West Wyalong 42
Black and Whites 6
WEST Wyalong shook off a scratchy first-half to blow the Griffith Black and Whites off the park at EW Moore Oval yesterday, cantering home to win by 36 points consigning the local team to a winless 2010.
In what has become a worrying sign ahead of the finals next week, the Mallee Men have not been able to put together a solid effort for much of their past three games, with half-time sprays often needed to wake them from their slumber.
Captain-coach Michael Loudon again needed to be in full voice at the break yesterday as his side looked down the barrel of a defeat to the winless Black and Whites.
"Thing were a bit rough for us early on because of the bad day and things didn't really go our way," Loudon said.
"We were only just in front at half-time and I got up the boys and I think it lifted them.
"We did back ourselves to win but I had a long talk to the boys during the week leading into the game and said that I didn't think we'd been playing really good footy all the time and I think it revved them up a bit."
After leading by only eight points at the break, the visitors put on six tries in the second stanza to pull away from Griffith and consign them a winless season.
"I'm pretty happy with how I've been playing, but hopefully going into the finals with it being a different kind of footy we can play better than what we did today," Loudon said.
Griffith coach Steve Parr paid tribute to the players that stuck with the side during a year that featured near-misses and thrashings at the hands of sides bound for finals.
"During the first few weeks of the season we had a pretty tough draw and we were being competitive and I thought we'd be in with a good chance of doing well this year," Parr said.
"But the local boys that stuck with us really it was good to see them push through to the end and they all put in and did what they had to do today.
"It wasn't too bad that first-half really from the guys, but in the end completions hurt us and they've got a couple of class players they just beat us."
Rheis Brill excelled against Group 20 centre Willy Jones and kept him quiet for much of the game, but the Mallee Men had too many other weapons with Mark Leadbitter and Craig Iverach bagging double to go with an excellent game for Brendan Robertson.
Despite the indignity of playing a full season without a win, Griffith coach Steve Parr said the club was already looking to turn things around in 2011, starting with a high profile captain-coach.
"We've already put a couple of irons in the fire and we've emailed a bloke about next year, he's ex-NRL so we're waiting on him at the moment because he said he's got some commitments overseas at the moment," Parr said.
Bernie Lancaster only played limited minutes and Loudon hinted the prop might be rested from next weekend's clash.
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