Armidale Blues earned the first points of the day but it was Robb College who managed to secure the victory at Bellevue Oval on Saturday.
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With Robb’s lineup vastly different from the one who took to the field the week before against Albies, the round six team didn’t miss a beat and managed to make the most of Armidale’s errors.
The Blues hit an early, five point-lead when Richard Cumming found his way over the line but it was shortlived as Robb nailed back-to-back penalty goals.
In an error-riddled match, the students edged ahead of the Blues 6-5 and the points for them didn’t stop there.
Robb scored two consecutive tries within the next 1- minutes to round out the first half ahead 18-5.
It was an unhappy start for the Blues in the second half with error after error landing Robb the first points through a penalty to extend their lead 21-5.
A runaway Samson Bai provided a bit of spark for Armidale when he sped 40 metres to score under the posts and bring the score to 21-12.
Their celebrations were again shortlived as more mistakes led to successive tries to Robb for them to widen the margin further and take the win 33-12.
Coach Sam Ditchfield was pleased his side were able to use their opportunities to put pressure on the opposition and grind out the win.
“Once we got into the lead we pushed the ball into the corners and played good field position,” he said.
“We also made the most of our opportunities early on.
“We kicked the penalties rather than going for the line and traded pressure for the points which helped us set the platform with the pressure from the points.
“All round it was a very good effort.”
The game was stop-start through plenty of mistakes from each team and Ditchfield believed it was his team’s sore point throughout the game.
“Unforced errors or forced errors,” he said.
“Just a few too many mistakes but not as many as last week.
“We made too many mistakes and gave Albies too much ball last week but we improved and we still have a lot of improvement to do.”