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3:05AM Wednesday 15 October, 2008 Sunshine Coast weather Late thunder min 17° - max 26°

Pirates sail into finals

5 August 2008

| By Jon Tuxworth

Following his side’s 30-24 victory over Kawana at Stockland Park at the weekend, Noosa player-coach Noel Goldthorpe was unaware how many games his team had won in succession.

Didn’t know. And couldn’t care less.

For the record it’s the last five. And nine out of the past 10.

But the cunning little halfback cares only about what lies ahead – past wins are all water under the bridge.

The Pirates’ place in the finals appears assured and they are just two points out of the top three, and a subsequent double chance.

Kawana, on the other hand, relinquished its top-five place to Caloundra, which easily disposed of Kilcoy 44-14 on Saturday night.

Noosa scored first in the fourth minute when fullback Dale Gilbert crossed after a Kawana error in its own half. Just 12 minutes later, Kawana equalised through Scott Moxham after Gilbert ran into touch while attempting to prevent a 40-20 kick.

Midway through the first half, Noosa centre Matt McCook gifted the Dolphins a try when he dropped the ball cold while attempting to get out of his own in-goal area.

Kane Richards was on hand to swoop on the loose ball for Kawana, giving them a 12-6 lead.

On the half-hour mark, Goldthorpe showed exactly why Noosa was always a legitimate chance to defend last year’s title.

A Goldthorpe inside ball put his halves partner Anthony Zipf into a yawning gap, the five eighth tackled 10 metres from the try line.

From the ensuing play-the-ball, Goldthorpe pinpointed a cross kick to unmarked winger Brad McCarthy, who scored to reduce the deficit to 12-10.

Noosa took the lead 14-12 for the first time when Phil Anderson scored on the first set from the kickoff.

But when Noosa’s hooker Michael Fisher was sent to the sin bin just two minutes before the break, the Dolphins appeared to have their opening.

They failed to capitalise, however, with Noosa’s Trent Heathwood crashing over four minutes into the second half.

When McCarthy scored his second of the game with 18 minutes left, the Pirates led 30-18. They fought off a late charge from Kawana to triumph by six points.

“I don’t know how many (we’ve won in a row) and I don’t care; the important thing is we win next week (at home against Bribie Island),” Goldthorpe said later.

“That should sew up a semi-final spot, I don’t know, but I’d like to think it could.

“That was a good win today and I thought we should have won by a lot more.

“We handed them a couple of tries and I thought the scoreline flattered them a bit.”

With his team now one point out of the five, Kawana captain Paul Cohen admitted a couple of soft Noosa tries just after halftime had hurt his side badly.

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