It’s a scoreline more synonymous with soccer, but historians were scrambling for the rugby league record books when NSW’s women’s grand final was decided by a single field goal.
Mounties halfback Tilly Power kicked the winning one-pointer with just over two minutes left in her side’s epic 1-0 victory over the Bulldogs at a wet Leichhardt Oval on Saturday night, sealing the Harvey Norman NSW Women’s Premiership.
“We do say you only need a point to get the ‘dub’ – and that’s what we did,” laughed Mounties captain Simaima Taufa. “Regardless of it being 1-0, 15-14, whatever … this is the game and you only need to win by one point.
“I’ve seen all the memes about the game already, but a victory is a victory.”
The match revived memories of the famous tryless grand final between Parramatta and Canterbury in 1986, won by the Eels 4-2. It remains the only grand final in the history of the NSWRL and NRL not to feature a try.
The Harvey Norman NSW Women’s Premiership, the equivalent of the men’s NSW Cup, features a number of NRLW stars, and few could have imagined the season would be decided in such dramatic fashion.
Mounties celebrate their historic 1-0 win over the Bulldogs in the Harvey Norman NSW women’s premiership grand final.Credit: NSWRL
Both teams had several close calls throughout the game, and it was left to Power to slot a 68th-minute field goal.
“I said to Til, ‘give me a glance at 10 [minutes left] and we’ll see how we’re going’,” said Mounties coach Grant Izzard, a former Penrith and Illawarra first grader.
“She gave me a glance with about three or four to go and I said, ‘you better have a crack’. The run from Eli [Walton] beforehand got us in a position to do that.
“In the women’s game at this level, they don’t defend their mistakes very well. If you get a couple of shots at them, you will normally come up with points. But [Saturday night] was different.
“I played in a 4-0 game, but that was years and years ago. I’ve never seen that before.
“It wasn’t like a boring game of footy either. A lot of my mates came for the first time and said, ‘how good was that?’”
It was the second straight year the Harvey Norman NSW Women’s Premiership had been decided by a field goal, with the Tigers beating the Sharks 21-20 in the 2022 decider. It was also Mounties’ first title since 2018.
“I told the girls, ‘it took us five years to get here, and you don’t know if the person next to you is going to be there next year, or the year after that’,” Taufa said.
“We wanted to walk off the field with no regrets or no what-ifs.”
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