Tigers suffer a second narrow loss

It was a privilege to be playing on Mother’s Day against North on the 100th anniversary of their time at Prospect Oval, where we replicated their first ever game at this ground. Conditions were perfect and we were looking forward to bouncing back from our loss to Port the previous week against a very strong North outfit.

But it wasn’t to be. It was a a disappointing one to lose in the last minute to a free kick against us 10m out from their goal. Unfortunately it was another extremely close contest and we ended up on the wrong side of the ledger when the final siren sounded.

We knew it was important to start the game well and for the majority of the first quarter we played the way I wanted to. We were accurate in front of goals, kicking five goals to one, we were defending well, and our ball movement was looking positive on a bigger ground to what we are used to.

The second quarter was one that was played in patches, with both sides having the momentum after we started well and kicked the first goal of the quarter. We were struggling to get our hands on the ball but our defence was strong and we were rebounding the ball well. We let ourselves down with some costly free kicks that resulted directly in goals to North. But I was pleased with the way we were able to wrestle back the momentum in the quarter, kicking three of the last four goals of the quarter.

The third quarter started with North getting a lucky goal early on when Snooky was held without the ball and was unfortunately turned as he kicked it, so it ended up going the wrong way and resulted in a goal. North then claimed another one from centre bounce. From here, it was pleasing to see our guys rally together and wrestle the momentum back in our favour. We had our opportunities to be further ahead at ¾ time, kicking 3:4 for the quarter, but North were extremely accurate and continued their impressive accuracy, kicking five goals and n0 behinds during the third quarter to match their six goals straight in the second quarter.

The last quarter turned into a really good contest and we had our chances, kicking 2:5 to 3:3 for the quarter. But unfortunately we didn’t make the most of our chances throughout the day and North did. It was a disappointing way to finish the first batch of games knowing that the last two got away from us. It has been a tough start to the season playing the top five teams and a full Port Adelaide team. But we’ve managed to win four and this sets us up well leading into the next round of matches after the bye.

Congratulations to Liam McBean, Sam Durdin and Matthew Allen on being selected for the State team to play WA this weekend in Perth.

Rest assured we will learn from the last couple of weeks and enjoy a break this weekend before priming ourselves for our next game against South Adelaide at ACH Stadium on Saturday 21^st May.

– Brett Hand, Senior Coach

Goal kickers: L. McBean (5), H. Stagg (4), L. Hosie (3), C. Gerloff, M. Snook