Ahead of their clash with the bottom-of-the-table Eagles at Pride Park tomorrow, Orange City coach Steve Hamson has said anything less than a complete performance from the Blowes Clothing Cup leaders will be considered unacceptable.

“We’re certainly not taking anyone lightly,” Hamson fired.

“Getting towards the end of the year, sides like Cowra are going to be desperate. We’re going into the game expecting it to be tough.”

It’s a sentiment shared by prop-come-backrower John Colgan.

Colgan said his side heads into every clash, whether it be against Cowra or the second-placed CSU Bathurst, looking to play the kind of uncompromising, tough and entertaining rugby they had all year.

“It’s the same as every game this year, we just haven’t worried at all about the other team. I’m sure they’re desperate for a win and they’ll want to knock us off. Over the last couple of rounds, everyone has turned up to play,” Colgan said.

“It’ll be the same again. We’ll worry about our attack and defence and let the game take care of itself hopefully.”

Colgan will line up at No.8 tomorrow for Orange City.

The 21-year-old is filling in for the injured Dan Johnson and is likely to for the next month with the rampaging backrower set to miss at least the next three weeks with a fractured left wrist.

“I think we’re missing a big ball-runner with Dan out so I’m trying to run the ball as much as I can and fill his shoes a bit, fill that big gap,” he said.

Orange City accounted for Cowra 45-12 in round one, with flying winger Sione Lafo’ou scoring four tries in the seven-tries-to-two romp.

But Colgan expected a fired up Cowra tomorrow.

He said with the Lions undefeated through the opening 12 rounds of 2012, opposition sides had begun to shape up against Orange City.

“The last three weeks, with Dubbo and Parkes they really turned up to play and even Forbes had us to start with,” Colgan said.

“The first round, everything just happened so easy for us but now everyone is ready for us and they’re trying to nullify our big players too.”

He said although it’s hard to avoid, the thought of going all the way and taking out the premiership was inevitable.

But the Lions were keeping it simple.

“We’re just trying to turn up, have fun and play the same way we’ve been playing all year. It’s a lot better than losing... a lot better than losing,” he laughed.

But, from here on, winning will become tougher.

After the Lions play Cowra, they then face a string of tough games against the Dubbo Rhinos (away), Narromine (home), CSU Bathurst (away), Bathurst Bulldogs (home) and Orange Emus (away) to round out the regular season.

“Hopefully we can get a few of our players back because, yeah, geez there’s some big games coming up,” he said.

Kick-off is at 3.15pm tomorrow at Pride Park.

ORANGE CITY: 1 Nathan Short, 2 Josh Tremain, 3 John Gander, 4 Mitch Pearce, 5 Chris Barrett, 6 Gus Brotherton, 7 Duncan Young, 8 John Colgan, 9 Nick Quinn, 10 Michael Sparks (c), 11 Sione Lafo’ou, 12 Tatafu Na’aniumotu, 13 Ben Mills, 14 Sam Powell, 15 Maesui Lomoto.