Smallwood Stars In Red Ants Victory

20120519 Kingaroy v Blackbutt — How’s that, sir? Ashley Smallwood scores his fourth try for the Red Ants

May 20, 2012

Kingaroy’s Ashley Smallwood scored four consecutive tries, and captain Matt Allen kicked five goals and scored a try himself in the Red Ants 44-16 victory over Blackbutt at TJ O’Neill Oval yesterday.

The first half was an arm-wrestle with the score locked at 12-all with 12 minutes left to the break when Shannon Smallwood crossed the line for the Timbertowners, taking the visitors into the lead at 16-12.

Just three minutes later, Blackbutt piled on the pressure again and went within inches of scoring until a Kingaroy player kicked the ball to safety, just out of the grasp of Blackbutt fingers.

Kingaroy hit back almost immediately with Matt Allen converting his own try, and Ashley Smallwood scoring his first for the match.

At half-time the score was 24-16 in favour of Kingaroy.

The Red Ants didn’t reduce the pressure in the second half, with Ash Smallwood scoring his second just two minutes after the re-start. Within minutes Kingaroy was on the attack again, a first attempt ruled held-up, and then Smallwood scoring his third.

At the mid-way point through the half, Smallwood scored yet again – his fourth try for the match – and the score was 38-16.

With 14 minutes left on the clock, an incident in a tackle mid-field resulted in players rushing in from both sides to swap a few blows before calmer heads prevailed. Two players – one from each team – were sent to the sin bin for 10 minutes.

While they were off, Kingaroy’s Luke Evans scored in the corner – his second for the match – and Matt Allen converted, taking the score to 44-16 … the final tally when the full-time siren blew.

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At Wondai, the home team scored seven tries to defeat the Nanango Stags in the A Grade 34 to 20.

Cody Beggs scored a hat-trick for the Wolves, with other try-scorers being Tyrone Mickelo, Brodie Alberts, Brad Perese and Troy Kerkow. Danny Alberts kicked two goals and Luke Hedges one. For Nanango, tries went to Pat McCallum (a double), Brodie English and Harley Gilliland. English also kicked two goals.

One player from both sides spent 10 minutes in the sin-bin after an incident in the first half.

* * *At Murgon, Cherbourg overcame the Murgon Mustangs 54-30 in an entertaining game during which 17 tries were scored.

The first half was a close contest, with the home side ahead 22-20. The Hornets ran away in the second half, and the score would have been even higher if their goal kicking had been more on target.

Cherbourg notched up an impressive 11 tries. Fred Aubrey enjoyed a hat-trick and Cecil Sullivan and Carl Aubrey both had doubles. Other tries went to Gerard Prior, Cyril Georgetown, Nigel Williams and Robert Miller.

Scorers for Murgon were Charlie Paiwan (a double), Eddie Aubrey, Curtis Hill, Peter Bligh and Justin Cobus.

* * *In the U18s, the Murgon Mustangs defeated the Maryborough Wallaroos 28-22.

The home team scored six tries: Ashley O’Chin, Arthur Saltner, Slade Dalton, Thomas McDowell, Lehman Brunjes and Dwayne Malone.

John Ward scored a double for Maryborough, with tries also to Ben Turner and Aiden Churchill.

The half-time score was 18-12.

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