Sport

Dogs in shock joust win

THE Bulldogs have gone above the Titans at the bottom of the NRL table, after the former upset the Knights in Newcastle and the latter was comfortably beaten by Penrith.

Canterbury pulled off their second upset in as many games to shock Newcastle 20-14 at McDonald Jones Stadium on Friday night.
Scoring two converted tries in a four-minute stretch while Knights prop James Gavet was in the sin-bin for a late tackle on Chris Smith, the Bulldogs clawed back an 8-0 deficit to consolidate their 14-12 victory over the Sharks a fortnight ago and put a dent in Newcastle’s play-off campaign.
Fijian international Brandon Wakeham sparked the Bulldogs with two pieces of brilliance in the 67th and 71st minutes, creating tries for Corey Harawira-Naera and Reimis Smith.
Despite being on the back foot early on, Canterbury recovered and counter-attacked by spreading the ball to the edges with quick passes and changes of direction.
Bulldogs centre Marcelo Montoya appeared certain to score when he steamed on to a Jack Cogger pass in the 22nd minute but initially grounded the ball on Jamie Buhrer’s leg then was held up.
While Gavet was off the field, Wakeham delivered a short ball for Harawira-Naera to crawl over and score in the 67th minute, then four minutes later planted a pin-point cross-field kick for Reimis Smith to touch down out wide.
Meaney converted both tries to build a 20-8 lead but there were still some nervous moments to endure when Napa spilled a pass in front of his own posts in the 73rd minute and Kenny-Dowall scooped up the scraps to score between the sticks.
Lino converted to make it 20-14.
Thrilled, coach Dean Pay said: “Just so proud. So many players put their hand up and just wouldn’t give in today … that’s what we always want to do.”