Central North Rugby: Narrabri get the better of Pirates in women's 7s encounters

Since losing their opening two games to Gunnedah, the Blue Boars have won their last six, and beaten the defending champions, to sit second on the table behind the Red Devils.

On Saturday they defeated Pirates 29-12 and 24-19, clinching victory in the final minute in the second game after trailing 12-nil midway through the first half.

"I was very pleased with the wins we had on Saturday," coach Dean Hancock said.

"Pirates are a good team and a good outfit."

The old theory of don't let the opposition get the ball worked for Pirates in the first half. the Blue Boars didn't get in their 22 until the final seconds of the first half.

They almost blew it but managed to score after the bell to trail 12-5 at the break.

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From the kick-off for the second half the Blue Boars spun the ball wide and found Toni Gale, who scorched the Pirates defence from about 70m out to score.

April Smith then pounced on a Pirates mistake as they tried to run the ball out of their 22 from the kick-off to put the visitors ahead. But Pirates hit straight back, Sophie Barr putting the footwork on to get around the defence and racing away to put the home side up 19-17 with three minutes remaining.

As they did in the first half though the Blue Boars had the final say - Shaine Baker, from deep inside the Narrabri half, standing up the defence with just over 30 seconds to go and streaking away to secure the points.

It was the third in a run of five straight games for the Blue Boars and followed a pair of wins over premiers Inverell the previous week.

"I'm very happy with how they are travelling," Hancock said.

"The girls are starting to get confidence in themselves."

"And the whole team is starting to gel as a team. We're starting to have confidence in the player outside of us, which is good."

With a lot of new faces joining the side this season, they had to pretty well start again at the basics, especially with several having not played much non-contact sport before.

Some were horseriders, Hancock said. A couple of them netballers.

"A lot of them last year were sitting on the sideline seeing how it was going to go," he said.

"At different points they came up to me and said count me in for next year."

He said having a core from last years side still involved has helped speed up their transition.

"We've got to a good point pretty quickly," he said, adding that all the training they are doing is starting to show on the field.

They face two of the competition newcomers in their next two games, with Quirindi this Saturday and Moree after the long weekend.

In the other round 7 game Barraba scored one of the biggest results of their debut season drawing 17-all with the Highlanders after going down 20-10 in the first game.