Maitland Blacks co-captain Chris Logan ran in four tries and set up another in the Blacks 69-5 demolition of University at Marcellin Park on Saturday.
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“We rested for him for the last 15 minutes so he probably could have scored a couple more,” Maitland co-coach Mick Hickling said of the fullback’s performance.
“He got the players’ player and the three points from the coaches. He was outstanding.
“He is so quick and so strong, it’s a pretty impressive combination. He is football smart as well, he is playing at the peak of his powers at the moment.”
While Logan was the stand-out the Blacks had plenty of strong performers in what Hickling said was the Blacks best hit-out of the year to day.
Maitland established a 36-5 lead by half-time and were able to scramble in defence to snuff out University’s scoring chances in the second.
“It was probably our best performance of the year. It was nice. We trained well during the week, particularly Thursday and we were able to transfer that onto the field on Saturday,” he sai.d
“Our shape and structure was very good. The boys are playing their role and no one overplayed their hand. We played controlled footy and it was good that we went on in the second half.
“We were able to concentrate and play some nice footy right to the end.”
Hickling said Michael Howell was given another week to recover but hopefully would be available for next week’s crucial clash against Nelson Bay.
“We were hoping to use him off the bench yesterday, but he wasn’t 100 per cent confident with the ankle so we didn’t want to risk him becuase we’ve got Nelson Bay away this week, which is going to be a massive game for us,” he said.
“After that we’ve got the weekend off for the long weekend and then we’ve got Lake Macquarie to finish off the first round.
“If we can go up to the Bay and put in a good performance it will set us up nicely for the back half of the year.
“The competition is pretty tight, the table is pretty congested so that’s going to be a big game for us. They won well again on the weekend, they are playing some good footy.”
At the bottom end of the table, however, Lake Macquarie conceded 100 points for the third time this season.
“I couldn’t say whether Lake Macquarie will see out the season, they’ve got Hamilton next week and then us so it’s not getting any easier,” Hickling said.
“You want to maintain the integrity of the competition, so whether that means they try to stick it out to end of the first round or see out the season I don’t know.”
