Michael Godden - League Coach Report
It’s fair to say that the performance down at Hickinbotham Oval this week was extremely disappointing. No doubt it was a long drive home for all of our members and supporters after a performance of that manner. The importance of the game certainly wasn’t lost on the players. Their preparation was very good and I felt the mindset was in the right place. How wrong I was! Not for a minute do I think the players didn’t try because that is never the case, but what we didn’t do was handle the ball correctly and with any precision. The myth that we are too slow could easily be explained by my review of the video last night; we had first possession from stoppages 28 times only to cough the ball up to South, where they ran hard forward and put our backline under enormous pressure. To summarise, 22 times South entered their forward 50 from our 28 fumbles. When you look at the fact they had 45 inside 50s for the day, it really hurts.
The backline stood up ok, but for most of the day they were under enormous pressure. The midfield had an ordinary day, with too many turn-over’s and not enough pressure on the break away’s to help our backs, even though we did break even with the stoppages. The forward line at times looked dangerous, but too often we didn’t honor their hard work. Nick Salter I thought was very good both offensively and defensively, Adam Grocke worked tirelessly all day and Scott Welsh provided us with a lot of space, and often has to take the full brunt of the opposition, but I can assure you if you watch him closely his work up forward is extremely creative and team orientated.
In reviewing the game you would have to start by saying our first quarter we didn’t do enough, and I think we suffered for that all day. The second quarter was ok by our standards, to break even into the breeze was a reasonable effort. The third quarter was once again ok, but we wasted a lot of opportunities going inside 50 (16 times to only score 4.2) is not a good enough return, but to keep South scoreless was a positive. Then the last quarter was a disgrace, to have 9.4 kicked against us is not good enough, even though we kicked 3 goals into the breeze which was a good effort we handled the ball terribly and too often gave the ball back to the opposition.
Finally, I can assure all supporters and members that we as a football department are not hiding from that performance and certainly are not looking for excuses, all we are doing is identifying what went wrong, working on these areas, and are looking forward to coming home to Woodville this week and showing that we are growing as a group and we don’t take losses lightly. Where we are at as a playing and coaching group will be determined with our efforts this weekend.
Craig Smith – Reserves Coach Report
It was another frustrating win for the Reserves on the weekend. This may sound like a contradiction but it was certainly the prevailing emotion after the game. The conditions were difficult at Noarlunga with a strong breeze blowing to the Southern end. This made the match a game of two halves and the team that took its opportunities while kicking with the breeze was going to be the team that won the game, and so it proved.
South kicked with the breeze in the first quarter and kicked five goals, but we were fortunate enough to kick a couple into it and basically break even at quarter time. In the second quarter we wasted some opportunities and went in at half time a couple points behind. In the third quarter we did some good work and kicked some team lifting goals into the breeze but let ourselves down with several skill errors and poor decisions. South made us pay for these and at three quarter time the scores were dead level. It is fair to say that the players were left in no doubt about what was expected of them and they responded positively in the last quarter kicking six goals and keeping South scoreless.
The last quarter showed a glimpse of what this group is capable of and as I said to the players after the game if we can put that together for a full game we will be a formidable outfit. The themes of improvements in skill and decision making will continue for this week in preparation for West on Sunday.
There were some pleasing individual efforts throughout the game. Duane Schultz returned to good form and provided consistent drive throughout the game. James Stewart showed some good signs and is running into good form after three games back from injury and Jarrad Wright returned impressively from injury, while Aaron Day and Glen Dawson provided strong targets up forward and kicked four and three goals respectively.
This is a short week for the players so we will need to recover quickly for the next challenge against West on Sunday.
Terry Hutton – Under 18’s Coach Report
In fine conditions Eagles were into attack early scoring through Jake Von Bertouch twice.
South struggled to move the ball past centre line. Pressure and tackling was very strong.
The back line was able to repel the few attacks made. Lack of clean ball handling cost the Eagles many scoring opportunities. J. Fairclough picked up many touches.
Huppatz and Easther were controlling the ruck at centre bounces. We had control around packs and attacked the goal front many times. Several players found difficulty keeping their feet so went to ground. Polec and Lane were active around goals scoring 2 goals each.
The Eagles dominated the third quarter with hard running and linking play. The ball was constantly in attack area with 17 shots on goal. Joyce read the play well, being positive and direct in his disposal. Sutcliffe used running power to strongly rebound through the centre.
A somewhat disappointing last quarter saw the Eagles run out easy winners. Promising attacks ended up with no score or points or fumbles or frees against. Simple decisions saw turn overs or scrimmages occurring as players got tired.