DESTINY’S Child and Muppets Elmo, Grover and Zoe combined with Blowes Clothing Cup leaders Orange Emus.
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It’s not a combination you’d expect, to say the least.
But just like the R’n’B super-group and Muppets trio did on Sesame Street all those years ago, last weekend Emus found a new way to walk.
Facing a wealth of unavailability Emus called up a number of replacement players for their clash with Narromine and promptly thumped the Gorillas 78-0.
The prospect is similar for the greens leading into Saturday’s round 14 fixture against the Mudgee Wombats, but assistant coach Andrew Logan is supremely confident his side’s fill-ins can do the job again.
“At times, coaches get comfortable with the players they have so they keep running with them. Sometimes it takes a game like last week to show you there is different ways to play the game and that other people bring different things to a side,” Logan said.
“I think that’s the biggest thing we took from last weekend, it showed us there is different ways to play the structures and game-plans we have so that’s something we’ll look for over the rest of the season.
“There’s no easy games in this competition, despite the disparity on the ladder so you can’t go through an entire year playing the same way.”
Emus will once again be without regulars Steve Fergus, Nick Hughes-Clapp, Simon Badgery, Zac White and Lachie Harris in Saturday’s match-up with the seventh-placed Wombats.
Of the fill-ins Simon Thompson and Marty Bryan were particularly impressive at centre and wing last weekend, respectively, and get another chance to try and play their way into spots full-time on Saturday.
Sometimes it takes a game like last week to show you there is different ways to play the game and that other people bring different things to a side.
- Emus assistant coach Andrew Logan
“It’s another good chance for us to look at a few other guys to see who can do the job for us, and who else we can look at in the back end of the season,” Logan said.
The Wombats are coming off a loss to the Cowra Eagles last weekend, they went down 51-31 in a high-scoring game – proving their ability to score points, despite the result.
Logan said that is one aspect his side will be wary of, particularly considering Mudgee beat Emus at Jubilee Oval last year thanks to their outstanding outside men.
Although, former National Rugby Championship gun Rota Setu carved-up that day. He won’t be in a Wombats jersey after defecting to rugby league in 2016.
“Last year, Mudgee was the side who probably played the most like us in their ability to play wide, so that’s something we need to be on guard for,” Logan said.
“But we don’t want to be worrying too much about what they’re doing, we don’t really know what they’ll bring over here anyway.”
Emus host the Wombats at Endeavour Oval on Saturday, the game kicks off at 3.15pm.
ORANGE EMUS: 1 Michael Graham, 2 Tom Goolagong, 3 Nas Havealeta, 4 Scott McLean, 5 Sam McLean, 6 Jack Marchinton, 7 Andrew Selwood, 8 Alo Finau, 9 Sam Green, 10 Todd Freedman, 11 Marty Bryan, 12 Simon Thompson, 13 Nigel Staniforth, 14 Tom Green, 15 AJ Sykes
Matt Findlay
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
