Lidbury Puts Money On Tall Timber

Sydney Morning Herald

Friday April 23, 2004

Rob Murray

Gordon coach Steve Lidbury has issued a command to Setefano Tone, the giant forward who once earned a living ensuring that New Zealanders didn't fall behind in their loan payments, for tomorrow's clash against Sydney University.

``We recruited big Sete from the deep depths of New Zealand where he was a South Island debt collector," Lidbury said. ``But all I want this weekend against Sydney University is for Sete to be our ball collector."

Tone, recruited from NZ's National Provincial Championship, has recovered sufficiently from an off-season injury to partner fellow two-metre, NPC-educated Nisi Naufahu in a second-row partnership that puts the `high' into Highlanders, and which Lidbury is depending on to secure plenty of possession for his side.

``They've both got the goods, there's no doubt about that," Lidbury said. ``While we expect Sete to be strong in the lineouts, Nisi is more a No.2 jumper, a stockier sort of player who gets around the field well and who has a good work ethic.

``But they're about to come up against a team that is excellent in the set pieces and who will be stinging after losing last week, so we'll have to step it up a notch."

The Students were overrun by a late Eastwood rally and will lose prop Gareth Hardy and second-rower Al Campbell to Waratahs duty when they travel to Chatswood Oval to face a buoyant Gordon outfit that eked out a disjointed 20-16 victory over West Harbour in the Shute Shield's opening round.

``It was very scrappy with lots of penalties," said Lidbury, ``but as I said to the boys straight afterwards, we bombed a lot of scoring opportunities and still came away with four points."

One of Lidbury's major decisions since taking charge at Gordon this season was to hand the captaincy to centre Dominic Byrne ahead of equally deserving candidates.

``The players look up to him [Byrne] and I'm a big believer in giving the captaincy to someone who leads by example, and he does that every week," said the former back-rower who played 112 games for Warringah, with all but one of those matches being in first grade.

``There's obviously other people who could do the job as well, there's Sam Burton Taylor and Billy Cheadle . It's a bit like the Brumbies where there's three or four captains out there, just as long as they're not all yapping at once and they're saying something constructive."

West Harbour welcome back Rodney Blake from Super 12 duty with the Queensland Reds for the Pirates game against Norths at Concord Oval.

ROUND TWO

SATURDAY

Warringah v Manly

Pittwater Rugby Park, 3.10pm

Eastwood v Southern Dist

TG Millner Field, 3pm

Gordon v Sydney University

Chatswood Oval, 3pm

West Harbour v Northern Subs

Concord Oval, 3pm

SUNDAY

Eastern Suburbs v Randwick

Woollahra Oval, 3pm

Bye: Parramatta, Penrith

© 2004 Sydney Morning Herald

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