North Queensland have all but booked their ticket to this year’s NRL finals after Kyle Feldt scored twice to steal a comeback 16-14 win over the Wests Tigers.
Faced with the prospect of dropping out of the top eight with defeat, the Cowboys were down 14-6 when Tigers winger Malakai Watene-Zelezniak scored with 16 minutes to go on Friday.
But Paul Green’s undermanned side crossed twice through Feldt in the space of four minutes to snap a worrying four-game slide.
The Cowboys right winger first finished off a right-side shift to reduce the deficit to four in the 66th minute, before racing to ground Michael Morgan’s long-range grubber soon after.
Morgan then sealed the win by plucking Jake Granville’s late deft kick, lifting the visitors four points clear of ninth-placed St George Illawarra with one game left form them in the regular season.
The Dragons face sixth-placed Penrith on Sunday.
It was yet another brave performance from the Cowboys, who are without five top-line players including co-captains Johnathan Thurston and Matt Scott.
They struggled for fluency for the best part of the opening hour in Campbelltown before being awoken by Watene-Zelezniak’s second-half try.
Morgan, who was ably supported by Te Maire Martin’s dangerous first-half effort, then took over and provided the clutch plays for Feldt.
Star forward Jason Taumalalo was once again strong with a game-high 179 metres.
In a hotly-contested first half, Tigers skipper Aaron Woods surprised the 9,346 crowd with the opening points when he sold Taumalolo a dummy in the 24th minute.
It didn’t take long for the Cowboys to respond, with five-eighth Te Maire Martin mirroring Woods’ fake to fool Tuimoala Lolohea four minutes later.
However the Tigers claimed a four-point halftime lead when Josh Aloiai trampled over Martin – breaking his nose in the process – before scoring in the 35th minute.
Tigers youngster Bayley Sironen, son of Balmain legend Paul, played 22 minutes on debut.