The Mallee Men went close to scoring with their first set with the ball but it was all Black and Whites from there.

Five minutes in, Sosaia Finefeuiaki crossed on the left edge for the first points and the lead quickly ballooned.

By the 18-minute mark, the Black and Whites led 24-0 as the left side put in a dominant display.

The lead came down to how much defence West Wyalong had to do.

At one point, the Mallee Men didn’t touch the ball for nine minutes straight.

When they did have the ball, the Mallee Men made metres and were finally rewarded when Tim Dore crossed with 13 minutes left on the clock.

However, the fightback was short-lived as George and Stephen Broome crossed before the break.

A Jarrad Kelly knock-on from the opening kick-off signalled a sign of things to come from both sides in the second stanza.

West Wyalong recovered to score first through BJ Kerry on the back of a string of penalties and mistakes from the Griffith side.

Plenty more penalties and errors came from both side but it was the Black and Whites who took advantage – namely Kodie Charles who bagged a double on the back of a strong performance – to win 54-12.

Josh Charles also snared a try and had a big game as he offloaded at will throughout the match.

While Morriss would have liked for his side to have conceded less penalties in the second half, he was happy with the performance.

“I think it was pretty good across the board, they all put their hands up and worked hard,” Morriss said.

“I think we gave 14 [penalties] in the game.

“We gave away one in the first half, which is something we’ve really worked hard on, and then to give away 14 – there’s 80-odd tackles you have to do extra.

“There were missed intercepts too, that’s probably another 20 extra tackles but to the boys credit, West Wyalong only got over once [in the second half] but we worked hard when we didn’t have to.”