THE Young Cherrypickers Under 18s played second-placed Albury on the weekend with Young coming away convincing winners 36-4.
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The defensive effort from the once again understrength side showed 100 per cent improvement with the boys only allowing one try against them in 70 minutes of football.
With a great kickoff by Jesse Corcoran the Albury side couldn’t get to the ball with it going dead and Young receiving a drop out to start the game.
The next 10 minutes saw the ball go from end to end when a good kick resulted in a repeat set.
Albury gave away a penalty in front of the posts which allowed dummy half Casey Wall to duck over for the first try of the match.
Jesse Corcoran added the extra two points to take Young to a 6-nil lead.
Albury then giving away several more penaltys to let the Young side back on the attack.
A clever kick from halfback Woody Norton gave Casey Wall an opportunity to grab a loose ball and score his second try next to the posts, with Jesse Corcoran kicking the goal to put Young in front 12-nil.
Both sides not settling down began to drop the ball and give away penaltys, when a great kick return from DJ Slater got the Young boys back on track.
Albury were consistently giving away more penaltys which gave the referee no option but to sin bin an Albury player for 10 minutes for a professional foul just before the halftime break.
Once again coaches Steve Woolford and Stuie Norton asked the guys to have a look on their edges and get the ball to their fast men as much as possible.
Young started the second half slow with the Albury side scoring an unconverted try to take the score to 12-4.
It was the wake up call Young needed and played how the coaches wanted.
A good break and chip kick from Jesse Corcoran saw Nick Schiller get his hands on the ball and score in the corner.
Jesse once again coverted for Young to take a 18-4 lead.
Nick Schiller then showed too much pace to beat the defence wide and run 60 metres before throwing a great inside ball to Jack Stanley backing up and scored under the posts.
Jesse converted again for a 24-4 lead.
Albury had no answer to Young after that with the hard defence and strong runs form Youngs forwards, saw Jack Stanley take the line on and beat several players for his second try of the day and Casey Wall to convert for a 30-4 lead.
With only minutes remaining some more strong forward runs and another penalty from the Albury side Young had a good backline hands movement which saw Brady LeStrange put Nick Schiller in for his second four pointer out wide.
A great conversion by Casey Wall took the final score to Young 36, Albury 4.
Both coaches were impressed by the boys defensive effort which saw limited one-on-one misses and plenty of aggression to lay a platform for them to rack up some points and see the Young Under 18s finally make their mark on this years competition.
