In what was a wonderful opportunity to push for a top four spot on the ladder, the Dandenong Southern Stingrays played in fits and starts to eventually go down by 5 points to the Geelong Falcons in the Round 11 TAC Cup clash last Sunday at Skilled Stadium in Geelong.
Playing on an AFL venue was a great buzz for the Stingrays players as the traveled to Geelong to tackle the highly rated Falcons. The Stingrays started slowly and despite having first use of a 2-3 goal breeze did not make the most of it. The Stingrays 14 inside 50’s resulted in only 1 late goal to Chris Doria who drifted down the fatside from the Wing to mark in the goal square and convert. Too often the Stingrays mid field zoned off their very dangerous opponents and were made to pay as the highly skilled and very quick Falcons repeatedly pumped the ball forward.
The second quarter was all the Stingrays as the piled on 8 goals straight into the breeze to convert a 13 point ¼ time deficit into a 3 goal half time lead. The Stingrays denied the Falcons the ball through the midfield and put a lot of pressure on the Falcons tall defenders. Scott Sienkiewicz was in fine touch both controlling the Falcons play makers and winning plenty of it through the midfield. Doria was having his best game for the year with a fine performance on the Wing and up forward and Rick Ferraro was his usual industrious self and managed 3 goals for the game. Corey Millard was impessive at CHF, Tom Gillies was steady at FB and Aaron Purves shrugged off his disappointment of being left out of the Vic metro team with a fine game forward and on-ball which resulted in 20+ possession and 3 goals.
The third quarter was a repeat of the first as the Stingrays allowed the Falcons to run and carry the ball into the corridor and were outscored despite having the breeze. It was almost time on before the Stingrays kicked their first goal for the term but 3 late ones to Aaron Purves, Riley heddles and Levi Casboult put the Stingrays back in front. The 11 point ¾ time lead was once again going to tough to defend, just like last week. The last stanza was goal for goal with the falcons always having a slight buffer after they opened up with 3 quick goals early in the term. Eight points down with only a couple of minutes left the Stingrays pressed forward to have the last 4 shots at goal. One was smothered on the mark, one hit the post and the other two could only register behinds including a shot from 40m out by Billy Hayes to draw the game after the final siren had rung left the Stingrays 5 points adrift at the end. Stingrays Coach Graeme Yeats was disappointed with a number of the more senior players who lacked the consistency of effort expected at this level and may find themselves back in local football next week as he promised to ring in the changes to inject some pace and enthusiasm into the side.
Next Wednesday 9th July is the final day of the Under 18 National Carnival with Vic Metro taking on WA in the grand final at Telstra Dome at 2.30pm and the game is live on FoxSports. The Stingrays meanwhile have a home game next Saturday at 2.00pm against the Northern Knights in a must win series of three home games.
Last Modified on 18/07/2008 12:42