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Newcastle Herald
Newcastle Herald
National
Renee Valentine

Ball retention key as Hunter Wildfires women make first home appearance in Jack Scott Cup

SWITCH: Emily Sheather moves from outside centre to the wing in one of a number of positional changes to Hunter's starting side this weekend. Picture: Max Mason-Hubers

Coach Joey de Dassel has put the focus on ball retention as the Hunter Wildfires prepare to make their first home appearance of the season in Jack Scott Cup against Warringah at No.2 Sportsground on Saturday.

Hunter have made a mixed start to Sydney women's premier rugby union competition, opening their campaign with a 29-12 win over Western Sydney before going down 17-5 to competition heavyweights Sydney Uni last weekend.

"I don't know too much about Warringah and to be honest we're not focusing too much on them, rather just fixing up the little things in our own game that we needed to work on," de Dassel said.

"We trained really hard on Tuesday night around the breakdown and making sure we can secure our own ball when we've got it and not turn it over too much. That was a really big focus area."

De Dassel has made several positional changes to his match-day squad.

Openside breakaway Olivia Creswick is unavailable and Jen Mauli comes back into the starting side in her place.

Susannah Cooke also comes back into the starting side at No.10 after making her first appearance this season from the bench last weekend.

Cooke was injected into the game after only two minutes against Sydney Uni when the Wildfires lost forwards Creswick and Mary Utai to early injuries.

Peta Salter moves back into halfback after starting at five-eighth last weekend, Emily Freeman slides from halfback to outside centre and Emily Sheather from outside centre onto the wing.

The women's match is at 12.05pm.

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