Bending said.
Despite the one-sided nature of the contest, Lea’aetoa was pleased with the improvement his players displayed after their first-up loss to Surfers.
“Last week we gave away a lot of off-side penalties,” he said. “I think 12 out of the 18 penalties were defensive related and we have worked on that. I don’t think we had a defensive penalty (against the Pirates).”
For Colleges, the win was a positive outcome in their first match since the 2017 grand final.
“We didn’t have any trials because they were cancelled due to rain and we had a bye (in Round 1), so that was our first game this year,” coach Graham Herlihy said. “We were pretty strong.”