The Ipswich Jets have gone to Mackay and come home with the t-shirt from the airport that says 250th Hostplus Cup win.
In game number 568 the Jets have brought up their 250th win; the Jets had to do it without captain Nat Neale and found their third win of the season and their 16th over the Mackay Cutters.
Both teams spent 20 minutes sorting each other out and feeling their way with it taking 14 minutes for Mackay to click into formation.
The Cutters half Brendan Finnegan has become a great contributor to the Cutters over his 30th Cup game, on the right the half shaped to kick which the Jets bit in and took but Finnegan had his eyes on centre Jake Riley.
Riley was given space by the Jets left side coming in on Finnegan and Riley was given an easy route to the try line and the Cutters’ first try.
The Jets left side continues to be porous in defence; it was the Jets left side’s 39th try this season of 92 against the Jets which is 42 per cent of Jets' tries against.
It was Finnigan again this time from the centre scrum, the Mackay half did it easy when he ran straight off the scrum with little fuss and pushed his way over the line to give the Cutters a 12-0 lead after 23 minutes.
The Jets have leaked 22 tries in the first 20 minutes of games this year and added another two this week.
The Jets answered back with a nice short kicking game applied by Gerome Burns for a flying Denzel Burns to jump on before it went dead.
Burns has been an attacking light for Ipswich with his athletic put down being his seventh try from 12 games in 2022.
Match: Cutters v Jets
Round 15 -
home Team
Cutters
11th Position
away Team
Jets
13th Position
Venue: BB Print Stadium, Mackay
At half-time the Cutters had taken two chances driven by Finnegan and Jets had executed a short kick for a try that was their 13th this season out of 41 proving the Jets main attacking danger is the ball on the ground from Burns or Cooper.
The Jets started the first set of the second half with another try from a kick,
Burns hoisted it high and chased his kick, he grabbed it and Keenan Yorston to pass in a quick-thinking movement that found Jets winger Ricco Falaniko and run down the left-hand side to score in the corner and give the Jets their perfect start to the second half.
The took the lead when Rhys Jacks jumped out of dummy half and take some Cutters’ defenders out of the picture for Zaachues Chong-Nee to offload to quick moving Denzel Burns to score his second try and become the Jets equal highest try scorer with eight tries.
The Jets two-point lead disappeared when the Cutters Mitch Fogarty shaped right and came back to the left. The Jets right hand side hadn’t moved up and wasn’t able to stop a rampaging Ewan Coutts from scoring and taking the lead back for the Cutters.
It was a centre scrum again that saw the Jets winger Falaniko score his second try, when the Jets went left and stripped the Cutters for numbers.
It was 18-18 with 20 minutes to go.
The Jets extended the lead when Ngangarra Barker took back the Jets top try scoring spot.
The Jets moved up the field denting the Cutters with short sharp passes then when the front door was ajar they shifted it left until they were in attacking position then it was over to Lucky Pokipoki got one over the top for Barker to score in the corner.
In an obscure last five minutes, there was a Cutters’ sin bin, a Cutters’ held up and a late Cutters penalty that kept the Jets defending their own line.
When the Cutters committed a play the ball error the Jets went down field and were able to close out the game with a 24-18 win.
Jets captain Rhys Jacks was in the middle of everything, jumping out and engaging the Cutters’ first two defenders and getting the Jets big outside backs some one on one time.
“It wasn’t pretty but it was calm,” Jacks said.
“I think that 10 weeks ago at 12-0 it becomes 24-0 but since Tweed we are calm and spoke about having faith in each other and what we are doing.
“There wasn’t anything pretty about it but a good tough win.
“We held up the Cutters twice and that was just Jets being prepared to get under them and hold them up.”
The Jets will face Tweed Seagulls in Round 16.
Match: Seagulls v Jets
Round 16 -
home Team
Seagulls
6th Position
away Team
Jets
13th Position
Venue: Bauhinia Park, Springsure
The Cutters will take on Wynnum Manly Seagulls.
Match: WM Seagulls v Cutters
Round 16 -
home Team
WM Seagulls
4th Position
away Team
Cutters
11th Position
Venue: Ray Edwards Oval, Sarina
