Comets hit Sea Eagles

Sea Eagles Junior Palau is wrapped up by Ben Hunt and Alan Rothery in Saturday’s match

Cade Mooneycm

WE might have felt the effects of a cyclone in this area, but on the Sunshine Coast they received the full force of the Comets.

The Central Queensland Comets made it two-from-two with an outstanding 32-18 victory over the 2009 premiers at the Coast’s home ground

For Comets’ coach Wayne Barnett, things started going well even before the team entered the changing sheds.

The Sunshine Coast Sea Eagles base much of their moves around brilliant young halfback Trent Hodkinson.

However, the young playmaker received a call up to the Manly NRL team and that left a bit of a gap for the Coast team.

“We played a pretty good, controlled game of football,” Barnett said.

Life on the park was not made easy for either team as the weather conditions did not allow for that.

“We got four seasons in the one day,” Barnett reported.

“There was a lot of spilt ball by both teams.”

Quick tries to Junior Auru and Ben Hunt had the home team reeling as their problems had been further compounded when hooker Cameron Joyce was knocked out and could take no further part in the match.

However, the game is about playing against what is on the park and the Comets did that well.

Daly Cherry-Evans tried to make like difficult for the visitors with his astute kicking game.

Using the swirling wind to advantage he tried to force errors from the Comets defence, but the back three of Junior Auru, Guy Williams and Dallas Williams stood firm under the high ball.

Even the Sunshine Coast coach Brandon Costin was impressed by the Comets saying he doubted the result would have been any different had Hodkinson been available.

Once again Barnett came out and praised the effort of Dallas Williams.

His defensive work has been brilliant in the opening two games and managed to back that up with a try in each match.

“He is a confidence player and he has great confidence at the moment,” Barnett said.

“His work helps Josh (Bishop) in his first Queensland Cup season.”

Second-rower Chris Beasley again pleased his coach, tackling himself to a standstill.

Barnett said it was a remarkable effort from Beasley as he went through a gruelling fitness test for a position in the fire brigade on Friday.

As expected Alan Rothery returned to run-on team and put together an inspirational performance.

One thing that did perplex Barnett was the sending to the sin-bin of forward Aaron Summers for 10 minutes for undisciplined swearing.

Barnett said he would seek clarification from the QRL if there is a clampdown, as Summers was not addressing an official at the time of the incident and therefore is asking for clarification on consistency.

Next week the Comets are back in Brisbane for a match with Eastern Suburbs.

The match is the televised Intrust Super match of the round.

For the game Barnett said he has no injury problems, just the normal bumps and bruises.

However he will have full back Jade Williams to call on if necessary.

INTRUST SUPER CUP

CQ Comets 32 (Junior Auru (2), Ben Hunt, Dallas Williams, Matt Minto, Karl Johnson (2) tries.

Sunshine Coast 18

Other scores from round 2

Norths 22 def Tweed Heads 12, Mackay Cutters and Easts postponed, Souths Logan 24 def Burleigh 10, Wynnum Manly 18 def Northern Pride 16, Redcliffe 40 def Ipswich 10.

Next week round 3

Easts v Comets (televised), Mackay v Redcliffe, Ipswich v Norths, Tweed Heads v Burleigh, Souths Logan v Northern Pride, Wynnum Manly v Sunshine Coast