The young Boars team showed their many loyal supporters in attendance that a win is not too far away and they will continue to improve under the guidance of master coach Terry Aquilina.

The opening exchanges of the match were brutal and the tough, young Boars showed that they may lack the physical size to dominate teams, but showed they lack nothing in the courage department.

The game was twenty minutes old when the Boars were rewarded for their persistent attack with a clever try to Steve Coote who darted over from dummy half to have the Boars leading 4-0.

The Newtown Lions then began to play the type of football that has them running second on the TRL ladder and they crossed for a converted try in the 35th minute to take the lead 6-4.

Just when the Newtown team thought they had the Boars measure, dynamic centre, Craig McKenzie once again showed his propensity for scoring tries as he carved through some wafer thin Lions defence to score adjacent to the up-rights.

Unfortunately the conversion attempt went wide and the Boars now held a slender 8-6 lead.

A raft of handling errors gifted the Lions easy territory and in the shadows of half-time, the Newtown backline clicked into gear and were able to score a try that gave them the lead 10-8 as the two teams headed to the sheds for a well earned break.

Unfortunately for the Boars, the physical nature of the match began to take its toll in the second half and the relentless Newtown attacking machine soon found several gaps appearing in the tiring Boars defence and the Lions were able to score three unanswered tries in the second half to run out convincing 26-8 victors over a gallant Boars team.

For the Boars, none played better than David Wild in his new found position of prop and his powerhouse charges into the Lions defence wreaked havoc on every occasion.

He was ably supported by union-convert, Mark Jekyll, who was damaging in both attack and defence, and Jake McCosker who has the best defensive technique seen in bush league.

For the backs, father and son (sounds like a Cat Stevens number) Will and Robbie McIntosh showed glimpses of brilliance in attack and are the lynchpins behind every attacking raid by the slick Boars backline.

The Boars find themselves languishing near the bottom of the TRL ladder after nine rounds of the competition, but they show enough potential to suggest they will win more than they lose in the second half of the season and the Gilbert Oval faithful should continue to turn up in their droves to watch this young and courageous team play.

Reserve Grade

The Malcolm Peckham coached Reserve Grade Boars defeated Newtown 24-20 after they found themselves down 4-0 after ten seconds of play.

In what would arguably be the quickest try ever scored on the hallowed Gilbert Oval turf, Newtown kicked off to start the game and the Boars defence let the ball bounce and the Lions were blessed when the ball landed in the arms of their flying winger who scored untouched.

A further try in the 15th minute saw the Boars behind 8-0 on the new electronic score-board and the Boars had to wait until the 25 thminute before the try-scoring freak, Derrick Craigie crossed for another four-pointer to reduce the lead to 8-6 and this remained the score until half-time.

After a half-time blast from the normally subdued Mal Peckham, the Boars began the second half on fire and within six minutes the Boars had raced to an 18-8 lead after tries to Shaun Swan and the ageless veteran Richie Mackie.

The Boars were then guilty of some sloppy defence and this allowed the Lions to mount sustained attack and when they crossed for a try in the 45th minute the lead was reduced to 18-14.

The final ten minutes of the game saw both teams throw the ball around with gay abandon and the Boars profited by this action with yet another try to Derrick Craigie to take the Boars to a seemingly unassailable 24-14 lead with five minutes left to play.

The Lions retaliated immediately with a try beside the uprights after a rare handling error by the safest pair of hands in football when coach Mal Peckham dropped a pass on his line and the Lions had closed the gap to 24-20 with two minutes to play.

The Boars held on to take out a thriller and the victory keeps them within sight of a semi-final berth.

Under 18

The young Boars were soundly beaten on Saturday night against the visiting Newtown Lions to the tune of 40-20.

The Boars found themselves down 16-0 after only twenty minutes of play and when Chris Cubby crossed in the 25th minute, the Boars reduced the score to 16-6 by half-time.

The Boars began the second half with a try to Jordan Jenkins to narrow the lead to 16-12 before Newtown hit back with a further try to lead 22-12 after 37 minutes of play.

A comeback of biblical proportions was on the cards when Jordan Jenkins crossed for his second try of the day to narrow the gap to 22-16 and the young Boars were full of running in front of a large home ground crowd.

A series of unforced handling errors halted the comeback in its tracks and Super Coach Cyril Mayberry will have to work hard on the training paddock to eliminate this facet of play from his young charges.

Newtown were able to run in a further four tries and the Boars could only manage one try to the dangerous Corey McIntosh to have the fulltime score 40-20 to Newtown.

The young Boars were best served by halfback Casey Tierney, Jamie Aquilina and Wade Gresty.