4 in a row for the Bays in Round 8

I have a few reflections a day or so on from our Round 8 clash with Central District Football club. The first is that I’m really proud of our group for the way they had worked their way through the week, and in a tough physical contest were able to grind out another important win.

The next is we have work to do – as stated a few times over the year. But, being able to win ugly and not playing exactly how we are wanting on a consistent basis against good teams is a really positive sign. Like everyone we would like to get the game on our terms early and then play exciting attacking football and let the score board take care of itself, but the reality is, it is a good competition with some strong competitive football clubs that are hell bent on chasing what we are.

It was certainly a challenging week, firstly being a 6 day turn around out of a really tough physical game against WWT the previous Sunday. It doesn’t allow us to train as would like with the time available and is far from ideal. This was then compounded with the news that Lachlan Hosie’s season was over with the knee injury suffered against WWT a lot worse than we had first suspected. No doubt this had knocked a fair bit of energy out of our group when it became reality on Thursday. This is the third reflection out of the game, we were not able to play with same energy over the day especially in offence where we settled to kick long to contests far too often. This was added to by our overuse of the ball by hand which is not what we do when we are playing somewhere near our best and some poor errors by foot when we had some opportunities. Credit to the opposition also who were really strong in their pressure and willingness to keep getting at us.

There was some positive in the game also and while we didn’t have the energy we would like in offence our defensive intent was again strong for most part. We were able to scramble well often and we felt our pressure on them was equally strong and the numbers suggest that with 100 tackles for the day. This is the one big positive over our last 4 games and has played a major part in putting 4 wins in row together. Out of a mixed-up week for all we were able to end it with a really positive outcome which is the most important part.

Well done to our Reserves group, for the third game in a row they were able to play a really strong brand in both offence and defence. It is really pleasing to see the development and consistency in a number of players across the group. Equally pleasing is the complete 4 quarter efforts that the group is producing week to week. There are 2 or 3 guys that are playing at a level that is demanding selection and this is what we are after as we continue to build into the season. Exciting for our club to have this group performing so well.

We head into this week with a couple of extra days break and an opportunity to put a really strong week of training together before heading into our Monday clash with North Adelaide at Stratarama Stadium. It shapes as a great contest with the importance of a good result as we head into the mid-season bye the following week. We look forward to seeing a big crowd at the game with lots of exciting things planned. Most importantly, we will have a really desperate group looking to win our 5^th game in a row.

Go The Bays

– Darren Reeves, Senior Coach

Goal kickers: Allen (3), Holder, Lyons, Martini, McBean, Reynolds, Stagg, Stretch, Walker

Best Players: Martini, Allen, Bell, Lovelock, Stagg, Gould