Northern Sharks showed their skills in the wet, while the Palmerston women showed their intent
Northern Sharks got some early revenge in the wet, while the Palmerston women got their season off to a flying start. See all the action from NRL NT Round 1 here.
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Northern Sharks tasted some early season revenge against reigning premiers Palmerston Raiders with a show of class in torrential conditions.
It was Raiders who lifted the premiership cup at the end of the 2022 season after beating Sharks in the grand final.
And it was a hurt Sharks who did not let go of using it as fuel to propel themselves to a big 22-4 win over their rivals in green.
Both sides had undergone slight changes in personnel in the offseason, but both had come to play bringing the intensity at every contest.
Sharks had most of the run early on with their eyes firmly set on the try line with David Munro and Mitch Burke particularly busy in the opening minutes.
It was Burke who created the first score kicking deep where Samuel Pearson was able to knock the ball back for captain Lachie Wright to get the try.
This gave Palmerston incentive to respond and they did with their own crash runners such as Stephen Smith and Watson Koroirere getting to work.
The Raiders were, however, given a further knock back when club stalwart Brad Hansen was sent to the sin bin after mistiming a tackle.
However, the loss of a man didn’t faze the premiers and they finally created a chance late in the half, getting the ball out to Dylan Roser on the left wing to create an overlap.
Roser squared up his opposition defender, but instead of running on kicked into space to give Jarryd Lawton an easy score, but they remained two points down with a missed conversion.
A near-torrential downpour marred the second half, and it was Sharks’ Brent Crisp who capitalised kicking deep into the try zone to force a mistake from Beau Lothian, who slipped into touch.
And after Palmerston kicked off from deep in their territory it was Crisp once again who took his chance slipping through the defence to put his side more than a score ahead.
As the rain calmed Sharks continued to cement their advantage, with Burke bringing clean passing and control from the halves.
Big forward Adam Hall charged through for Sharks third flattening one of his opposition on the way over, while full back Cooper Segeyaro claimed the fourth late to seal the deal.
“I definitely feel we deserved it in the end, we worked a bit harder coming off preseason and for us it’s good to get the win over Raiders,” Burke said.
“It’s always a matchup we have marked and obviously after what happened last year going undefeated to get done in the granny, but it’s still Round 1 so can’t take too much from it.
“We didn’t drop too much of the ball once it started raining, but we did shorten the passes up a bit, but I’ve never really played in torrential rain like that before, it was pretty full on.
“It came down to our defence, that’s where we won, we didn’t too badly in attack but our defence was awesome, everyone was working for each other.”
Meanwhile, Litchfield Bears came back to beat the Darwin Brothers 20-16 after an early deficit, while Nightcliff Dragons held off South Darwin to win 36-26.
Palmerston women get season off to winning start
The Palmerston Raiders women got their season off to a perfect start on the back of a dominant opening half against the Northern Sharks.
After losing the grand final to Darwin Brothers in 2022 the onus was on Raiders to kick off the new season in style.
The largely new look side did just did that, building a comfortable lead in the opening half to ultimately score a 32-16 win over the Sharks.
It was all Palmerston right from the start with the team showing they had both forward power and fast backs aplenty to kick off the new season.
And it wasn’t long before they crossed the white paint for their first as Lucy Aigea charged through a number of defenders to get the ball down.
That wasn’t all from the Raiders side as the continued to find ways to score whether it was through their big runners or from Crystal Browne crashing down beside the posts.
Sharks had their moments on the offence and found themselves on Palmerston’s line more than once due to the evasive running of Ayesha Kay and Tamara Madzika.
But for all their efforts they were kept out and instead it was Kiara Hawkins who ran 60m dodging more than three defenders to secure yet another try for Raiders.
Sharks took the game on at the start of the second determined not to go scoreless and to potentially steal the win despite their deficit.
They put in attack after attack on the Raiders line but strong tackles and botched passes kept them at bay, until a big run from Ana Malupo allowed Shae Muhleisen to claim the Sharks first try.
It was a momentum turning moment in the match as Muheleisen crossed again just minutes later, and when captain Ayesha Kay scored the third Sharks were back in the contest.
But Palmerston, despite fatigue, dug in and rediscovered the front foot scoring once more through the powerful Aigea to put any doubt of the winner out of mind.
Captain Briannan Ross was pleased with her side’s efforts crediting them for their resilience when play started to go against them.
“It was great to get our first hit out, test a few of our combos and get the win which is a big positive going into the season,” Ross said.
“We wanted to go in with the dominant tackles and dominant runs, unfortunately we were just a bit fatigued, which is something we will work on.
“It came down to our resilience, we really wanted to get the win, and so when things went against us we just got back up and fought back, which is a big kudos to our team.”
Meanwhile, the women reigning premiers Darwin Brothers also enjoyed a perfect start beating Litchfield 28-6, with both Ellie Niki and Janna Ransome scoring two tries each.
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