The Braidwood Servicemen`s Club Bears came with in a whisker of playing in the George Tooke Shield grand final when they went down 26-22 to Bungendore on Sunday. The bears where leading 22-20 with 10 minutes remaining in the final when Tigers captain/coach Ben Amey forced his way over the line to score a controversial converted try to end the bears best season in 40 years The Tigers skipped away to a 8-0 lead after 7 minutes, then the Bears hit their straps with four tries and three conversions. The Tigers crossed just before the break to give a 22-14 score-line to the Bears. The second half was exciting with both sides unable to get over the line with great scrambling defence a highlight . The bears lost Bill Raynolds , Daniel Backhouse and Matt McCarthy to game ending injuries and this probably reduced the effectiveness of the Bears interchange . The Tigers grabbed another converted try half way through the second half to make it 22-20 still to the Bears.

Amey`s try just before the hooter didn't dent the Bears enthusiasm, for as the fulltime sounded Jimmy Evans put a huge bomb up and the Tiger's fullback just beat a flying Shaun Heycox to it . the best & fairest judges had an enormous task with all of the nineteen Bears playing out -standing games. 3 points went to Steve Newsome who had an another top game at fullback. He led by example and made great ground every time he touched the ball . 2 to Rocky Demetriou who played himself to a standstill and 1 to Jimmy Green who took the ball up hard all game and was punishing in defence. The players player went to Billy Hallgan. Billy came off the bench and gave no thought to self-preservation, constantly bringing off kamikaze hits in defence and never far off the ball in attack. The coach's award went to Mark Piper who scored two tries and was unstoppable from dummy half.

The Bruce Stuart building scoreboard, Tigers 26 Peter Davies 1 try , Jamie Cocks 1, Mick Alder 1, Greg Lovelock 1, Ben Amey1, Jarred Dorrington 3 goals. Bears 22 Mark Piper 2 tries ,Daniel Backhouse 1, Rocky Demetriou 1, and Matt McCarthy 3 goals