PORT Macquarie Pirates set up another mouth-watering Mid North Coast rugby grand final showdown with Hastings Valley Vikings next weekend with a brilliant win on Saturday over Coffs Snappers.
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The Pirates put in a top class defensive effort to beat the Snappers 22-0 on their home soil and ensure that the final would be fought out between the two Port teams for the third consecutive year on Saturday.
Matt Mane, Chris Young and Reece Martin scored for the Pirates. Young kicked a penalty at two conversions in the victory.
Mane got on the board after about five minutes, charging over from close range on the back of a good Pirates move.
The big man is almost impossible to stop from that range, and the defence had no chance on Saturday.
"He's huge," Pirates coach Nigel Hurlston said of Mane.
"A really big unit."
While the tries got the points, Hurlston was also thrilled with the team's tackling.
Pirates had a plan to keep the Snappers to nil, and they ticked that box on Saturday.
"The defensive effort was massive," Hurlston said.
"We talked a lot in the week about it, because we weren't happy with our defence against the Cannonballs [in the previous week's minor semi]."
Standouts were hard to pin-point in such a fantastic team effort, but Hurlston eventually came up with one.
Caleb Scholes got through a huge amount of work in the second row.
"You know the good players because you never see them," Hurlston said. "The amount of work he did was phenomenal.
"He's like [World Cup winning English captain] Martin Johnson. An old style number four."
Scholes began the season in reserve grade, but Scott Munro left the country and English import Sam Howes did an ACL, so he was brought into firsts.
Captain Chris Geary was also shuffled to blindside flanker at the same time, and he had another outstanding game on Saturday.
"His game has gone to another level," Hurlston said of his skipper.
"He was the best player on the park again. He was first to everything."
Geary will hope to put in another strong game on Saturday in the decider at Oxley Oval against the Vikings.
In the back of his, Hurlston's and the other Pirates' minds will be the blazing start the Vikings made in the final last season.
There are five Pirates left from that 29-15 loss: Geary, Young, Jacob Law, Ryan Kenny-Wilson and Angus Knox.
Hurlston looked forward to a good week in the lead-up to the match.
"The town will be buzzing all week," he said.
"It's a massive week for both clubs."
The same two sides will face each other in seconds on Saturday. Vikings haven't been beaten in either grade in 2015.
