THEY already have two teams in the grand final and Hastings Valley Vikings will aim to add a third in Saturday’s ladies clash at Coffs Harbour.
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The Vikings missed their first chance at gaining a grand final spot with a defeat to Port Pirates last weekend, but coach Blayne West preferred to do it the hard way.
“Could have had a nice break this weekend, but who wants to do it that way,” she said.
“It’s a good thing because it means the girls need to work at it.”
In the first year of the competition, many of the Vikings girls had never played rugby before so West felt they wouldn’t have been prepared to progress straight to the big dance.
“A bit of hard yards is okay for a team sometimes,” she said.
The Vikings head into the clash with the Wauchope Thunder confident of progressing to the season decider at Oxley Oval.
They have claimed two wins from two matches already this season.
“We hope we can get through this game. They’re strong, they’re big and have some size to them so we will have to use some different strategies against them and they know that.”
West said the Vikings would look to use their speed in the backs to their advantage.
“We don’t match up size for size so it’s silly to play that sort of game against them,” she said.
The performances of Megan Fealy, Michaela Elford and Rose Waddell would play an important role in getting the Vikings home.
“Megan is our our fly-half who has a good head and reads the game well and we’re looking for Michaela Elford to turn on the wheels and get us some speed out wide,” West said.
“Rose Waddell has also got some incredible speed.”
West wasn’t concerned about the prospect of another match against the Pirates next weekend.
“We seem to have a mental block against them because we’ve played them three times this season and we’ve lost all three games,” she said.
“But they are a very good side.”
Saturday’s match kicks off at 9am at Coffs Harbour.