Legendary coach Alan Gaffney helps Greens as Uni hit more hurdles

Now the legendary attack coach is lending a hand at Merewether.

Greens coach Tony Munro is friends with Gaffney, who lives on the Central Coast. Scrum coach Steve Barretto also played under Gaffney at Leinster.

"We have all these experienced resources and we seem to let the intellectual property drift out of the game," Munro said.

"Al came up last Monday and spoke to the boys about their alignment and their running lines. "After the session, he sent through more information.

"The boys loved it. They took everything on board. Al is heading overseas on Thursday but will come back up later in the season."

** University coach Sam Berry can not recall a more disrupted start to the season.

No team has been impacted more by the recent wet weather than the Students, who have had two games washed out and have had to train on basketball courts.

Now they have injuries and suspensions to go with it.

The 2023 Hunter player of the year Murray Sutherland faces eight weeks on the sideline after breaking his wrist at training.

In a further blow Onewai Tai, who has returned from Canberra, picked up his third yellow card for the season in the loss to Maitland and is suspended for the match against Merewether.

"It rained a fair bit two years ago, but we didn't have the injuries," Berry said. "This is both. On the rare ocassion we get on the training pitch we lose blokes to injury."

The Students' lower graders did manage to get on the field on Tuesday night against the University of Kansas, who are touring the east coast of Australia.

"We played a 20 minute game to give them a hit out on a modified field. It was great night. Then we had them back at the pub and won all three boat races. They are headed to Byron Bay. We are looking at maybe visiting them next year."

** Lake Macquarie are making moves in their second season in the Central Coast competition. The Roos beat Gosford 45-10 last round to jump to fifth spot on 11 points. It was their second triumph in four games after stunning premiers Avoca 21-7 in round two.

** Referees often cop the brunt of frustrated coaches. It was the opposite on Saturday at Townson Oval. Hamilton coach Marty Berry and his opposite Tony Munro had high praise for the job done by Jarryd Logan in extreme conditions.