REPRESENTATIVE football is a great test for all who take part and it’s guaranteed that the Mornington Peninsula Nepean Football League (MPNFL) Sharks and the West Gippsland Latrobe Football League will put on a show worth watching at Pakenham this Saturday.
The match is part of the VCFL Country Challenge round, a bi-annual event that is played in between the similarly scheduled VCFL Country Championship years and is designed to pit neighbouring country leagues of similar standing against each other for pride and bragging rights.
MPNFL and West Gippsland sides have a long history of competition over many decades and this year’s match will be contested for the Pakenham Gazette Cup, won in its inaugural year by the MPNFL in 2008.
The two sides have gone down different tracks as far as selection is concerned with the MPNFL concentrating on youth, speed and all-out attack and the WGLFL choosing a more physical and experienced squad with the aim of applying pressure.
The MPNFL team will be led by Adam Hunter from Dromana and Jared Goldsack from Pakenham.
Among the players to watch will be star wingman Luke Walker (providing he is not playing for Collingwood), teenage playmaker Brad Sykes, on-baller Michael Collins, ruckman Donny Epa and prolific goalkickers Ryan Hendy and Daniel Fry.
Unfortunately former AFL player Andrew Williams and former Frankston ruckman Russell Gabriel were late omissions from the list due to injury, however coach Paul Kennedy is confident that the side will be very competitive.
“We’ve gone for a fast, attacking team with the aim of hopefully kicking a big score. You won’t see any tagging from us,” he said.
“You need to cover a lot of ground at Pakenham and we’ve tried to pick the best team possible. I don’t believe in just picking players just so clubs have a representative and we’ve gone on this year’s form more than anything else in selecting the side.
“Nobody is in there on reputation and we’ll go into this weekend with a team full of character keen to do their best on the day.”
Kennedy said he enjoyed the challenge of coaching at this level and that it was a real team effort between him and his assistants Michael Holland and Steve Capp.
WGLFL coach Hayden Burgiel will rely on some tried-and-true stars in his push to reverse last year’s result.
Forwards Matt Forys and Adrian Burgiel are genuine stars and are hard to beat one-on-one with the two best MNPFL defenders sure to get big jobs.
Former AFL Kangaroo Troy Makepeace and former Saint Brett Knowles, along with Maffra skipper Ben Batalha, will provide the experience, while Ryan Davey, Michael Geary and Gary Jones have genuine speed.
Brent Eastwell, Damian Carmody, Brad Rayson, Craig Robbins, Daniel Risol and Leigh Sheehan all provide class and coach Burgiel said his side would not allow the MPNFL to get an early break as they did in 2008.
“We intend to pick a side that can exert a lot of pressure around the ball,” he said.
“We will have a strong emphasis on tackling and forcing errors and tight defence.
“We hope to avoid a repeat of last year when we got jumped in the opening 10 minutes. Based on the team we played last year, I don’t think they have any more talent than us.”
Players who will miss the game include Ben Coleman, Daniel Stubbe, Kelvin Porter, Steve Hazelman, Adrian Cox and Kane Fraser.
There will be an under-18 curtain raiser starting at noon, as well as two grades of netball with the 19-and-unders starting at noon and the A-grade game at 2pm.
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