A sideline conversion after the buzzer sent the Dubbo Pacemakers crashing out of the 2018 NSW Aboriginal Rugby League Knockout in devastating fashion at Apex Oval on Sunday.
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The local hopes led 10-0 after half-time, but conceded a try to the Gilgandra Sand Goannas with just 10 minutes remaining.
The Pacemakers were camped on the Sand Goannas’ try line and looked sure to run away with the match, but a series of penalties saw passions flare and a fight ensued.
Brayden Peachey was sin-binned with five minutes remaining, and it was the leg-up Gilgandra needed.
With the numerical advantage, they pushed the ball to the opposite end and five-eighth Brandon Hammond showed terrific composure to slot a precision chip through to Josh Nixon to level the game at 10-apiece.
Hammond’s conversion was make-or-break. In and his team were through to the next round. Out, and the Pacemakers would go through on the first try rule.
He slotted it.
“Heaps of pressure!” Hammond laughed after the game. “Just hit it sweet and hope it goes over.”
Dubbo skipper Travis Hill admitted failing to play to the whistle had cost his team against a Gilgandra side featuring a number of the Pacemakers’ family and friends.
But he was still proud of their performance, even if their top-30 finish was well shy of his hopes for 2018.
“We’ve had a few fall out, a couple of our boys got poached to NCC on Saturday morning, we lost a few and picked up a couple,” Hill lamented.
“It was a good physical game, a couple of the boys put their hands up Jayden Merritt, Kurt Fuller, myself, Matty [Hill] and my nephew Dylan Hill, he’s got stitches and he’s just come back from two ACL reconstructions so we’re all pretty wounded at the moment.
“We wanted to go one further [than 2017’s top-10 finish], we thought we had it in the bag but you’ve got to play to the whistle and credit to the Gilgandra boys, they did that.”
Hill also paid credit to Hammond’s composure and thanked his teammates, Uncle Mick Peachey and Aunty Wendy Peachey for their efforts pulling the team together.
“You can’t get any cooler than that!” he said.
“Most of us are all family … all the teams we’ve played are pretty much half our family,” he added.
“But we’ve got no friends and family on the field … we give it our all.”
All of Dubbo’s hopes have now bowed out of the carnival, with the Googars defeated by the Doonside Brown Bears 12-6, Wellington Wedgetails downed by the Pacemakers 18-14 and Nanima Common Connections defeated by La Perouse Panthers 14-6.
