They’ve knocked off the highly fancied North Sydney Bears to make the Grand Final. Next up is Cronulla Sharks in the Harvey Norman Women’s Premiership decider.
Saturday’s win over the Bears was special. In fact, it was brilliant.
Norths finished the season top of the ladder as minor premiers, had beaten Wests Tigers convincingly (34-6) in Round 3, and were widely expected to march into the decider.
Our team also lost to Saturday’s Grand Final opponent in the regular season, going down 20-16 to the Sharks on a bitterly cold Monday night at Homebush.
Last weekend's win over the Bears shows that past results, count for little. This team is going from strength to strength, improving week on week, and hopefully saving its best performance for the final game of the season.
Coach Adel Hage says the home ground advantage could be a telling factor. He’s calling on all Wests Tigers fans to show their stripes at Campbelltown this weekend.
"A lot of our fans turned up to help us at Kogarah on Saturday and I can tell you now, they were a huge help."
Our girls really fed off their energy and I’m hoping we’ll have even more turn up for the Grand Final.”
HNW Coach Adel Hage
"Our win against the Bears was terrific and we aim to put in another really strong performance against Cronulla."
As the game got tougher, we played tougher, and that’s what is needed in finals football. We started slowly against the Bears, but we showed great character to absorb the early pressure and build our game."
Hage says there is a tremendous amount of belief within the playing group.
They showed on Saturday that they believe in each other and in our systems."
Adel Hage
"They were prepared to move the football in a high-pressure match and that to me shows it’s a really confident group of players."
While it was a huge team performance to beat the Bears, Hage says a couple of his leaders really stood up.
“I thought Emily (Curtain) had her best game of the year. Her and Kezie’s (Apps) leadership was huge, especially when things weren’t going our way.”
Harvey Norman Women’s Premiership Grand Final
Wests Tigers vs Cronulla Sharks
2pm Saturday 16 July
Campbelltown Sports Stadium
Ticket information:
Get to the game early to watch the Local Girls' game (kick off 11:00am) and you can gain entry to both games for just $2!
Age Pensioners and children 12 and under will be able to attend free of charge.
If just attending the HNW Grand Final, adult tickets are available at the gate for $10.
