The last time Orange City and Emus met, it was the latter who came away 66-7 winners.
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Nigel Staniforth put on a show that time around and is hoping to emulate that performance when the rivals clash at Endeavour Oval for the first time in this year's Blowes Clothing Cup first grade competition.
"Derbies are always big games. When (City) were really good a while ago when I first turned up, they were very tight margins," he said.
"It's since flipped the other way, but every now and then they get pretty close and they're pretty good games."
While Emus haven't had the start to the season they would have liked - one win from three games - things have been even worse for their rivals.
The Lions are winless from the opening three rounds, a streak Logan Buckley is keen to end.
"It would mean everything to get the win in the derby. It's what we work for and it's what we train for," he said.
"Everyone's been playing well and we've been that close in the first few games, we just need everyone to click this weekend."
In what would be an oddity in recent outings, both teams come into Saturday's fixture off the back of a loss.
For Staniforth, that nine point defeat to the Dubbo Roos makes things clear within the club that they can't take this match for granted.
"We've had so many changes from last year, I think we counted eight guys who have moved on. It's a fairly new team and the result last week was pretty poor so there's no complacency," he said.
"We need to get it going. We knew that all these new combinations would take a little while. Last week we kind of went backwards a little bit. We're working pretty hard at training and you want to play good footy on Saturday to get some satisfaction."
One element of the game which may have the biggest impact is the elements themselves.
The Bureau of Meteorology is predicting up to 17mm of rain between Friday and Saturday, something both players are wary of.
"I'd say there's going to be a lot of scrums, so the front row will have to be on point," Buckley said.
Staniforth agreed.
"It's going to be wet, so it will be hard to score points, so the margin squeezes that much closer," he said.
"A win gives you the confidence that what we're doing is right, so it does come with that little bit of pressure."
Should other results go their way, a win on its own could propel Emus up into second place, while the Lions would need a bonus point victory at the minimum to get themselves off the bottom of the ladder.
The first grade match will kick off at 3.15pm, with seconds at 1.55pm, third grade at 12.45pm, Colts at 12.30pm and the women at 11.45am.
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