Palmerston Raiders men and women sides pull through prelim finals

The 2022 NRL NT mens and womens grand final sides are locked in after a fierce prelim final weekend. Read all the action from the knockout rounds here

Palmerston Raiders survived a heated and tight encounter against Darwin Brothers to book themselves a place in the 2022 NRL NT A-Grade grand final.

There had been barely anything between the Raiders and Brothers all year, and the preliminary final was no different.

But Palmerston ultimately came out on top winning 16-14 to give themselves a shot at the premiership against the reigning champions Northern Sharks next week.

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Defences held strong for much of the prelim final with neither side giving any edge to their opposition.

The first break of substance came almost of 20 minutes into the fray when Palmerston speedster Tevita Kanalagi raced down the left wing to plant the ball beyond the white paint.

But just as soon as he scored Brothers found the room to make a response with their captain and playmaker Isaac Sedan-Kurnoth spiraling out of tackles on his way to levelling the score.

A dangerous hit gave Brothers an option to score near the close of the half, and knowing the tightness of the occasion the Brethren opted for the penalty to go ahead at the break.

Raiders returned the field with intent and tested the Brothers’ defensive line which held strong through their forwards such as Sam Ryan-Winn, Elijah Coombes and Lachie Braun.

But a clever run to take on the line from Sean Huriama allowed Kanalagi a gap to run 50m to score his brace.

Once again Brothers popped up to return the favour using pacey backs Caleb Niki, Xavier Grant and Jarrod Northam to test the defence.

The Brethren used those strike runners to stretch the Palmerston defence across the field until the ball fell into the hands of Xavier Grant who placed the ball down on the right wing.

The tables turned once again when the big frame of Joel Turaga came back on the field for Palmerston giving the ball a few massive carries up the field.

And his presence made an impact putting Brothers on the back foot and from there he was able to charge through and finish the move with a try.

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Brad Hansen had the tricky job of converting from the sideline, but knocked it through to take the lead.

Brothers didn’t stop coming from then on fighting for every metre and their chance to play in the grand final.

There looked like there would be another twist to the tale when Niki went crashing over, but the Palmerston defence had done enough to push him out of play and seal the win.

“Brothers are a hard team, they always give it to us and they always fight right to the last minute,” Hansen said.

“We stuck to it. The boys dug deep, we stuck together and we keep turning out for each other.

“The brotherhood we have in the team is strong and I think we have the team it to Sharks next week.

“I haven’t kicked goals in a bit, but I was pretty happy it went through and happy we got through to the final.”

Palmerston coach Merg Mikaelian called the result a relief after what had been a tough encounter.

“Brothers were outstanding, they hung in all game, but I’m really proud of our boys who held in despite us picking up some injuries in the second half,” he said.

“It came down to a lot of luck. Both sides were magnificent and in semi-final footy where it is do or die you get some luck and the boys held on when they needed to.

“There was some outstanding defence. The boys fought off wave after wave and it came down to our willingness to get off the line and make those tackles.”

Palmerston will now move on to play Northern Sharks in the grand final.

Raiders women in with a shot of back-to-back premierships

The Palmerston women gave themselves the opportunity to take back-to-back premierships after posting a 22-14 win over Northern Sharks in a thrilling prelim final.

It was an uncompromising start from Raiders who used their forward power to surge past the Sharks line with every carry.

And they had their reward soon after with full back Shaylah Barba making an incisive dart giving prolific try scorer Ciara Aigea the chance to seal the opening score.

Palmerston’s Shaylah Barba played an important role in her sides win over Northern Sharks. Picture: (A)manda Parkinson

The score inspired a response from Sharks and they played to their strengths kicking into space and using their evasive runners to catch Palmerston on the back foot.

Those runs, from players such as Natasha Medbury, Ayesha Kay and Deanna Peckham, pulled Raiders’ defenders out of position allowing Jasmine Castro to run into an open try zone.

Palmerston regrouped and got their big runners including Ruti Tuivaisgano Tagiloa and Lucy Aigea back on the ball.

They were really able to push their advantage from there with both Lucy Aigea and Ciara Aigea scoring tries ahead of half time.

And on the other side of half time it was Tuivaisgano Tagiloa turn to bulldoze through the Sharks defence to cement Palmerston’s lead.

Sharks, with a grand final on the line, didn’t go down without a fight as both Asha Fisher and Grace Bailey scored tries to narrow the margin.

However, despite some further efforts later on the Palmerston defence held strong long enough to hold onto the win and seal a spot in the grand final.

“We’ve had an up and down season up to now, but to put ourselves in the grand final is fantastic,” Barba said.

“We knew we had to pick up the intensity in the warm up and to come out here and score the try in the first couple of minutes really set us up.

“When they came back at us in the second half we just regrouped and reminded ourselves what we want, and that is to be in the grand final next week.

“We just had to relax, reset and go back out there and back to our game plan.

“Our goal now is to go back to back, we know it won’t come easy and we know we will have to work really hard to get there.”

Palmerston moves on to face Darwin Brothers in the 2022 grand final.

Originally published as Palmerston Raiders men and women sides pull through prelim finals