Kia Toa Tigers tame Eagles to retain premiership

The Kia Toa Tigers celebrate their win with family and supporters at the Oval on Saturday afternoon. Photo: Gregor Richardson
The Kia Toa Tigers celebrate their win with family and supporters at the Oval on Saturday afternoon. Photo: Gregor Richardson
The Kia Toa Tigers were crowned back-to-back Premiers on Saturday, beating the East Coast Eagles 52-20 in the final.

The Tigers went into the encounter as favourites, charging into the final with a five-game unbeaten streak.

It did not take them long to open the scoring, with their lethal combination of Vila Apuula and Shane Unahi testing the Eagles' defence before getting the ball out to Josiah Mani on the wing to score.

Mani, has been a standout in his first year with the Tigers, regularly scoring tries and showing his impressive pace and footwork.

He showed that pace on a dash down the sideline before passing to Joel Taniora, who ran in under the posts to score.

The Eagles' strong forwards kept them in the contest in the early stages of the game.

Lock Cameron Brown was their first try-scorer, busting through multiple defenders on the line to score under the sticks.

As expected, the Eagles props provided a real attacking threat, with Marcel Taani taking the ball to the line before offloading to Tipene Wairepo to score. Minutes later, William Jackson pushed through multiple defenders in a barnstorming run to the try-line to level the score.

It looked as if the Eagles might take the game away from the Tigers and hooker Sam Johnstone helped them gain the lead for the first time, showing excellent footwork to break through the line and go 40m before being brought down by Tigers fullback Ryan Tapsell.

Daez Mulipolathen had a good follow-up run and offloaded to Owen Draper, who scored to give the Eagles the lead.

However, that was the last time the Eagles scored, with the Tigers levelling the scores minutes later through centre Lamen Pere.

Pere has been one of the top performers this year for the Tigers, his strong ball-carrying ability and determined defensive efforts outstanding.

The halftime score was 20-20.

The second half would be a much different story, with the Tigers lifting their attacking game and running in six unanswered tries.

With quick and elusive wingers on both sides of the field, the halves pairing of Apuula and Taua Piri manipulated play to exploit the Eagles' edge defence, allowing their wingers to score five tries between them.

Cooper Keach was a standout on the right wing, scoring two tries, including a long-range try from a smart intercept.

Josiah Mani was equally impressive on the left wing, scoring two more tries in the second half to bring his tally to three in the match.

The Tigers' team unity and experience was the key difference between the sides, with several leaders among the group stepping up in the second half.

The Eagles pack had worked hard to keep them in the contest but their efforts took a toll and they were unable to sustain that level of defence for the full 80 minutes.

The impressive performance from the Tigers caps off two seasons of dominance in the Otago Rugby League competition.

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