Match Report Round 14 V Beaumaris

HOWE GOOD – A YOULTIDE DELIGHT ON THE SIREN!

Could it get any worse? Turner, Lovig, Britton out on Thursday night. Johnston out on the morning with teething problems. Then add to that trainer Mick Dove, while reliving his departed youth at training sustains 4 fractures in 3 fingers, our goal umps are all unavailable (thanks Kam for filling in), our boundary Jo Naulty out on birthday preparation duties, Brent Stevens thinks we?re playing Bentleigh and arrives there and finally Max brings the work keys to the footy and has to do a pre game dash to return them!

All bad omens and the coach was worried. Another windy day and again the coach opted to kick against the breeze. When will his luck desert us The wind for about the fourth week in a row restricted us from demonstrating our skills and, with an opposition stacked with some of their better players, we were in for a tough day. New runner, Craig Stevens was being given a solid workout from the first quarter and, with the team not firing on all cylinders the signs were ominous. While against the wind in the first we kept equal, it was in the second that we let ourselves down – 2.7 to 3.1 meant that for the only time for the year we were behind at half time. (A pretty amazing situation when you think that includes our two losses)

The coach was not happy. He thought too many were taking it easy and not committing themselves to the ball or to helping their team mates who had the ball. Kicking against the wind in the 3^rd would be critical. With Russ Howe in and under every contest and one of the few players able to take the ball cleanly, he was keeping us in the game. Likewise, Tom Youl in a rich vein of form over the last few weeks was dominating around the centre. Baxter had a return to form in the third but that wasn?t enough to hold the Beauy boys who took full advantage of the wind to leave us 3 goals down at – time – unfamiliar territory. In fact, not only was it the only time for the year we had been down at – time, it was also the greatest amount by which any team had led us at any stage all year!

The pressure was on and we rose to the occasion. All looked lost with a couple of minutes to go and down by 13 points. Two quick goals and we were a point down with a little time left on the clock. A rushed behind from a ballup after a kick in infringement and the scores were level. With seconds remaining Tom Youl comes to the rescue and a snap on the siren for a goal lets us sneak away with a most unlikely win!

This is not to say that the coach was happy with the teams performance. At the aftergame assessment he made it clear that he believed that a number of players let the team down on the day in a critical match when the pressure was on. With three tough games coming up against the other three teams in the four he made it clear he will be looking closely at players commitment, both on the training track and at the game over the coming weeks.

SCORES

HR 3.1 5.8 6.10 10.15 75

BEAU 3.3 6.4 9.9 10.9 69

BEST Howe, Youl, Jewel, Baxter, Woltering, Hoban

GOALS Goss 3, Innes 2, Youl 2, Fallon 1, Naulty 1, Stevens 1,

NEXT WEEK

V AJAX AT THE BOSS AT 2PM

OFFICIALS

GOAL JOHNSTON

TIME INNES

BOUND NAULTY

INTER CAVE