Bears crush Jets to resurrect title defence hopes

BURLEIGH’S premiership defence is alive after the Bears took a hammer to Ipswich’s Intrust Super Cup title chances with a 44- 0 thrashing on the Gold Coast yesterday.

Bears winger Jake Carl produced one of the great Intrust Super Cup debuts, scoring three tries and producing a miraculous try- saver to help Burleigh alive.

Burleigh’s dreams of winning back- to- back premierships looked shot following a slow start to the season.

But yesterday’s comprehensive victory at Pizzey Park showed the Bears will not go down without a fight.

Carl looked like a seasoned veteran, racking up a hat- trick and pulling down Jets speed- keep their season ster Michael Purcell in a fantastic effort to keep Ipswich scoreless.

“I put in a hard pre- season and it was good to have the first run,” Carl said.

“Our forwards performed well and made it easy for us.

“We set a goal midway through the second half to have no points scored against us.”

The result put a major dent in Ipswich’s finals chances.

The Jets went into the clash two wins behind sixth- placed Souths- Logan and the 2015 premiers could have edged closer to the all- important top six.

Burleigh never gave the visitors a chance, controlling 63 per cent of possession, and the Jets were horrible in defence.

Bears hooker Pat Politoni played 80 minutes after sitting on the Gold Coast Titans bench for the entire duration of last Friday’s game against the Tigers.

“Against Ipswich you’ve always got to switch on mentally,” Politoni said.

“We had to dominate their big boys and not give the quick guys any chances.”

In other matches, SouthsLogan fell 19- 12 to Redcliffe, Townsville thrashed Tweed Heads 50- 8 and Mackay hammered Norths 52- 4.