The Illawarra Steelers Harvey Norman Women’s Premiership team has qualified for the finals in their inaugural season, finishing second and winning seven of their 10 regular season games.
Prop Viena Tinao has played every game this season and is looking forward to this Sunday’s semi-final challenge against the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs at Leichhardt Oval.
“It’s been amazing. To be honest, I didn’t think I’d be playing every game, but being here with the girls and having them help me has been really good. I’m honoured and pretty proud of myself and the girls, and to get this far is amazing,” Viena says.
Read More>>Team Lists
The Steelers battled past the Bulldogs by 22-10 earlier in the season and come into the match with last weekend’s crucial win against reigning premiers, the Wests Tigers, under their belt. Viena was named NSWRL’s player of the match against the Tigers and said she is nervous but excited about the challenge on the weekend.
“There are games I’ve played that have been knockout, but this feels like a whole different level because we’re the first Harvey Norman Steelers to go through to finals.”
[Watch] >>Viena scores against Tigers
Sulieto stands out for Steelers
The Steelers will also take on the Bulldogs in the Tarsha Gale Cup in semi-final action this weekend. Sulieti Ahio is in her second year with the team and has had a standout season, scoring six tries and playing centre and second-row.
She says the undefeated Bulldogs team will be a big test for the team this Saturday.
“This weekend is going to be such a challenge. They’ve had two weeks off, and we’ve had to change our game a little bit to try to get the upper hand,” Sulieti says.
“It’ll be a good game, a really hard one, probably the toughest we’ve had thus far.”
The team put on an impressive performance to defeat the Parramatta Eels 20-4 in the first week of the finals, with a clear message coming from coach Courtney Crawford for the team in that match and for the Bulldogs this weekend.
“It was all about simplifying. We tend to overthink, so when we’re fatigued, we’ve just got to go back to simple plays and simple shapes.”
“Everyone loves an underdog, and we’re really hoping to win.”
[Watch] >>Sulieti’s season highlights
Words | Russ Haylock