The Steamers will play finals.
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The Border outfit confirmed its place with a 78-12 demolition of Wagga City on Saturday.
Blake Le Cornu grabbed a personal haul of 23 points with a try and nine conversions.
The visitors posted 12 tries against the winless Boiled Lollies, with strong winger Uraia Vuluma and forward Charlie McIntosh snaring hat-tricks.
“Charlie had a barnstorming game, it was hard to pick the points,” delighted coach Paul Musarra said.
“He’s (Vuluma) been on holidays for two weeks, so he’s probably missed the last three weeks, but he’s played since the start of the season.”
Vuluma replaced the impressive Simon Clements, who was unavailable.
Front-rowers Tom Boyle and Gethin Cattle were also excellent, providing tremendous power through the forwards.
The Steamers won the 2013 and 2015 premierships, but have missed finals the last two years.
“We can’t afford to go to sleep for 10 minutes, but it’s all positives, there’s no negatives at the moment,” Musarra said.
“The second grade is also playing better than in recent years, so we’re just trying to build more depth.”
The Steamers sit in fifth spot, on 38 points.
Griffith is sixth on 24 points with just the one round left.
Tumut (41) and Ag College (38) fill third and fourth respectively.
Richard Manion starred at fly-half and the Steamers have an embarrassment of riches in the backline, with speedster Sam Allen, the classy James Devlin and Manion all capable of filling the important link position.
“I could play Blake Le Cornu at 10, they can all play fly-half and that puts a lot of doubt in the defence,” Musarra said.
“Just in the first half of the year, we only had one or two of them at the same time.”
Manion missed around a month during the season with work commitments in the agricultural industry.
“Richie can read the play as good as anyone in the comp, he knows what’s going to happen ahead of time,” Musarra said of one of the league’s top players of recent years.
“He’s brutal in attack and his running lines are good, he’s a physical defender and opposition players are constantly looking for him, seeing what he’s doing.
“For many years he’s been that step ahead of most people in the league.
“James Devlin is another with those abilities.”
The Steamers will now host second-bottom CSU.
Tumut is home to Wagga City, but Ag College has a tougher test against second-placed Leeton.