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Caulfield  5 – 17 – 47     Defeated by    Ormond  8 – 5 – 53

Perfect conditions greeted us EE Gunn reserve, with mild conditions and little breeze to speak of. A couple of changes to the previous week’s winning side were made due to injury and team balance, but the boys were confident and looking good in the warm up. Based on the score board at quarter time, you would think it was a howling cross breeze as we kicked an inaccurate 7 behinds (no goals). Although our kicking was a little wayward, the intensity at the ball and contest were good which meant we were able to limit Ormond’s scoring opportunities and only trail by 6 points at quarter time.

The same trend continued in the second quarter as we kicked 1 goal 3 behinds for the term, into a slight breeze. The endeavour and attack was still really good to get first hands to the footy. However, some fumbles and failure to give first options were putting us under pressure at times. Despite having a lot of the ball, this resulted in some costly turnovers that were converted into long goals from Ormond with the assistance of the wind. Rubbing salt into the wound considering our inability to put it through the big sticks! Tom Stewart’s game to half time was worth a mention. He was one player that was clean grabbing it consistently and bringing others into the play by using the first option and getting them into space.

Despite our goal to behind ratio, we were still only 20 points in arrears at the half time break. A deficit we knew could be quickly pegged back if we got some of the basics right. Spittal re-enforced the need to give the first option and that resulted in some much more free flowing play. Hayden’s shoulder injury resulted in a coaching move to put Jacko Small forward. This had immediate impact as he was troubling Ormond in the air and kicked a goal after a good passage of play to find him loose 35m out (although it may have been a mis-kicked pass to Tom Stewart in the goal square, we were due one to bounce our way!).

Ossie’s move into the midfield also assisted in our midfield gaining control of the centre square despite their ruckman getting his hand to it on most occasions. A third quarter 4 goals 5 behinds we took a one point lead into the final change and knew it would need a big effort to get over the line in what was now a strong breeze. However, a challenge we were ready for.

The final quarter saw some fantastic defence and some of the better passages of play we have had for the year with the team linking up to move the ball end to end very quickly to put Ormond under a lot of pressure. Unfortunately the chances we had went the wrong side of the goal post (or point post) which meant scores were even with a few minutes to go. Ormond were able to get a quick rebound into their forward line to take a one goal lead and despite winning the next centre clearance we were unable to snatch the draw.

In the end a disappointing result but as they say, bad kicking is bad football. Plenty of positives to take out of the game however and buoyed by the senior victory in the late game, we will re-group and take on Marcellin this week.

Go Fields!