The Queensland Reds have come up victorious in a topsy-turvy 45-24 win over Fijian Drua in Brisbane.<\/p>\n
The Reds led 21-5 in Friday night’s match at Suncorp Stadium before the Drua snatched back the lead early in the second half courtesy of a Manasa Mataele hat-trick.<\/p>\n
But Queensland’s set-piece dominance at the scrum and line-out turned the match, with a four-try burst following Mataele’s magic lifting the Reds to victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The bonus-point win improved Queensland’s regular-season record to 8-6. But their hopes of landing fourth spot were already extinguished before Friday’s match after the Crusaders crushed the ladder-leading Hurricanes 47-14 earlier in the night.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It means the Reds (37 points) are likely to finish sixth, assuming the Brumbies (33 points) beat the last-placed Moana Pasifika in Canberra on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Queensland’s win against Drua (5-9) came at a major cost, with centre Hunter Paisami limping off in the 28th minute after hurting his heavily-strapped left knee when tackled to the ground.<\/p>\n
The 28-year-old cut a despondent figure on the bench in the second half while sporting a big knee brace, with scans to determine the extent of the damage.<\/p>\n
Mataele scored the opening try in the 12th minute when he intercepted a pass from Reds playmaker Carter Gordon before sprinting 60m to the line.<\/p>\n
Queensland hooker Matt Faessler hit back for the home side in the 25th minute following a successful rolling maul.<\/p>\n
A sharp pass from Josh Flook while he was falling to the ground set up Filipo Daugunu for a 30th-minute try.<\/p>\n
And the score ballooned to 21-5 when Daugunu turned provider for Flook to score in the 34th minute.<\/p>\n
The Drua hit back on the stroke of half-time, and it was the Mataele show early in the second half as the former Force flyer added two tries in the space of four magical minutes.<\/p>\n
Mataele collected his own dribble to score his second try of the night ad the hat-trick was complete in the 48th minute when Virimi Vakatawa’s kick bounced upright, allowing Mataele to jump high to collect before racing to the line.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“It’s pretty special, but I would trade that for a win any time,” Mataele said after the match when asked about his hat-trick.<\/p>\n
Queensland hit back hard via the set piece. Harry Wilson scored in the 55th minute from a dominant scrum, and yet another powerful rolling maul from a line-out led to Faessler’s second in the 59th minute.<\/p>\n
The floodgates were officially open by that stage, with Seru Uru and Richie Asiata also getting in on the fun to secure victory and a bonus point.<\/p>\n
“It’s always a great contest against the Drua. It’s always unpredictable,” Reds scrumhalf Tate McDermott told Stan.<\/p>\n
“I’m really proud of that effort. We were a little bit scrappy in patches.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“But if you look at a lot of their tries, they did some pretty freaky stuff to get them, so I thought our defence for the whole part was pretty good.”<\/p>\n
Star Reds fullback Jock Campbell revealed at halftime he was dealing with a little groin niggle, but backed himself to be fit for the first week of finals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Queensland Reds 45\u00a0(Tries: Faessler 2, Daugunu, Flook, Uru, Asiata, Wilson; Cons: Gordon 5)\u00a0def Fijian Drua 24\u00a0(Tries: Mataele 3, Tuni; Cons: Armstrong-Ravula, Valetini)<\/p>\n
Teams:<\/p>\n
Reds:\u00a015 Treyvon Pritchard, 14 Lachie Anderson, 13 Josh Flook, 12 Hunter Paisami, 11 Tim Ryan, 10 Carter Gordon, 9 Tate McDermott, 8 Harry Wilson, 7 Fraser McReight (captain), 6 Seru Uru, 5 Lukhan Salakaia-Loto, 4 Josh Canham, 3 Zane Nonggorr, 2 Matt Faessler, 1 Aidan Ross.
\n\tReplacements:\u00a016 Richie Asiata, 17 George Blake, 18 Massimo De Lutiis, 19 Vaiuta Latu, 20 Joe Brial, 21 Louis Werchon, 22 Ben Volavola, 23 Filipo Daugunu.<\/p>\n
Fijian Drua:\u00a015 Isaiah Armstrong-Ravula, 14 Manasa Mataele, 13 Tuidraki Samusamuvodre, 12 Isikeli Rabitu, 11 Taniela Rakuro, 10 Kemu Valetini, 9 Issak Fines Leleiwasa, 8 Elia Canakaivata, 7 Kitione Salawa, 6 Vilive Miramira, 5 Temo Mayanavanua (captain), 4 Isoa Nasilasila, 3 Samuela Tawake, 2 Zuriel Togiatama, 1 Meli Tuni.
\n\tReplacements:\u00a016 Sairusi Ravudi, 17 Peni Ravai, 18 Mesake Doge, 19 Joseva Tamani, 20 Etonia Waqa, 21 Isoa Tuwai, 22 Simione Kuruvoli, 23 Virimi Vakatawa.<\/p>\n
Referee:\u00a0James Doleman
\n\tAssistant referees:\u00a0Fraser Hannon, Dan Moore
\n\tTMO:\u00a0Glen Newman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Queensland Reds have come up victorious in a topsy-turvy 45-24 win over Fijian Drua in Brisbane. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":452993,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,69,213],"class_list":["post-452992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452992","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=452992"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452992\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/452993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=452992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=452992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=452992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}