www.sundayterritorian.com.au Sunday, November 17, 2013. Sunday Territorian. 63

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sundayterritorian.com.au SPORT

In game of cat and mouse, Vettel still big cheese

Nico Rosberg

A SUPREMELY-confidentSebastian Vettel topped thetimes with ease ahead of hisRed Bull teammate MarkWebber in yesterday’s secondfree practice session for thisweekend’s US Grand Prix inAustin, Texas.

After a frustrating morningsession curtailed by fog, dur-ing which he was only 18th fa-stest, the newly-crowned four-time world champion blastedback to lead the way. He cloc-ked a best lap in one minute

and 37.305seconds to finisha tenth of asecond ahead ofhis retirement-bound team-mate who later

suggested the champion mayhave toyed with his rivals.

Webber, who would dearlylove to end Vettel’s tri-umphant run, said he felt the26-year-old German did notreally show his true pace.

‘‘Seb did a pretty good lap

— at his fourth attempt,’’ saidWebber. ‘‘So I don’t think hegot the best out of his tyres,unfortunately. Or, fortu-nately for him, but unfortun-ately for us.’’

Webber reminded re-porters of the way in whichVettel had made a dramaticstep on race day in Abu Dhabitwo weeks ago.

‘‘I will try and get involvedagain if I can tomorrow,’’ hesaid, recalling that he wasable to grab pole position at

the Yas Marina circuit, a featthat provoked Vettel’s sharpresponse.

‘‘He wasn’t too happy inAbu Dhabi, but then he de-stroyed us in the race. So Iwill try to have a clean Satur-day and Sunday and get thebest result.’’

It was a dominant perform-ance again from Vettel who isseeking his eighth consecu-tive victory of the season inSunday’s race at the Circuitof the Americas.

The Mercedes pair of NicoRosberg and Lewis Hamiltonwere fourth and fifth fastestahead of Heikki Kovalainen,who made a strong return asreplacement for compatriotKimi Raikkonen at Lotus.

Hamilton, who admitted hehas been suffering poor formsince the European summerbreak, looked faster andsharper and was hopeful hisnew Mercedes chassis willsolve his recent problems.

The 2008 world champion

has a new chassis because theteam found what Hamiltondescribed as a hole in the carhe had used during the AbuDhabi Grand Prix.

As Raikkonen underwentback surgery in Strasbourg,Kovalainen confirmed his po-tential with an excellentshowing to wind up ahead ofsixth-placed Esteban Gutier-rez and his Sauber team-mateNico Hulkenberg. Kovalain-en’s Lotus team-mate RomainGrosjean was eighth.

Tahs in for helluva ride in effort to beat SaintsFOOTBALL

ByGREYMORRIS

Rick Nolan

NTFL purists say theWaratahs-St Marys rivalrywas born at Gardens Oval36 years ago, when bothclubs played off in a classicgrand final.

Waratahs upset the oddsthat day when they beat StMarys in front of a red andwhite-clad Queen Elizabeth 2.

But today’s clash at thespiritual home of Territory

football shouldbe a bit morepredictable.

St Marys havewon 25 games ina row since los-ing to the Cen-

tral Australian Redtails inRound 1 of last season, whileBrenton Toy’s Tahs side areconstructing the foundationsof a league side that will servethem for the next decade.

Subduing the Saints for-ward line is Plan A for Toy

and his brains trust, particul-arly the twin towers of PeterMacFarlane and Justin vanUnen, who have destroyedopposition back lines in re-cent weeks.

Van Unen’s 22 goals in histwo matches make him a dan-gerous proposition for Tahsdefenders Josh Chaplin andJustin Beugelaar, while thespectre of MacFarlane mark-ing anything his teammatedoes not looms large.

More food for thought

among the Tahs brains trustis the return of Karl Lohdeto the following divisionalongside ball magnet MarkMcLean and hard nut JustinWilson.

Ben Rioli returns to Saints’halfback line to add more runand vision to the class of IggyVallejo and determination ofJack Long.

First-year Saints coachRick Nolan wants the maxi-mum effort from his playersdespite a six-game winning

streak that has them two ga-mes clear of everyone else.

‘‘Records mean nothing tome,’’ Nolan said.

‘‘What I want is a consist-ency among the playinggroup and more improve-ment as the season goes on,’’he said.

‘‘Our ball movement andwork ethic have been verygood so far and even at Gar-dens, where the space is notas much as Marrara, I expectthat trend to continue.’’

Saints will be without in-jured pair Raphael Clarkeand Henry Kerinaiua buttheir replacements and greatdesire to win should ensureplenty of ball supply to vanUnen and MacFarlane.

Waratahs should get plentyof supply from their new-look centreline of PatrickHeenan, Ben Mahon and JakeFarrell and beanpole ruck-man Tom Marsh will give hisopponent Steven Miles plentyof contests.

Josh Helliwell marking for Darwin during last night’s NTFL premiership clash against Southern Districts at a very wet and slippery TIO Stadium Picture: JUSTIN SANSON

Buffaloes stun Crocodiles

BUFFALOES 112

CROCODILES 53DARWIN 17.10 (112) dSOUTHERNDISTRICTS 8.5 (53)Goals - Darwin:Clark 4,Mensch4, Rowe 2, Anderson 2,Vanderklooster 2,Wills, Stokes,Moore; Southern Districts:Cupido 6, Taylor 2.Best - DarwinRowe, Clark,Collison,Mensch, Fuller;Southern Districts:Headland,Staunton, Cupido, Hudson.

DARWIN has recorded itssecond win of the seasonafter thrashing Southern Dis-tricts in the late game atTIO Stadium.

The Buffaloes were met bythe sound of a jubilant crowdafter winning the match 17.10(112) to 8.5 (53).

The heavens openedshortly after the start of thematch, which meant most ofthe first half was played inheavy rain.

The young Buffaloes sidecapitalised on the wet condit-ions and controlled most ofthe play in the first quarter.

The weather did not re-strict either side’s ability toscore and at quarter time Buf-faloes led five goals to three.

Crocs coach Shannon Rus-ca was disgusted with hisside’s performance in theopening term and gave hisboys a spray at the break.

It did nothing to stop the

run of the Buffaloes and newrecruit David Mensch wascausing trouble for the Dis-tricts defence.

The 41-year-old 158-gameplayer at Geelong may be theoldest debutant in the historyof the NTFL but he showedthere is still some good footyleft in those ageing legs.

Tempers flared in the thirdquarter when Darwin’s JoshHelliwell was placed on re-port for making front-on con-

tact to the head of DeanStaunton. The hit created afracas on the grandstand sidethat involved a couple ofplayers from both teams.

Buffaloes started to gainfurther ascendancy after thisand the discipline of theSouthern Districts side wastested.

Damian Cupido gave awaya couple of down-field freekicks and was subsequentlydragged by Rusca.

By this stage of the match,the star spearhead had al-ready booted six goals andwas causing headaches forthe Buffaloes defenders.

Cupido would not return tothe field until early in the lastquarter but by that stage thematch was essentially over.

The Crocs offered little bitein the final term as the Buffa-loes piled on goal after goal.

To make matters worse forSouthern Districts, youngster

Zane Carter went off theground with an apparentlyserious knee injury.

Nothing could ruin theparty for the Buffaloes sup-porters and they started sing-ing the club song before thefinal siren had sounded.

Luke Clark and Menschkicked four goals each, whileClinton Rowe and Helliwellwere solid in their first gamein double blue colours.

— JACKSONCLARK