Eels’ Moses sets up NRL winner over Tigers

Mitchell Moses has broken the hearts of Wests Tigers fans in his first game against his former NRL club, setting up the match-winning field goal in Parramatta’s 17-16 win on Sunday.

Three weeks after kicking a golden-point field-goal winner of his own, Moses looked to step up again when he got the ball at first receiver in the 77th minute with scores locked up.

But he instead found halves partner Norman to his left, whose 25-metre, low-trajectory shot just flew over the crossbar to give the Eels their third consecutive win.

Tigers halfback Luke Brooks, who still lives with Moses, missed a chance to send the game to overtime for the healthy crowd of 30,091, but his shot sailed wide.

“I don’t know if it was more by chance or luck, but we actually practised a field goal set this week. It didn’t look nice, but it got us the point,” Eels coach Brad Arthur said.

“We had him back on the inside of Mitchell if there was pressure because we knew they’d be coming at Mitchell so the boys practised a lot of that.”

However the win was soured by a knee injury to Clint Gutherson, with scans on Monday likely to rule the Eels fullback out for a number of weeks.

“He’s going to have to get some scans tomorrow but we don’t think it’s great. Not sure exactly what the diagnosis is but it could be bad,” Arthur said.

The Eels’ third straight win consolidates seventh spot on the table, while the Tigers suffered their sixth loss in seven games and remain second-last.

An upset was on the cards at ANZ Stadium when Tuimoala Lolohea kicked two penalty goals in the space of three minutes to take a two-point lead soon after halftime.

Gutherson appeared to have seized the initiative, only for Tigers winger Malakai Watene-Zelezniak to level the score with a soaring take of a Lolohea kick.

Lolohea sprayed the potential go-ahead conversion 15 metres in from touch.

“It was disappointing. We rued a few lapses in decision making with the ball in the second half,” Tigers coach Ivan Cleary said.

“We probably had four times I think where we turned the ball over.”

Bevan French opened the scoring in just the second minute when he finished off a right side shift, however James Tedesco hit back with a 40-metre individual effort soon after.

A Lolohea penalty edged the Tigers in front but another well-executive set piece ended in Semi Radradra giving the Eels a 10-8 halftime lead.

Brooks was put on report for tripping late in the match.

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