Prior to Sunday's Group 11 clash with the Macquarie Raiders, Wellington Cowboys captain-coach Justin Toomey-White spoke to his players about his past battle with cancer and his determination to "just keep fighting".
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It's clear that attitude rubbed off on his players during the club's bowel cancer awareness round as the Cowboys scored a scrappy yet entertaining 34-30 win over the Macquarie Raiders.
This season is Toomey-White's first back on the field after enduring more than six months of treatment following a shock bowel cancer diagnosis in late 2018.
The club and community supported him throughout and that continues now he's cancer-free, with the annual awareness round something the Cowboys put a huge amount of emphasis on.
"What a way to finish it off," Toomey-White said after Sunday's tight win.
"I said to the boys they knew what I was going through two years ago and when your back is against the wall you just keep fighting and that demonstrated it today."
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The captain-coach said it "wasn't pretty" but the win could be a hugely important one for the Cowboys.
They trailed 12-4 early on and went into the sheds down 18-16 and after the lead changed hands in the second half it was a a third try of the day for centre EJ Fernando six minutes from time which decided the contest.
"Close ones like that, we'll take it," Toomey-White added.
"We never had our heads down. With nine (minutes) to go they scored to get in front and we knew we were still in the contest.
"We just had to get back to basics and rip in a good defensive set and then we had a chance and we know our attack will flow."
Both sides were guilty of a raft of handling errors, particularly in the second half, and Raiders assistant coach Peter Gibbs simply stated the Cowboys were able to hold the ball and get the job done while his own side continued to struggle.
"There was a lot of errors from both teams but Wellington was a little better than us overall," he said.
"If you don't complete sets you aren't going to win games. I don't think there's many teams who could complete as many sets as we did today and win so we didn't deserve to win."
The Cowboys opened the scoring at Kennard Park through Fernando but midway through the first half the Raiders had the lead after tries for Tyler Bamblett and Richie Peckham.
A neat Toomey-White offload put five-eighth Mason Williams over in the 27th minute but just four minutes later the visitors struck again through hard-running halfback Matt Toole.
With half-time quickly approaching momentum shifted again as Fernando charged down a Kane McDermott kick and regathered it. After his side worked the ball down towards the line the centre crashed off after receiving a lovely cut-out pass from Dennis Moran.
The boys just never gave up.
- Justin Toomey-White
The Raiders had a two-point lead when the action restarted but back-to-back penalties in the first set off the restart allowed the Cowboys to march into attacking territory and they made the most of it as another fantastic Toomey-White offload led to a try for fullback Will Lousick.
Toomey-White himself was then a hugely popular try-scorer at his home ground after bumping off tackles on his way to the line but the Cowboys' joy was short-lived as first Peckham went over for a second and then prop Nick Harvey was too hard to stop close to the line.
The front-rower's try and subsequent conversion from Matt Naden had the Raiders back in front, 30-28, but in the final stages the visitors again gave away a penalty and some quick hands in a shift to the left led to Fernando stretching out and planting the ball down.
"The boys just never gave up," Toomey-White said.
"We knew it would be tough and tough wins like that can sometimes sort your season out."
Toomey-White highlighted the number of tries conceded as an obvious area that needs to be corrected while Gibbs was staying upbeat despite the Raiders having now suffered back-to-back losses.
"We're still building. I'm disappointed in the loss but there was a lot more effort today and there's areas of improvement in us and we're building, and looking forward to CYMS next week," Gibbs said.
The monster Dubbo derby headlines next weekend while Wellington travels to Parkes and Nyngan hosts Narromine.
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