The Northern Knights have suffered a disappointing seven goal loss at the hands of the Gippsland Power. In torrid conditions down at Moe it was the Power who got the early lead and gradually added to it in each quarter.
The first term saw Gippsland come out and attack the contest hard. Their ferocity at the ball saw them winning possession in contested situations, which in turn meant that the Knights were conceding too many free kicks. On the rare occasions the Knights did enter their forward 50 the Power were able to rebound quickly and with little difficulty. At quarter time Gippsland held a five goals to two lead.
In a relatively uneventful second quarter the sides traded one goal each, however Gippsland were inaccurate in their conversion to keep the Knights alive. However, it was clear that the Power were dealing with the wet conditions much better and this certainly wasn’t lost on Knights Coach Paul Satterley. “Our boys just didn’t adapt to the conditions. Some were trying to do things that didn’t suit the weather like handballing too much.”
The second half was played in a similarly scrappy fashion and the Knights could only muster a goal in each quarter, while the Power scored three goals in each of the last two terms to blow the final margin out to 41 points.
It was a day where very little was going right for the Knights and Satterley noted that it all started from that opening term. “We were going in second for the footy and were giving away too many frees. It was the first wet weather game (of the season) for both sides and Gippsland dealt with it really well.”
Satterley maintained a touch of optimism by putting it down as a learning curve for his inexperienced group, which consisted of 16 bottom aged or first year players. “For a young side, throughout the game there was some good intensity at stages, but it’s the inconsistent efforts we need to get rid of. The inexperience of our side is not an excuse because there were areas that we were poor in that we can be better at.
“A four quarter performance is something we will keep working on. It’s not just keeping our intensity up within a game. We have players not backing it up from good games that they’ve had, so our consistency also needs to improve on a week to week basis. Improvement doesn’t come in one week, it comes over a number of weeks.”
Next week is a general bye in the TAC Cup for U/18 Vic Metro trial games to take place, but the Knights next game is against the Geelong Falcons on Saturday May 17 at Skilled Stadium.
Gippsland Power 12.11.83 def. Northern Knights 5.12.42
Goals: Hood 2, Dornauf, Hurley, Kelly
Best: Lambert, Paynter, Hill, Dornauf, Drapac, Kelly
Last Modified on 19/05/2008 16:38