Big birds… bigger battle

Reigning Norm Walker Medallist, Beaconsfield’s Scott Meyer, will look to put his unique mark on this Saturday’s huge clash against Cranbourne at Holm Park Road. 124523 Picture: ROB CAREW

By DAVID NAGEL

CASEY CARDINIA FOOTBALL NETBALL LEAGUE
PREVIEW – ROUND 15

 

BEACONSFIELD v CRANBOURNE
SOME say our great game is not a matter of life and death but, in football terms anyway, this Saturday’s clash between Beaconsfield and Cranbourne, well… it’s about as important as a home-and-away fixture gets.
Cranbourne, the perennial grand finalist, has a fight on its hands to remain in the top-three, while Beaconsfield needs to win to keep its double-chance hopes alive. Both teams are playing close to their best football of the season, with Beacy on a three-game winning streak while Cranbourne has extended its unbeaten run out to four. The last time these two sides met at Holm Park Road, Cranbourne dominated for three quarters, in last year’s preliminary final, before Beaconsfield made the scoreboard look respectable in the final term.
That game became the pre-curser to one of the great grand finals of all time… wouldn’t the winner of this contest love to take that sort of form into the remainder of the season.
If there was ever a right time for Beaconsfield to get a hold of Cranbourne, it is now – because it certainly is vulnerable.
Serious injuries to Ryan Davey, Max Gearon and Leigh Holt have been well documented and have opened the door for players in the club’s development squad, like Shaun Sparkes, Joshua Rich and Martin Leinmueller – from the under 19s – to show their wares ahead of this year’s finals series.
The problem for Beaconsfield however, is that when you take on Cranbourne you take on some of the most elite talent in the competition, and they’re consistent top-end performers, which makes them such valuable commodities.
Speedsters Ryan Jones and Luke Bee-Hugo have been superb for Cranbourne this season, the combination of lethal-acceleration through the midfield, and the ability to hit the scoreboard hard- has got the Eagles out of jail on a regular basis.
Cranbourne is also well-stocked down the spine, with Brandon Osborne and Stu Morrish down back, the mercurial Curtis Barker likely to return in the centre, while Troy Tharle and the club’s heart-and-soul, its skipper Marc Holt, providing difficult match-ups for the Beaconsfield defence.
The most intriguing thing to observe at 2pm on Saturday will be what Beaconsfield coach Clint Evans does with his in-form key-position player, Shaun Pollard.
Pollard is moving well at the moment and would appear the perfect choice to take on the difficult assignment of stopping Cranbourne’s dangerous half-forward, Michael Theodoridis. But does Evans rob Peter to pay Paul, with Pollard clearly the most influential forward on the ground in Beaconsfield’s big-win over Doveton last week.
There will be a real-hot start to this contest, one of four games remaining this season that will have a direct bearing on the double-chance hopes of Beaconsfield, Cranbourne and Pakenham.
And there’ll be some added motivation in this one too, with Beaconsfield celebrating the 40-year reunion of its 1974 premiership side with a luncheon, while Cranbourne will be hoping to celebrate an important victory at its 125th Anniversary Ball on Saturday night.
On form, there’s nothing in this one, but Cranbourne’s freakish ability up forward has won it many a game in the past, and it will do so again, it’s Scott Sutherland’s Eagles to win the battle of the birds by 14 points.

DOVETON v PAKENHAM
LADDER positions wouldn’t suggest so, but Pakenham face a massive test to prove that it really is a top-three contender when the Lions make the trip to Robinson Oval to take on Doveton on Saturday.
The Lions, who are humming along nicely in third-place on the ladder, visit a ground that doesn’t hold fond memories in recent times, with their last two outings at the ground not ending well.
Pakenham was clearly a better side than Doveton last year, but a 38-point loss to the Doves, in Round 4, went down as one of the club’s poorest performances of the season. The Lions were totally outplayed that day, out-hunted by the Doves, who will believe they can do likewise this weekend.
Pakenham then returned to Robinson Oval for last year’s first-semi-final, where it went down to Beaconsfield.
Doveton will not want to waste a promising stretch through the middle of the season, a stretch that claimed five-victories on the trot before a loss to Beaconsfield last week. The Doves are out for one more scalp, and with visits to Cranbourne and Berwick, and a home clash with Narre Warren to come, this might be their best chance left for the season.
Pakenham just keeps on winning, and it has done so through a positive attitude, one installed in it by coach Steve O’Bryan and spread through the group via some Lion-hearted leaders and a band of talented youngsters.
Players that have been around for a while like Anthony Young, Dean Blake, Cory Lenders, Kym Jones and Nathan Brown are sensing something big and will be keen to make sure this weekend is not reflected upon with regret.
The Lions will break their mini-hoodoo and get the choccies by 19 points.

ROC v BERWICK
WITH its theme-song still ringing in its ears for the first time since Round 8, Berwick will be out to make it two-in-a-row when it visits ROC at Starling Road.
The Wickers can console themselves with being competitive during their five-game losing streak, but the bottom-line is, that stretch of the season was a time when opportunity knocked – but it wasn’t taken. The Wickers’ standard of play may not have reach the glorious heights of their first eight weeks of the season, but they were still in every game… you know the story… the really good teams just find a way to win.
The problem for the Wickers is that three of those losses were true eight-pointers, against teams around them, and it means success this year will need to be earned the hard way.
Berwick’s best footy is still brilliant, the class of Madi Andrews, the grunt of Michael Harold, the leap, and guts and determination of young ruckman Jake Gains… they’ve got all the tools.
ROC’s young bodies appear to be tiring, slowing as the season rolls on and it remains to be seen if Brad Jones can produce a bit of magic and get some spring back in the Kangaroos’ step. It won’t happen this week… it’s the confident-again Wickers to take the points.

TOORADIN v KEYSBOROUGH
IF Tooradin is struggling for motivation right now, maybe it should spare a thought for Keysborough -the Seagulls opponent at Westernport Oval this Saturday.
Sure, three wins from 14 rounds means the Seagulls are playing out time, but the Burra is absolutely down on its knees right now, showing real character and sacrifice, just to honour its playing commitments for the remainder of the season.
Players like Geoff Humphreys, Ryan Goodes, Danny Morland and Corey Wilkinson are Burra through and through and it would be stinging like a paper-cut treated with lemon-juice to see what their club is going through right now. Tooradin is not in a position to handing out sympathy however, the Seagulls need a win to bring some cheer to the club after a horror-run with injuries has seen it largely depleted.
Matt Wade, Michael Wallace, Julian Suarez and Paddy Chin, will be looking for big games and to taste victory for the first time since Round 10. It will happen… it’s the Seagulls by 46 points.

HAMPTON PARK v NARRE WARREN
IT’s quite appropriate really that Narre Warren will make the short trip down Pound Road to take on Hampton Park at Robert Booth Reserve on Saturday… because when top meets bottom… it’s going to end in a pounding.
The Magpies are quite rightly showing absolutely no mercy as they head towards the business end of the season, they’ve got one thing on their mind, and come five o’clock this Saturday, it will be just 49 days away.
They’re just plain ruthless this lot.
In the last two weeks they’ve registered a 15, an 11, a 10 and two nine-goal quarters and you can bet the Redbacks will cop more of the same this weekend. The Baskaya’s, Kain and Kerem, and the Collins’ boys Chris, Damian and Michael, are all in ripping form and will prove too much for the Redbacks to handle.
Expect something ugly!