2009 R10 - Club XVIII v Mazenod (Home)

30 June 2009

A game of two contrasting halves for the Clubbies on Saturday!

After an even first 10 minutes with both sides scoring a couple of goals, the Blacks upped the pressure and the run to blow the game away over the next quarter and a half. Brooksy was getting first glove on everything at stoppages allowing the usual suspects of Aggs, Boogs, Swifty and Murph to pump plenty of ball forward. Scooter continued on his form from the previous week finding plenty of it, while Schafe was marking everything and kicking drop punt goals from where Daicos required a checkside.

Highlights of the first half were without doubt Ash Grove picking the fattest guy on the opposition to tackle and fall on him in the sandiest part of the oval, resulting in temporary blindness on the side of his face where the switch of play was on. The other was Matt Lane reading a ball beautifully off a pack in the goal square, popping it through and giving the fist pump to the cemetery. When quizzed at half time I found out he was mainly excited because it halved the deficit in the tightly fought-out battle between the Lane brothers for most goals this season. Current standings Sam Lane - 2, Matt Lane – 1

I’m not sure if Brooksy summarizing Merls’s half time speech in one sentence after he lost direction of his message affected our game in the second half, but it wasn’t a Clubbies performance we have become used to. Scores were even for the second half with the Blacks not maintaining their intensity, hard running or accountability that had seen them 12 goals up at half time. Matt McInnes obviously thought he’d done enough, literally hitting the showers and watching the second half in jeans and a jumper. Willo put the ooohs and aaahs from all the females in attendance when he went near it to the back of his mind and played another solid 4 quarter performance. He was well supported down back by Bruiser, Buster, Cal and Smelts who provided plenty of run all day. Dunny battled hard against the numbers again and straightened us up going forward, finishing with 4 goals of his own which was a great effort. Ben Begley was also busy across half forward.