Central North women's coach Lincoln Stewart says there are a lot of positives to take away from their NSW Country Championships campaign on the weekend.
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While the Kookaburras weren't able to repeat their history-making Thomson Cup finals effort from the previous year they produced some strong performances over the two day carnival in Tamworth and were only a penalty goal off finishing at least equal third.
And not that far off a spot in the final.
In an almost repeat scenario of last year, after winning their first two games (17-nil over Far North Coast 17-nil and 27-5 over New England) it came down to the Kookaburras and Hunter for top spot in their pool and a finals berth.
But starved of possession they didn't really have a lot of opportunities and went down 12-nil to the eventual champions.
On Sunday then facing Central Coast in the play-off for third, they had to weather wave after wave of attack in the first half.
The defensive wall eventually broke on about 20 minutes.
But the Kookaburras hit straight back through Piper Rankmore after some great play through the backs.
They then had a golden opportunity to take the lead going into half-time, with a succession of penalties on their line in the closing stages. But they just couldn't for one reason or another capitalise.
The score then remained 5-all until about five minutes to go with Central Coast kicking a penalty that would see them go on to win 8-5.
Stewart lamented that they couldn't make something of all of that possession late in the first half - had they "got some points there" and got a bit more momentum, he felt it could have opened up in the second half for them.
But he couldn't fault their effort, pointing out that it was their fourth game in two days and also 30 minute halves as opposed to the 20 they had played in the pool games, which none of them are really accustomed to: either 60 minute games or playing that many games back-to-back.
"We're (he and assistant coach Matt Hannay) happy and very impressed," Stewart said of the weekend.
"The two games we lost, we probably only just lost both of them."
"There's a lot of positives and at the end of the day we're playing against teams that are consistently playing 15s in their own comps, and that are a lot closer together. They don't have to travel so they can train a lot better and more continuously than what we can."
"I don't think either me or Matt have a bad word to say about any of our performances or our girls."
He was particularly proud of the steel they showed in defence.
Against Hunter, they were pinned in their 22 for much of the game and tackled themselves to a standstill.
"They just peppered the line over and over again and for the most part we held them out, so it was very impressive," Stewart said.
Steph Lennon played the best football he's seen her play and was adjudged their best back for the weekend while Efstratia 'Esta' Kalatzis was their best forward.
"She was amazing, just an absolute workhorse," he said.
