Mundine broke his ankle playing for Group Three in the representative clash against Group Four at Tuncurry on Friday night. He won’t play again until 2013. It was also a costly game for the Hawks as in-form front rower Cory Shields broke a thumb.

Mundine has been a regular try scorer for the Bulls and his loss is a major blow to the side’s premiership aspirations. Wayne Paulson returned from suspension to take Mundine’s place in the centres, with electrifying Trae Clarke coming up from under 18s to play fullback. And what a game the 18-year-old custodian had. He was a constant menace to the Forster defence and he set up a try late in the game that gave the Bulls a 20-14 lead. For good measure Clarke scored a brilliant try just before time when he followed up a kick from centre Clint Walker to seal the result.

The Hawks had their excuses. Forster lost five-eighth Sam McCartney early in the first half with a hamstring injury - continuing his unfortunate trot this year. McCartney only made it back to the field the previous weekend after recovering from a leg injury. Midway through the second half lock Matt Finlayson was assisted off with an ankle injury, reducing the bench to two players. Coach Graeme Jennings was also fuming with referee Jason Allen’s handling of the game.

At one stage in the second half the Hawks were reduced to 11 after Allan sent five-eighth Troy Hilder and prop Dean Basham to the sin bin in separate incidents.

Despite all these problems the Hawks were right in the game until the back end of the second half when the Bulls ran in three tries. By today’s standards it was a quality match and it wouldn’t totally surprise if these teams battle out the grand final.

While Clarke was superb at fullback for the Bulls, their workaholic second rowers Abby Khan and Jacob Stephenson were outstanding. Both powered through the work in attack and defence. Captain-coach Daniel Dumas was also strong in the hard going.

The Hawks had five players backing up from the previous night’s match and not surprisingly, looked jaded. They were able to exploit a defensive weakness down Taree’s left hand side in the first half, however, the premiers had enough ball to pile on more points. Forster squandered chances and paid the price.

Young hooker Jesse McCarthy was their best while centre Kurt Lewis always looked capable of breaking the line.

Taree posted their first try soon after the Hawks knocked on from the kick off when Paulson took a short pass to crash over. Walker kicked the conversion and it was 6-0.

The Hawks then dominated play and camped in Taree territory. Pressure finally resulted in Basham taking a loose pass before brushing through tackles to post a determined try after a 20 metre run. Lewis added the extras to lock up the scores. Tall winger Dan Lawton gave Forster the lead when he finished off a raid to cross out wide but Sam Murray ducked under tackles for Taree to level the scores at 10-10. Walker cleverly gave winger Ben Northam space to score Taree’s next try from close range but seconds before halftime Lawton was in again and it was 14-14 at oranges.

Walker broke the deadlock with a penalty goal 21 minutes into the second half.

Ten from time Clarke flew through a gap up the centre of the field and looked set to score until the cover converged. He off-loaded to Khan who then threw an overhead pass to five-eighth Daniel Slater and he was in near the sticks.

However Walker missed the conversion and at 20-14 there was still life in the game.That was until Walker broke clear down the touchline and centre kicked. Clarke was on the spot and half volleyed the ball to dive over. Just before fulltime Doug Ferguson crashed through tackles to round off the scoring.