KANDOS Waratahs’ hooker Luke Hundy bounced back from his injury in his team’s previous game to score two tries in a man-of-the-match performance in round two of the Centennial Coal Cup.
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In the Waratahs’ first home game this season, they gave their fans a 20-16 victory.
But it wasn’t all smooth sailing for the defending premiers.
CSU Blue were off the mark with a try to Andrew McIlveen after 10 minutes but Hundy’s dummy-half try eight minutes later at the cement works end allowed Kandos to draw even at 4-all.
The first half was unremarkable and ball handling by the young Waratahs let them down at times, the teams going to the break with a locked-up score.
The side was boosted by the return of Adam Stewart, Steve Madden, Michael Parsons and Mick Tomlinson but former junior Dan Steel got the scoring off to a start again seven minutes after the restart, finishing off a back-line movement with a touchdown which was again unconverted.
Madden and fellow forwards Dean Mundey and August Pearce helped soften up the centre field attack with uncompromising defence and strong attack.
But leaky defence out wide gave CSU too many scoring opportunities, two of which were stifled by good one-on-one defence by Parsons and John Madden.
Scott Wilkinson’s involvement was rewarded with four points, breaking from 40 metres out and presented with a try after an angled run to the north-eastern corner which increased the lead to eight points.
CSU hit back with a converted try to Tyler Lawson to reduce the Waratahs’ lead to two points but three minutes later, Hundy was over again in similar fashion to his first try from dummy-half to push the score to 16-10.
Attacking the CSU line again soon afterward, a try was never in doubt when Steve Madden began his run on the 10-metre line and took the ball five metres out to crash through the defence to bring up 20 points for the Waratahs.
The game was virtually wrapped up with Madden’s try and a 20-10 scoreline but a late CSU try gave the students another six points with its conversion and a final score of 20-16.
This weekend there are no club games, with representative matches set down for Dubbo, and the CCC premiership recommences for Kandos Waratahs against Lithgow Bears at Lithgow Sportsground the following weekend.