The biggest crowd the Boars have seen at North Parkes Oval in many years were on hand to witness one of the greatest performances the Boars have put together.

With a place this weekends Grand Final at Narromine one the line the Boars were not going to die wondering as they battled out the hard fought victory against the Students from Bathurst.

The game lived up to all expectations, and blew many more out of the water. It started at a frantic pace with Parkes game breaker Joe Nash tearing the CSU defence to threads from the onset.

The pace of the game did not let up as the Boar’s backs took the game into the heart of the CSU’s strengths.

With the Boar’s forwards standing up and giving their backs the freedom to move the ball across the pack, the Parkes side jumped out to a 12-0 lead through winger Josh Van Der Stok’s effort down the right touchline and centre Himah Alu’s barging run to score under the posts.

CSU were not going to go down without a fight, the Mitchell Men fought back to take the lead late in the first half.

Then from out of nowhere Dyllan Phillips got his hands on the ball and darted around the winger down the far left edge.

With 40 meters to the try line and the CSU fullback closing in fast the instincts kicked in.

Dyllan dropped the ball onto his left boot chipping it over the CSU players head and with the ball rolling towards the try line, up came Ben Powlay in support on the inside who showed he had the wheels to win the foot race for the ball and score the try the Boars desperately needed going into the half time break.

The Boars started the second half on the front foot with a penalty goal for start from the restart.

The game continually sea sawed back and forth with both teams appearing to take the upper hand it was the Boars scrum lead by Jason Lowe, who took the game to the CSU pack and put them on the back foot.

This opened up the try line for Parkes No.8 Dan Ryan to scoot from the back of the scum and dive over.

This lead was to be short lived as CSU had a late flourish and put on two quick tries and with a seven point lead with under five minutes to go, looked to have booked their place in the big game.

One man took it upon himself to not let this happen, Joe Nash made the decision there was nothing on this earth that was going to keep him from muscling his way over the try line and getting that ball down.

That is exactly what he did, getting the ball 15 meters out he fought his way over the line not once taking notice of the CSU defenders attempts to pull him down short of the line. Nash scores, the Boars are down 32-34

Then the highest pressure kick seen in Central West Rugby, the Boars behind by two with only 1.49 on the clock and the wind starting to blow heavily from the South.

From pressure diamonds are made.

And that is exactly what Boars Fly Half Lloyd Rogers produced, as the wind picked up the ball blew off the kicking tee for a scored time, now with a CSU wall charging at him the quick thinking Rogers picked up the ball, gathered himself and dropkicked the ball between the posts to lock the game up.

With the scores locked and the game heading to extra time, Coach Joshua Miles rallied the troops and the Boars fought out the first stanza of extra time into the wind and the scores were still locked at 34-all.

The Boars forwards worked their way back down into the CSU end.

And it was that man again who was going to have nothing but a Boars victory.

Joe Nash once again blew defenders out of his way to force the ball down for what was to be the match winning try.

With three minutes left on the clock the Boars took possession of the ball and their forwards once again stood up and took charge, keeping the ball tight and giving CSU no chance at retaining possession to wind down the clock and force the extra time victory.

Boars 41 – 34 CSU

The Boars now turn their focus to this weekend Grand Final at Narromine which has been a happy hunting ground for the Boars on Grand Final day.

2011 was the last time the Boars took out a Grand Final and it was against Narromine at Narromine with the Boars fighting out a 10-6 win in extra time.

The Boars will go into the game full of confidence after their efforts against CSU and with Narromine having the week off Parkes will go into the game with the momentum needed to hit the ground at full speed.

The Boars will be looking at making minimal changes from the side that took on CSU last week as the boys look to be near full strength.

The Boars will be leaving from the Coachman at 12noon on Saturday. We hope to see another large crowd in Boars colours to get the boys over the line again this weekend!  Kick off in Narromine will be 3.15pm  

The Club will be hosting the 2018 Presentation evening on September 1 at the Coachman Hotel function room with both the Junior and Senior Players, Supporters and Sponsors coming together to share in the end of season presentations and awards ceremony.

The evening will be starting with the Sub Juniors award presentations from 5pm followed by the presentation of the Junior award winners.  The presentation of the Senior award winners will continue the evening, with finger foods and drink specials during the night all for $10 on the night. So please let us know if you are coming so we have an idea of numbers. 

See page 32 for the Boars’ killer lineup for tomorrow’s grand final against Narromine at Narromine.