Over 50’s Match Report ROUND 10

Williamstown Gold (away) by Patty Buttigieg

 Almost the perfect Sunday morning to take on the old foe, with the sun shining and a bit of a breeze favouring the Blackshaws Rd end. Most of us wondering why we weren’t playing Geelong or Waverley, Geelong and Waverley both grateful they weren’t playing us and Williamstown hoping to beat up on us again. Well we had news for them and 25 determined Diamond Valley boys wanted to continue with that winning feeling, especially against this mob.

The skipper again won the toss and chose to take first use of a 3 or 4 goal breeze. Whilst we played all over them, keeping them scoreless, our conversion was bad and the revamped forward line struggled to make a big impact.

Change of ends and we’re kicking into the wind. Plenty of encouragement at qtr time by Coach and teammates and the opposition know it’s game on. Despite our injuries and them loading their team, our true character came to the fore in this qtr and we banged on 3.1 while they could only manage 1.2. The forward line started functioning, Dave and Bomber marking everything, James Wright lively and again we had plenty of options. The backline again superb, battling to concede as little as possible and succeeding

Determined to maintain this momentum, all of the talk at half time was to keep fighting for possession, not blaze away and this time use the ball a bit better with the wind. We created many opportunities and had all of the play in our forward line, but once again inaccuracy left them with a glimmer of hope of overrunning us in the last quarter. Unfortunately Gilesy was helped off in this qtr, after a solid head knock, but this helped to further inspire us.

This final qtr was one of our best all season and though we allowed them to score 3 goals, we managed to soak up a lot of time with some excellent possession football. Short passing our way up forward and holding on to the ball allowed us to score a goal into the wind, something they couldn’t do at their two attempts. Our best football is beautiful to watch when we combine well and transition the ball into attack. The way we held them out, subdued their supposed stars and again dominated a game of football across all lines, gave me the most satisfaction of any win in which I’ve been involved at this Club. Most agreed this was one of our best and I was extremely proud of this great team, which gave everything all season, combined so well and deservedly finished outright second on the ladder. Undefeated in the second half of the season, winning our last 5 games on end.                      

Shame there’s no finals and another crack at making them Blue again.

Thanks again to Grinder for giving me the honour of being Captain for the entire season and to everyone for all of your efforts. This game in particular was won by the contribution of all 25 players, with everyone doing something. Important smothers, goal assists or desperation to stop them scoring, are all highlights still vivid in my mind. I hope that everyone looks after themselves over the summer and you all return to do it all again.

Hope to see you all at the Presentation night

Diamond Valley           1.2.8          4.3.29       5.8.38                 6.8.44

Williamstown Gold        0.0.0          1.2.8        1.2.8                  4.2.26  

Best Players: Great TEAM effort!!!!

Goals: Bomber 2, Beaser 1, Marino 1, I. McCormack 1 & Wright 1