The Atunaisa Navuma captained BLK Nadroga side retained the INNK Farebrother challenge cup after silencing  Yasawa 17-0 at Lawaqa Park in Sigatoka today.

And Navuma dedicated the victory to Nadroga woman rugby centre, late Monika Koroidrekelevu who died after she allegedly sustained spinal injury in the ANZ Marama competition in June at the same ground.

“This win is for her and family who went through sorrow when she died;  as a rugby player I do understand what it is like,” Navuma said.

The Marlins were not spared by the Stallions.

Nadroga took the lead in the 20 minutes of play following to centre Eseroma Rikou’s try, the conversion came from first five eight Jack Volavola 7-0.

13 minutes later lock Jiuta Biau scored the try.

In the final minute of the first half, Nadroga prop Jone Koroi was sin-binned for unprofessional play.

The cup holders led 12- 0 at the breather.

The second half, lone points were scored by Nadroga’s Semiti Kaisau who came off the bench to score at the corner. Both teams tried to break the defence but their running lines proved to be tough to penetrate.

Navusa said, “We did not go slow against Yasawa, we knew that they will be coming with force. We have to stand our ground and show them. We just did not give them a chance to cross the line. But we are all learning. We have some young blokes too.”

Yasawa captain said, “It was a tough game for us. Now we know what the next level of games are going to be with the Skipper Cup next year. We expect next year to be better as we got a lot of new players. We tried to get all of them to play as we have a good mix.”

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