A wet and frosty WIN Stadium on the Wollongong coast was the backdrop for a great escape executed by the Dragons.
The home side scored two late tries by Euan Aitken and Matt Dufty in the last ten minutes to save themselves from a loss to win against competition cellar dwellers the Eels 20-18.
St George Illawarra had six representative players backing up to play this game, while Tyson Frizell was rested. It seemed like the perfect ingredients for Parramatta to get themselves a fourth win of the year. They were leading the Saints 12-8 at the break.
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The Eels were performing superbly on their way to staging a coup against the top-of-the-table Dragons, leading for over 50 minutes. Both Mitch Moses and Corey Norman played big parts with their kicking games, controlling the Dragons field position and the rest of the Parra team responding with big efforts in attack and defence.
Ben Hunt seemed a little down on confidence, the poorly executed kicks he displayed in Origin two appeared to have followed him to club football. Hunt was roundly criticised for his late-game grubber which went over the dead-ball line on what was effectively Queensland’s last significant chance to prevent the Origin shield from going south.
The commentators gasped as he did it, but Hunt was able to turn the tide late in this game with an inch perfect grubber kick for a chasing Euan Aitken to get his Dragons a really good chance to fight back in the final ten of the match.
Although for 65 of the 80 minutes played Parramatta the better footy team, the Dragons stuck to their guns until it paid off in dividends. Young superstar Matt Dufty crossed over snatching a Gareth Widdop grubber to steal a win for the Red V bagging up their 12th win for 2018.
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