Bendigo showed plenty of determination to beat the ladder leaders at North Bendigo’s Shadforth Park.

The Dust Devils charged to a 14-0 lead after the Miners allowed the opposition good field position from several missed first-up tackles.

It wasn’t until well into the first half that Bendigo had attacking chances, but errors were costly.

The Fighting Miners finally managed to score after the Bendigo scrum won the ball against the feed and number 8 Konrad Fepuleai broke a couple of tackles to cross the line.

The Bendigo line-out dominated during the first half allowing the Fighting Miners to move up the field with several rolling mauls.

The margin was cut shortly before the half time break when damaging prop Jessie Tuitupou crashed over in the corner to make the score 14-10 in Cobram’s favour.

Bendigo continued to attack after the break, but could not score.

Cobram responded after several clearing kicks were charged down and went to a 21-10 lead.

The reinjection back in the match of experienced prop Nick Poingdestre changed that with a crashing run on the edge of the ruck finishing under the posts to score.

Josh Manderson converted to bring the margin back to four points.

Bendigo gained the lead for the first time at 15 minutes to go after Michael Crichton scored out wide to take the score to 22-21 and earn the four try bonus point.

Cobram responded with a try to regain the lead after a Bendigo clearing kick was charged down.

The conversion kick went wide for the first time in the match.

Crichton crossed the try-line and Manderson converted the kick to lead 29-26 and clinch third place.

Best players for Bendigo were Nick Dehnert, Michael Crichton, Jessie Tuitupou, Daniel Fallaver and Josh Manderson.

Bendigo is at home again this Saturday to play Border Army at Shadforth Park in Fenton Street.