But home ground advantage kept Cowra Eagles in check as the men in red and white ran away with a 16-8 win over the Lions in the Blowes Clothing Cup.

Scoring early and shooting out to a 5-0 lead, the Eagles looked as if they were in for a big day.

However, the attitude of the Lions kept its defence in tact, with a penalty goal and try to outside centre Aden Fraser giving Orange an 8-5 lead after 22 minutes.

Admirably, City's try came after an unfortunate concussion resulted in second-rower Jimmy Ostini leaving the field, with the team fighting hard in his absence.

After 47 minutes though, Cowra went out to 10-8 lead and never let up, putting on two penalty goals to gain victory.

Despite the loss, Orange City's captain Logan Buckley was delighted with his side's resolve to keep Cowra to 16 points.

"We're really happy with it, we're stoked we were able to lead for a period of the game," he said.

"I'm happy with how everyone played, we all worked hard for each other which was good.

"Our defence was really good, we didn't take a backwards step and they didn't know what to do, our attack is starting to come together really well."

While there were plenty of positives for City, its first win of the season still continues to go astray.

With the Lions consistently putting in good first halves and falling away in the second 40-minutes, Buckley believes the solution to his side's issue comes from focusing for the full game.

"We just need to put a full 80-minutes together, we're just missing that. We're playing 40 to 60 minutes of good rugby and letting ourselves down in the last 20," he said.

As the long-weekend break beckons, the City skipper added it'll be a good opportunity for injured players to re-gain full fitness as his side look to attack the competition in the second half of the season.

"We'll have a few people come back from injuries after the break which will definitely help," he said.

"We'll keep working on our structure, we're still figuring that out, it played out well on the weekend and we need to refine it a bit and keep working on it."

COWRA EAGLES 16 (Damian Michael, Sullivan tries; Noah Ryan 2 penalty goals) defeated ORANGE CITY 8 (Aden Fraser try; Mark Burton penalty goal)

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