WALCHA held on to a 24 to 19 advantage late in the premiership decider before prop Andrew Collins bulldozed his way over under the posts and then goal kicker Wes Rooney landed the easy conversion. Collins had been originally suspended following the preliminary final a fortnight ago after he received his third yellow card for the season. His suspension was quashed along with that of his fellow front-rower Bart Leach at a judiciary meeting last Friday night.

PIRATES have now won four straight premierships, the last three against the Rams, and one against Narrabri in 2016. Pirates figured in all four grand finals last Saturday but were beaten in under 19s, Reserve grade and Women's sevens.

TO THE Walcha players who played in all three of the losing Grand Finals. I can still feel some of your pain after it happened back in the mid-1990s to the Walcha Roos reserve grade team.

ONLY three of us: Tony McKenna, Martin Smith and myself were members of all three teams that lost three on the trot to the South Tamworth Gators in 1993, 94 and 95. Certainly brings back bad memories even if it was only Reserve grade.

IT IS down to the business end of the season in the NRL now with Cronulla and Brisbane both eliminated last weekend. I honestly thought the Sharks would beat Manly and although Parramatta were good things the 58 to 0 scoreline was a big surprise.

THE final round of the 2019 4BBB Golf Championships is scheduled for this Sunday. At the halfway mark Wayne and Willy Brennan lead the scratch holding a very narrow one-shot advantage over Anthony Smith and Miles Archdale While in the net Bob Denniss and Mal Ballard are 6 points in front of Jim Nivison and Allan Green after they shot the lights out in the opening round scoring 50 points.

LAST weekend 11 Walcha golfers attended Narromine to compete in the 2019 New South Wales Sandgreen Championships, and although none of the 11 was victorious, our ladies club champion Cheryl Goodwin won the women's competition on Saturday after she racked up 39 stableford points and then finished runner-up on Sunday with 40 points.

BEST of the blokes were Owen Presnell and Doug McDonald who equal top-scored for Walcha on both days with 43 and then 46 points. Equal with them on Saturday was Wayne Brennan and Steph Sweeney, While on Sunday it was Jack O'Hara and AJ Cross.

CONGRATULATIONS to Sally McCormack on sinking her tee shot on the 18th hole here at Walcha last Wednesday. A hole-in-one was worth 5 points which certainly assisted Sal to a count-back win.

After completing one of the most dominant home and away seasons on record, Walcha dared to dream big last Saturday.

Unfortunately it wasn't to be, as the peg-legged bandits drove a dagger through the heart of Walcha in the final minutes to steal our treasure chest.

The lads ran out in front of a pulsating crowd riding a wave of hope. The game was a ding-dong affair, with Pirates dominating early possession, culminating in an excellent try out wide.

After feeling their way into the grind, the Rams found their mojo, with Simon Newton converting pressure into points with a penalty.

As the possession started to even out in the back end of the half, Walcha eventually breached Tamworth's defence with a scything run from Dom 'beep beep' Bower to score in the "Rad Nads" corner of Peter Fenwicke Oval.

Walcha kept the footy down at the reward end of the field with some intelligent kicking, and in the final five of the first half, Bucknell gift wrapped a little present for Cordingly who broke though the Pirates defence to give Walcha a handy 18-5 lead.

The second half saw Pirates apply their traditional forwards based game, and they muscled their way over the line to bring the score back to 18-12.

Another Pirates try meant that the lad's had to dig deep and in the final tense minutes, both sides traded penalty goals with the Pirates getting the final rub of the green to clinch the game with a converted try in the dying minutes.

Jock Nivison