by Jim Gordon
Defeating Ouyen United for the third time this season, Beulah marched straight into the Grand Final with a well deserved 15 point victory in the 2nd semi final on Saturday. The Blues had set themselves one major goal this season, and that was to make it to the MFL Grand Final. They did so to the great delight of coach and best on ground Scott Smith.
Having already won the MFL Best and Fairest Award for 2010, Smith has one step to go to make it a truly memorable year for not only himself, but for all of his tightly disciplined, hard tackling and talented team.
For the first three quarters Beulah had Ouyen United’s measure. They won across the centre, they held Ouyen United’s forwards and had the game well and truly in the bag by three quarter time.
To Ouyen United’s credit they came back in the final quarter and the crowd was left wondering how the Demons managed to get to within two goals of the Blues after a lacklustre performance all day. The Demons had hardly a winner on the ground over the day.
Peter Lehmann’s four goals for Beulah in his only match for the season was a standout contribution and with Riley Lehmann kicking another four, the Demon backline was under pressure all day. Todd Barker started off on Lehmann, and to his credit did reasonably well to end up one of Ouyen United’s better players on the day.
Down back for the Blues Kim Hallam and Chris McKenzie did well nullifying an Ouyen United forward line sadly missing Sonny Lindsay’s goal kicking prowess that had seen him score 50 goals in the past five weeks. Without Lindsay there, the Demon forwards were not able to function coherently even though Ash Connick did manage to chip in with four goals.
Beulah had stellar second and third quarters when they outscored Ouyen United eleven goals to five. The Demons couldn’t take a trick during this period. Beulah out muscled them and their bigger bodies meant that Ouyen United’s usually creative centre line players couldn’t get their trade mark handball game going often leaving targets short.
At half time Ouyen United moved Marc Hahnel from a wing into the centre and he immediately livened things up with some good contested marking and he created run out of the centre and around the packs.
Adam O’Callaghan did reasonably well on Jason Turnbull who nevertheless was a contributor with three goals for Beulah. Jarrod Munro kept the elusive Adam Carter to two goals. Jason Hahnel tried hard in the ruck all day and Brett Knowles bobbed up with two goals.
Beulah were deserved winners. They have maintained their undefeated record and will be desperately unlucky not to go all the way this year. For United it is back to the drawing board. They were sadly out of touch on Saturday and will need to lift their game next week to earn the right to have another go at the Beulah Blues in two weeks time.
Last Modified on 29/08/2010 12:28
