A positive end to the minor rounds for 2024

Our Round 19 and last minor round game for the season against South Adelaide, set up as an important step for our group. While the end result and the score board wasn’t overly important in what this week would look like, it was certainly important for us to clean up some areas of concern in our game and continue to build on areas that we have been pleased with. The first part of the week was important to reassure the playing group that we were doing a lot of things at a high level.  With 2 wins and 4 losses over the previous 6 weeks it is easy to start looking too deeply into it and start finding things that might not be there. Instead, we focused on the KPIs that we consider important to what we do. The majority of those had been really strong throughout the 6-game block, in fact mostly in our favour. It really did help our group feel confident in what we were able to show them, while also being really clear on what we needed to do to get our game back at the consistent level for longer periods. The other part was to make sure we made training fun and not losing sight of that at any point.

Pleasingly we were able to see what we know we are capable of show up for long periods. We recognise that South Adelaide were a young group, but it was all about how we went about our work. Relentless pressure on the ball, really engaged in our team defence to control the ground and then the work rate to make the ground long and wide to allow us to move the ball with real energy. For large parts of the day all of those areas were strong and we were able to see the reward on the score board, which is something that has been a little bit off in recent times. It was a strong performance right across the ground and provides us with some confidence that had been challenged over the previous 2 weeks.

Our reserves group were unable to continue on their form from the previous week. They found themselves behind in the game early and while they were able to get back into the game, they were not able to quite get over the line. It was a challenge with a number of players struggling with illness in the days leading up to the game. While it is disappointing not to get the result it has been a strong effort to finish 3^rd on the table and into a Qualifying Final against Sturt at Unley Oval on Saturday afternoon. Well done to the group on their efforts to this point.

We now head into an Elimination final against Woodville West Torrens at Adelaide Oval on Sunday afternoon at 12.15pm. Exciting for our group to be back at this point of the season. We are confident in the work we have done, confident in what our best football looks like and where that can take us. We have a group that is incredibly hungry and focused on what is ahead. While we have had some challenges, some that are common knowledge and a number that haven’t been over the year, we have never waived on what we wanted to achieve out of the season. We can’t wait to get after it on Sunday afternoon.

We look forward to seeing all of supporters there to cheer us on.

Go The Bays

– Darren Reeves, Senior Coach

Goals: McBean (5), Holder (3), Reynolds (2), Bell (2), Chandler (2), Lyons (2), Allen, Bailey, Snook, Window

Best Players: Allen, Curran, McBean, Bell, Lyons, Proud