The Colts are coached by Macleod, John Raidaveta and Scott Ferrari and will come up against Bathurst Bulldogs who easily accounted for them 37-15 in the major semi-final a week ago.

Saturday’s win over CSU was a perfect trial for the grand final.

The Roos have had the wood on CSU in recent times and their victory on this occasion was on the back of a 14-6 success a fortnight previous. However, the finals also produced losing results for the Kangaroos with the third grade and Women’s Cup teams eliminated.

Coaches Nigel Bourke and Brian Furner were both disappointed with their third grade loss to CSU 32-23.

The Dubbo Blue Flyers were outlasted by CSU 12-7 and with that defeat ended their chances of retaining the Women’s Cup premiership.

The first grade final at Orange on Saturday was a no-contest as Orange Emus brushed aside the lacklustre Parkes Boars to earn a shot at their third straight Blowes Menswear Cup premiership.

Emus delivered a crushing 53-13 defeat to the Boars in a final Parkes coach Tony Evans described as “dreadful”.

Emus coach Richard Turnbull was pleased his team had improved greatly on last week’s drab performance against Bathurst Bulldogs in the major semi-final, saying playing on Saturday instead of having a week off has done the team a world of good for Saturday’s grand final re-match in Bathurst.

“Actually I’m quite pleased we played this game and it didn’t do us any harm - I think we needed it for fitness and so on,” he said. “We improved certainly in this game after last week and I think we mixed it up better with them (Parkes).

“Parkes are a tough side to beat and I think the result shows that we didn’t allow them in the game - we picked up a gear or two and it was a different type of game than last week altogether.

“It’s going to be tough next week and it could go either way ... we weren’t thinking about next week before this game.”

but now is the time to start thinking about it.’’

The result was a bitter end for Parkes who earned a spot in the final with its spirited 22-21 win over Forbes.

Co-coach Tony Evans was not happy with the Boars’ performance but believed Emus were just too strong.

“It was dreadful. We left our footy boots back at Grinsted Oval I think,” he reflected.

“They were just too big and too strong, they had all the possession, we didn’t win a lineout and our scrum went backward all day.

“When when you give a side like that all the ball you are always on the back foot.

“They ran all over us and we had nothing to give them back. The only shining light of the day was Duncan Constable who put his hand up and had a crack.

“So now it’s back to the drawing board for 2002.’’

From the kick-off Emus looked in control of the match and in the sixth minute five-eighth Mitch Staniforth capitalised on the pressure to score. Halfback Andrew Mahoney’s conversion took Emus to an early 7-0 lead.

Giant flanker Ben Wright began his dominance with his first of three tries in the 12th minute, charging through slack defence to score under the posts. Mahoney’s conversion took Emus’ lead to 14-0.

A penalty in front of the sticks in the 16th minute gave Parkes an opportunity to put their first points on the board and winger Paul Moody duly obliged.

But from then on the humiliation continued for Parkes with another Wright try and one to fullback Mark Daley, both converted by Mahoney, to take Emus to a comfortable 29-3 half-time lead.

Winger Ron Rayner opened the second half scoring for Emus with a brilliant 50 metre solo try from his own chip kick, and there were further tries to Wright (2), centre Mick Wallace and Daley and two more Mahoney conversions.

Parkes managed to stage a late comeback with two tries to replacement Fini Latu.

ORANGE EMUS 52 (Ben Wright 3, Mark Daley 2, Mitch Staniforth, Ron Rayner, Mick Wallace tries, Andrew Mahoney 6 conversions) def PARKES BOARS 13 (Fini Latu 2 tries, Paul Moody penalty goal).