Cowra blitzed pre-season premiership favourites Oberon in round one before suffering a massive upset loss to Orange Hawks, at home, last weekend, but even so the Magpies still boast the likes of 2016 player of the year Jeremy Gordon, skipper Josh Rainbow, the enigmatic Warren Williams and probing hooker Benjamin John.

That’s some serious firepower by anyone’s standards, Sullivan says, particularly if they’re running with front-foot ball.

There’s also zero doubt the Magpies side that fronts at Wade Park, and the performance it produces, on Sunday will be a far cry from last year’s corresponding fixture, which CYMS won 100-6.

“I’m definitely very, very wary of a side like Cowra, particularly early on in the game,” Sullivan said.

“They’ll come out hard and if you let them get a roll-on early in the game and play on the back of that, like I think they would have against Oberon, then they can be really hard to handle.

“They’re always stronger at home but even though it’s on the road, on a fast track at Wade Park if we let them get the kind of go-forward they’ll be looking for, then play attacking footy and spread it wide on the back of that, they’ll be really, really dangerous.”

With that in mind, another big defensive effort to back up last weekend’s against Mudgee is what Sullivan wants from his troops.

“Particularly early on, but we need to maintain it obviously,” he said, Sunday’s clash is the first Group 10 fixture Wade Park will host this season.

“I was really happy with our defensive effort against Mudgee, two of the three tries we conceded came from kicks and sometimes there’s nothing you can do about those except maybe be a bit more enthusiastic on the bounce of the ball.

“Other than that it’ll give us a chance to build on what we did last weekend against Mudgee, with ball in hand, and keep working the kinks out. It’s good to be back at home too.”

Five of Sullivan’s troops will be backing up from Saturday's Western Rams Representative Cluster, Tom Satterthwaite, Ryan Griffin, Chris Grevsmuhl, Lachie Munro and Jo Duffy all have Group 10 duty, which Sullivan labelled “a bit frustrating”.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’ll always support them playing representative stuff and I hope they get the job done, I just want them to pull up okay,” Sullivan said.

“It’s a bit frustrating the way it all works, the timing of it, but it is what it is and we’ll just hope they pull through okay. Tommy Satts is the one I’ll really be keeping an eye on, he’s a young bloke with an old bloke’s body, he’s already had some injuries.

“But as I said, best of luck to them, I hope they get the job done. And, I guess, Cowra is in the same boat with [Gordon and Rainbow], so it’s something every club has to overcome, we just always seem to have so many because there’s so much talent coming through.

“I guess you can see it as a good thing or a bad thing in a way, depending on which way you look at it.”

Redeeming itself after last week’s loss is certainly on the Magpies’ mind, Rainbow said.

But it’s far from panic stations. Admitting the defeat was a “hiccup”, the Magpies’ skipper said he’s confident his side can return to form against the defending premiers.

”Last week we had a hiccup. We have strike power all over the park so it’s just a matter of turning up with the right attitude then I think we’ll go very close,” Josh Rainbow said.

“It was disappointing at home, trying to get people to come along and we put on a show like that.

“Our structure wasn’t really good in attack and our attitude wasn’t up to scratch. We’ve been back at training and working on doing those little things right.

“They have Chris Grevsmuhl I’ve heard he’s pretty good so I’d say they’ll play off the back of him and Mick [Sullivan].”

Kick-off is at 2.15pm at Wade Park.