Sport
7 April, 2025
Gladiators get off the mark
THE Mareeba Gladiators secured their first win of the season in a convincing win against Yarrabah Seahawks over the weekend, while the Atherton Roosters fell just one try short to Southern Suburbs.
Mareeba
The Mareeba Gladiators passionately overpowered their Yarrabah rivals 34-6 at home over the weekend to claim their first win of the season.
With four sin bins and a vocal home crowd fuelling a fiery game, Sunday afternoon at Davies Park was nothing short of exciting.
The home team struck first with centre Bronson Ryan going over for first points in the ninth minute of the game. From then on, the first half was a back-and-forth battle with plenty of quality ball-playing and good defensive hits.
However, with three minutes to go in the first, Yarrabah suffered their first sin binning of the game. The home team capitalised off the penalty and went over for a try through other centre Aparama Vulavou, taking the score to 12-0 at halftime.
Yarrabah opened the scoring 10 minutes into the second half through centre Wade Smith, earning his team their first points for the game.
Another 10-minute battle took place and saw Mareeba youngster Jason Hastie get sent to the sin bin. This didn’t slow the home side down however, with interchange hooker Alfonse Bulkua claiming a four-pointer followed up by prop Ian King several minutes later.
With eight minutes to go in the second half, Yarrabah lost their second player to the sin bin and Mareeba immediately answered with a try from youngster and starting hooker Kyan Sheppard.
Just a few minutes later, another Yarrabah player was sent to the bin and the young prop Jason Hastie redeemed himself with a barrelling run straight through the defensive line and over the try line.
Mareeba defeated Yarrabah 34-6 for their first win of the season, with halfback Kaleb Eaton kicking five from six conversions.
Gladiators A Grade co-coach Tom Hughes said it felt good to “get the monkey off the back” and get their first win.
“The boys have been working hard for it for the last couple of weeks, so to put it together and get the win was a good outcome,” he said.
“We’ve got a fairly new side with a lot of new faces and I think we started to gel a lot better on the weekend.
“It was a fiery game. I think being in the heat of the battle definitely helped fire the boys up at stages.”
Hughes also spoke highly about the performance of the young players in the squad.
“They hold themselves well and work hard at training. They know what they need to do and they’ve been getting it done week in week out at the moment which is really rewarding,” he said.
“We’ve got a really solid senior group, so these young fellas come through and they know what’s expected of them and the senior boys support them.”
The Under 19s also got their first win of the season, defeating Yarrabah 24-0. However, Reserve Grade are still yet to find their first victory after going down 36-20 to the visitors.
Atherton
The Atherton Senior Roosters suffered their first loss of the season over the weekend after going down 18-12 to Southern Suburbs.
It was a tight, defensive game down in Gordonvale with only five tries scored throughout the game.
For Atherton, it was winger Regan Herd and centre Brad Hammond who went over for a four-pointer, with Herd converting both tries. It also saw Atherton’s backrower Tyrone Opelu and Suburbs’ centre Kody Oliver both get sent to the sin bin in the 64th minute.
Atheron’s Under 19s and Reserve Grade also took their first losses for the season with the youngsters going down 30-16 and Reserve’s falling just short 22-20.
Atherton will take on the Ivanhoe Knights this Saturday at the Smithfield Sporting Complex. The Under 19s will get things underway at 3pm, followed by Reserve Grade at 4.30pm, and finally A Grade at 6pm.
Mareeba will have another home game this Sunday as the club faces up against the Mossman Sharks. The Under 19s will kick off at 12pm, Reserve Grade at 1.30pm, and A Grade at 3pm.
