Tigers make it 2 from 3, welcome ‘best in NQ’ crown

Wests Tigers redeemed themselves for last season’s grand final capitulation with a dominant display on Sunday night.

Wests Tigers winger Evander Cummins gets the party started early following the 42-18 RLMD A-Grade grand final victory over Townsville Brothers. Photo: Callum Dick

FOUR years, four grand finals and two premierships.

Wests cemented its modern Mackay rugby league dynasty in emphatic fashion on Sunday night, overpowering Townsville Brothers 42-18 to claim the Rugby League Mackay & District A-Grade premiership.

It secured a stirring Reserve Grade-A-Grade premiership double for the Walkerston club.

Just two weeks removed from suffering a two-point loss to the same opposition, Craig Menkins’ men proved the clear-cut best side when the grand final whips were cracking.

Townsville got off to the perfect start, scoring inside the first two minutes after a Wests error from the kick-off.

But the Tigers hit back immediately through bustling backrower Kimi Hemopo and from there, it was all one-way traffic.

These two teams had made a habit of playing out dire defensive arm wrestles, but on Sunday night the Tigers proved far too clinical in attack.

Sam Cook and Daniel Boyd pulled the strings in the halves, Wests’ forwards dominated the middle and the wide men made metres with ease.

It truly was a 1-17 performance.

The Tigers took a 26-12 advantage into halftime and although far from over on the scoreboard, a Wests win never really felt in danger.

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Wests Tigers defeated Townsville Brothers 42-18 to claim the Rugby League Mackay & District A-Grade premiership. Photo: Callum Dick

Townsville looked outmatched and out-enthused from early in the second half as the Tiger train rolled on, with a performance befitting a side ready to claim the unofficial title of best in north Queensland.

“No doubt about that,” Menkins said of the NQ crown.

“Townsville; they’re an awesomely strong side. Well financed, well resourced, a feeder to the Cowboys, to the Blackhawks … we put them to the sword today.

“It was a great performance. We’ve worked hard for this all year. We were one of the big drivers in getting this competition going and to finish it off like we did today with a great performance like that is fantastic.”

Wests had finished the stronger of the two sides in each of their previous encounters. It was the slow starts which hampered them.

History looked ready to repeat when Townsville took the early lead, but the Tigers refused to stay toothless a third time.

Even after the close contests of previous weeks, the Wests playing group and coaching staff travelled to the ground on Sunday confident their best football was deserving of the premiership.

They left the Mackay Junior Rugby League Grounds certain of their standing atop the Mackay rugby league mountain.

“We trained like that all week. We walked away Friday night after training very confident and thought we would get the job done today,” Menkins said.

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