Left: Drouin’s Cameron Bawden takes in his coach’s instructions at the Hawks’ huddle. By Ken Moore
WITH big apologies to Warragul, the season so far has been a twohorse race between top teams Sale and Maffra, who meet at Maffra this Sunday. A mouthwatering fixture looms as both enter the game brimming with excitement, Sale being undefeated and Maffra having not lost since round three. In the opening round Sale shocked Maffra to skip away to a sixgoal lead before Maffra steamed home, falling short by eight points in a cracking, highstandard game.
Maffra, under the tutelage of firstyear coach Hayden Burgiel, appeared to have improved since its firstround outing and Sale’s form cannot be criticised. The Magpies enter the game fresh from the week’s break after stitching up Traralgon in round eight and Maffra did a demolition job on Drouin. Hayden Burgiel missed last week’s game, reportedly with the flu, and is almost certain to return this week, while for Sale Stuart Anderson will return after a minor hamstring twinge kept him sidelined against Traralgon. Maffra’s side has a new look this year with less reliance on the Burgiels and whether it can achieve victory will probably depend on the ability of its youngsters. Winston Gieschen, Jesse Oldham and Tom Rawlins to all stepped up and rise to the occasion. Another factor is Sale City recruit Daniel Stubbe, who impressed on debut and scored six goals only to be denied a permit last week. In Shane Fyfe, Justin McLay, Chris Laverty, Russell Mc Adam and Tim Bristow Sale appears to have the running capacity to match Maffra and four of the league’s leading six goal scorers, Chris Aurisch, Nick Fowler, Jason Schuback and Brenton Martin. I’ll tip Sale to register its first victory at Maffra since 1999.
Warragul will be out to consolidate its third position when it hosts Traralgon. The Gulls upset the Maroons in round one and ensuing form has proved that the victory was no fluke as it has now accumulated six victories. Warragul will field a formidable side this week, bolstered by its under18 Gippsland Power representatives Ben Hughes. Joel Morgan, Ben Jostlear and Brenton Sheehan due to the TAC Cup bye for the national championships. After its strong finish last week over Morwell those players dropped to make room for the emerging youngsters can be considered desperately unlucky. Traralgon returned to some semblance of its best form last week in the first half against Garfield, only to put in a horror second half and give it supporters little idea whether it is on the road to recovery. With Kael Bergles at the fall of the packs, Ben Hughes and the superimpressive ruckman Matt Gray drifting forward, the Gulls should be able to conjure a matchwinning score. Matt Fitzpatrick will return for Traralgon but Greg Morley and Tom McQualter are both unlikely to come up this week. At Western Park, Warragul should win by a margin around 20 points.
Based on last week’s form, when it received a 120point pasting at the hands of Maffra, Drouin looks hard pressed to turn its form around when it visits Moe. Marc Olsen and Brent Mounsey should return but their presence is unlikely to ease the Hawks’ scoring woes. Moe will be wary of Drouin, which upset it by 10 points in their first encounter in round one. Since then Moe appears to have regained its composure and over the past two weeks was showing glimpses of the form that took the side the preliminary final last year. Moe has a host of nippy and inform midfielders in Matt Dickason, Gary Blandford and Chris Smogavec to counter Drouin’s Matt Hedley, Michael Ablett and Danny Murphy, so the result is largely to be decided by the team that has the more potent forwards. In this area, Moe is far superior with Dean Caldow, Jason Shields, Stuart Robertson and Karl Mutke all likely to pose a big headache for Drouin. Moe should win by 30 points.
After two consecutive losses, Morwell is teetering in sixth spot, however this week it should get some respite when it meets Leongatha. The Tigers will well remember its firstround encounter with the Parrots, for it got rolled by five points and with all its rivals having dispatched Leongatha with ease that loss will haunt the Tigers if it misses the finals by one match. Morwell has an injury concern with ruckman Ben Webb leaving proceedings in the third quarter last week with a rib injury however it should be boosted by the return of its talented Gippsland Power youngsters, ruckman Brent Connelly and onballers Robert Michaelides and Jeff Ryan. Leongatha will keep its fingers crossed that its star Paul LePage comes up fit after appearing to hobble off in last week’s game against Moe. There will be no repeat of the firstround result and Morwell will get over the line comfortably.
This week’s round with selections in capitals: WARRAGUL v Traralgon, Maffra v SALE (Sunday), MOE v Drouin, MORWELL v Leongatha, Garfield bye.
