Recap

Reds topple reigning premiers

The Goulburn Dirty Reds cleared another significant hurdle in the 2018 campaign with a confident 38-14 win against reigning premiers the Gungahlin Eagles.

But it would prove to be a costly result for the Reds with hooker Josh Guymer suffering a potentially season-ending injury. At the time of writing, Guymer was expected to be operated on for a fractured tibia.

That injury was one of the only shadows over a match in which Goulburn improved in some of the areas that let them down against ADFA.

Fewer errors led to fewer penalties against the Reds in a sustained and consistent performance, although as with the ADFA match the brakes were let off a little in the final ten minutes.

Against ADFA last week, the score was level-pegging until ADFA ran in four tries in the final 12 minutes. This week, after Goulburn established a half-time lead of 12-0 and stretched that to 38-0, the Eagles scored two tries in the final five minutes to avoid a whitewash.

But that glitch to one side, it was a dominant performance by Goulburn in which they put their opponents to the sword in the second half rather than dropping off and losing momentum.

Gutsy Eagles

For their part, the Eagles were anything but easybeats and provided tough opposition throughout. Tempers began to fray a little in the second half but debutante first grade ref Glenn Zuchetto kept it under control.

The Reds have next weekend off with a competition bye but will be back on deck the following week against Easts (in firsts) and RMC (in seconds) at Duntroon.

Best and fairest points in first grade went to Monty Hicks (3), Ben Todkill (2) and Brad Clements (1). Todkill, who scored a hat-trick of tries, also picked up players player in addition to notching up 200 points with the Dirty Reds.

Goulburn 38 (Ben Todkill 3, Monty Hicks 2, Cutis Flood 1 try; Mik Webber 4 conversions) by Gungahlin 14.