The Bull Sharks are charging deep into the finals, with four teams still alive after a weekend of high drama and history-making wins.
The Premier Women are once again setting the standard, booking their place in a fourth straight grand final with a hard-fought victory over Wests. Their experience and composure under pressure has them perfectly placed to push for another title.
The Premier Men, meanwhile, have become the feel-good story of Queensland Premier Rugby. Written off after starting the season 1–4, they produced a defensive masterclass to shut out Wests 34–0 and storm into a preliminary final.
Colts 1, the minor premiers, suffered a nail-biting loss to Easts in a match that continued the fierce rivalry between the two clubs. They’ll now regroup for a knockout clash with Wests.
And in 2nd Grade, the Bull Sharks edged Easts 26–24 to advance to a preliminary final against GPS.
Premier Men
Bull Sharks v Wests
Bull Sharks won 34-0
How it was won
It was our defence. Wests have big powerful athletes who break a lot of tackles and they been belting sides so we went into the game with defence as our focus. They ran through us at will last time we played, so our major objective was to muscle up and stop them in their tracks which we were able to do.
Did you see that coming
I thought we would put in a good performance, we trained well and came in with the right attitude, so I was confident we would give ourselves the best chance. But no, I didn’t envisage that result.
What made you happy
We defended better than we had all year. To keep a side like Wests scoreless is an exceptional defensive effort. And we also scored some great tries.
Bull Sharks Footy
I think it was just the complete nature of the performance. We got important contributions across the park
Trademark Players
Reyia Ueyama, our hooker was very good. He set the tone early, particularly with his defensive effort. I think Luke Depiazzi was very good and then our captain Tyler Campbell and Dan Boardman in the centres did a lot of great work in attack and defence.
The work to do
There’s always room to improve. I think we actually left a couple of tries out there. So we want to be able to keep adding to that ruthlessness to take every opportunity that presents itself.
The final word
The win gives us confidence but that is all it does. It doesn’t guarantee anything.
With Mick Heenan
Colts 1
Bull Sharks v Easts.
Easts won 39-35
How it was lost
It was another close one. We didn’t deserve to win even though we probably did enough to win. The main part was we didn’t close the game out. We were up by a point at about the halfway line with 40 seconds to go and we gave away a penalty. We could have been better in that situation.
Did you see that coming
No. For some reason we just didn’t have the urgency a semi-final deserves. A couple of players really let us down badly, it just meant that some guys had to try harder and some tried too hard. That’s what finals do, it brings that extra pressure. Some guys didn’t play to the standard we needed and that was disappointing.
Bull Sharks Footy
We scored some good tries in the backs. Scoring hasn’t been a problem for us all year, but sometimes I think it can lead to a bit of complacency, because the boys have confidence that we can score more than our opponents, regardless of how we defend. Our forwards got dominated all game and they are hurting from it. The life up our sleeve might have been there in the subconscious, because we didn’t have the edge I expected we would have. It will be a tough week for them before they get a chance to rectify that performance, which I think is good.
The work to do
We got penalized a few times on our own ball, we had guys not working hard enough to get over the ball. We had four or five A zone opportunities that we walked away from without any points.
With Rico Gear
Premier Women
Bull Sharks v Wests
Bull Sharks won 22-12
How it was won
They were really good, that is our best performance of the year. There were little mistakes from both teams, but it was grind all the way through which is a good way to win ahead of a grand final.
Did you see that coming
It is quite incredible. The way the girls have been training I know exactly why we are there.
Bull Sharks Footy
We really tested the girls, challenged them in terms of learning new things and jumping between different structures. We played one structure and then when we changed it, they started breaking the lines. They have done well to adapt to those challenges and then also be able to implement these different structures mid game, which takes organisation and communication.
What made you happy
The experience of having been there and done that played a role. We were able to shift another gear, and we knew if we went to that level they wouldn’t be able to go with us. If it had been our first year. We might not have been able to do that.
Trademark Player
I can’t go past Zoe Hanna, Jemma Bemrose and Lucy Dinnen. If I had to pick one it would be Lucy, she started at No. 10 and got us going really directly and then when she switched to flanker she provided forward movement.
The work to do
Working around what we are trying to achieve with our shapes and our game plans, focusing on areas that can get us going forward – building on the detail.
With Lawrence Faifua