By Nathan Beuman at WIN Stadium
The Illawarra Cutters have continued their stellar form of late, overcoming an early two converted try deficit to crush the Wentworthville Magpies 44-18 at WIN Stadium.
In the all-important second verses third clash, the Cutters dominated the Magpies for much of the match, proving that they are a team that are capable of playing well into September.
After an error riddled start to the game by both sides, Wentworthville opened the scoring through Ryan Matterson in the fifth minute, with the 19 year old throwing a dummy close to the line, before going over to put the Magpies up 6-0 following Luke Kelly’s conversion.
The visitors didn’t wait long to add to their lead, with Liam Foran crossing from dummy half ten minutes later to give Wenty a two converted try lead after Kelly slotted the extras.
From there, it all started to unravel for the Magpies, with Illawarra running in five tries in the twenty minutes before half time to take a 28-12 lead into the break.
The late addition of Nathan Green to the Cutters line-up proved pivotal, as the second rower used his size to burrow his way over from acting half for his first try of the afternoon.
Kyle Stanley drilled the kick from the eastern touchline, cutting the margin to six points with still 20 minutes remaining in the opening stanza.
Drew Hutchinson continued his impressive start to the VB NSW Cup season, using a big right foot step to beat the Wentworthville defenders, levelling the scores up with still a quarter of an hour remaining following Stanley’s conversion.
Tries to Yaw Kiti Glymin, Dylan Farrell and Nathan Green to close out the half saw the home side take a handy 16 point lead into the sheds.
Wentworthville had a couple of great chances to hit back just after the intermission, including a monster 30/10 kick by Luke Kelly, but the execution from the Magpies just wasn’t there.
Elusive fullback Kyle Eather added to his try scoring tally for 2014 ten minutes into the half, using his pace to get around a Magpies defender before putting the ball down under the posts.
With Stanley off the field, Sam Duggan assumed the kicking duties, launching the Steeden up into the Southern Grandstand to extend the Cutters lead to 34-12 with just under half an hour remaining.
Wenty managed to score their first points in more than a half of football on the hour mark, with Ben Jones linking up with Peni Terepo to peg the margin back to 16 points following Kelly’s conversion, giving the Magpies a sniff.
Charly Runciman quickly put that idea to bed, crossing for two tries in seven minutes to push the Cutters unbeaten run out to six games.
The two competition points sees Illawarra leapfrog Wentworthville thanks to their superior for and against, while the loss means the Magpies slide down to fourth position.
The Cutters will face a resurgent Knights side up in Newcastle this Sunday while Wenty square off against the Roos at Remondis Stadium on Saturday.
Illawarra Cutters 44 (C Runciman 2, N Green 2, K Eather, Y Glymin, D Farrell, D Hutchison tries; K Stanley 4, S Duggan 2 goals) def. Wentworthville Magpies 18 (R Matterson, P Terepo, L Foran tries; L Kelly 3 goals) at WIN Stadium.
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