Corrimal Rangers rounded out an impressive Fraternity Club Cup campaign with a dominant 3-1 win over Albion Park White Eagles in the final.

There was little between the sides in the opening stages with the Memorial Park pitch playing well despite coping days of consistent rainfall.

The first major chance fell for the White Eagles 25 minutes into the match with Shaun McRae knocking down a cross for Kyle Senior who air swung from close range.

White Eagles gloveman Brad Jardine made two first class and nearly identical saves in the space of eight minutes off Daniel Carreno. The first in the 32nd minute was a half volley which Jardine tipped on to the top of the bar while the second was a volley which the former Port Kembla goalkeeper pushed on to the underside of the bar.

In between the two Corrimal chances, Albion Park had an excellent opportunity of their own when McRae latched on to a stray ball. The attacker opted against playing Cameron Morgan through on goal and instead hit a tame shot which rolled safely to Nick Loe.

Corrimal hit the lead three minutes into the second half through Carreno who received the ball off Matthew Galanti before cooly slotting the ball into the bottom right corner.

Soon after the Rangers had their second with Dean Pender's cross from the left flank finding Galanti who demonstrated superb technique in lacing the ball back across Jardine and into the left of the goal.

Corrimal tightened their grip on the trophy 15 minutes from full time with another sublime goal, this time from the eventual man of the match winner Tomoki Wada who picked up the ball on the halfway line before he audaciously drove a lob over Jardine from 35 metres out which landed just over the goal line.

With 10 minutes remaining, Jardine prevented the score from blowing out to four with a good one-on-one save against Franco Khoshaba and the Albion were able to secure a consolation goal soon after through McRae who tucked home Valentino Merxhushi's cut across the box.

After the match, victorious Corrimal co-coach Jason Davkovski praised his squad who are set to get their Illawarra Premier League campaign underway at Balls Paddock next Saturday afternoon.

“We just continued on from last week and we are very proud of the boys,” he said.

“We have got a new squad and I think we have gelled really well over the last six or seven weeks and now we just need to take that into the season.”

“We are ready for Bulli next week.”

As for the White Eagles, their coach Paul Carter wasn’t willing to make excuses but still feels his side have got what they needed out of the preseason tournament and he has earmarked the Rangers as a team to beat in the season proper.

“Congratulations to Corrimal, they 100 per cent deserved to win but I am still happy with where we are a week out from the season,” Carter said.

“You would have to say Corrimal along with Wollongong Olympic are the favourites [to win the Illawarra Premier League].”

In the third-placed playoff which preceded the main game, Wollongong Olympic made light work of Bellambi Rosellas in a 7-1 win though the scores were locked at one apiece after 45 minutes.

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Sunday 17 March 2019 @ Memorial Park, Corrimal

Albion Park White Eagles - 1 (MCRAE 85’)

Corrimal Rangers - 3 (CARRENO 48’, GALANTI 54’, WADA 75’)

Man of the Match - WADA

Albion Park White Eagles - Brad JARDINE, Shannon FIELDING, Eiki FUKUSHIGE, Blake MCGINN, Chris NATHANIEL, Robbie DELBANCO, Shaun MCRAE, Cameron MORGAN, Araki NAOMICHI, Kyle SENIOR, Joel BEATTIE - Subs - Bojan CARIC, Luke DEBROT, Valentino MERXHUSHI, Yuki UNO, Jacob HUFTON

Corrimal Rangers - Nikolas LOE, Jason ZUFIC, Dean PENDER, Alvin CECCOLI, Banri KAWAIZUMI, Ben ZUCCO, Sam MATTHEWS, Tomoki WADA, Daniel CARRENO, Matthew GALANTI, Tim WYLIE - Subs - Paul GUIDO, Franco KHOSHABA, Nic GROZDANOV, Jake GATES, Yanni MAVRIKAS

Note - Fraternity Club Cup Final is unlimited interchange

Referee - Bobby MAZEVSKI

Assistant Referees - Steven BOZIC, Damien DENNELLY, Blake HERBERT (Fourth Official)

Report by Dylan Arvela, on Twitter @dylanarvela

Photo by Pedro Garcia