By David Nagel
Due to their run of success – Cora Lynn is the team that everyone likes to beat and the Cobras will face another foe keen to inflict some pain when a red-hot Tooradin-Dalmore arrives at the Cobradome on Saturday.
Talking to people around the traps, there’s not a lot of sympathy for the Cobras at the moment after their 121-point defeat at the hands of Inverloch-Kongwak over the Easter weekend in round three.
The Cobras have inflicted that same type of damage to many competitors over the years and now need to dig deep to avoid some collateral damage of their own.
The Cobras are a great club – we’re all aware of that – and you would expect nothing less than a repeat of the guts and determination the Cobras showed in the narrow round-one loss to Philip Island on this very same deck.
Players like Billy Thomas, Lachie Peluso, Tim Payne, Nathan Gardiner and Jeremy Monckton wear the Cobras colours with pride and will be refreshed and ready to go for this bitterly tough assignment.
The Seagulls are flying…there’s no other way to describe it.
But they haven’t been tested yet, against Kilcunda-Bass, Korumburra-Bena and Warragul Industrials, teams we would expect them to defeat easily before the gates opened to start the season.
Cora Lynn at its best would be an enormous challenge and give us a far greater idea of the Seagulls potential for success later in the year.
Let’s hope the Cobras do produce their best because, if they don’t, they could be in some real trouble here.
The Seagulls have elite level class, with Adam Oxley, Brent Macaffer and Blake Grewar the absolute cream of the crop, while players like Andrew Proctor and Adam Galea would run through a brick wall – or try anyway – for the Tooradin-Dalmore Football Club.
There’s class, there’s passion…there’s a real desire to break a quarter-of-a-century drought!
The Cobras will be improved, they simply have to be…but the Gulls will win by 27 points.
Bunyip is another team playing great footy at the moment but the Bulldogs will need to be on their toes when they travel to Kooweerup on Saturday.
Bulldogs coach Tim McGibney is trying to piece together a balanced game style, with the contest, offence, and defence all equal contenders on his wish list.
“For me, that’s what separates the top four teams at the start of the season from the rest of the comp,” McGibney said.
“They’re quite balanced offensively, defensively and at the contest, and we’re starting to link those things together.
“One doesn’t work without the other.”
McGibney bristles just a touch when people describe his team as solely an attacking force, with the experienced coach fully aware that a sturdy defence is what stacks up in finals.
McGibney has two of the best in the business in Aaron Paxton and Jye Keath and expect those two warriors to be given the major tasks of stopping Jason Wells and Nathan Voss on the weekend.
Stop those two and the Bulldogs are well on the way to victory.
Expect a close contest here…and possibly an upset, but we’ll go for the Bulldogs by 15 points.
Dalyston currently finds itself inside the top-six but starts an extraordinarily tough part of its draw when it welcomes Inverloch-Kongwak on Saturday.
The Magpies take on the Sea Eagles, and then face games against Tooradin-Dalmore, Nar Nar Goon and Philip Island in a part of the season that will test their new-found confidence.
“I think the win-loss column is irrelevant for us in the next four games, although we would love to win them all,” said Dalyston coach Peter Dunlop.
“This year, more than any other year, every side has improved from the bottom end, and the top end hasn’t got 20 percent better like the bottom sides have.
“We think if we turn up and play really well, and play how we want to play, we can take it to any team on any given day.
“Hopefully we can snatch one or two along the way.”
The Magpies challenge will be made harder by the absence of star forward Adam Amin, against a Sea Eagles’ side coming off a 20-goal win.
We wish the Magpies well…but it’s the Sea Eagles by 59 points.
In other games this week, a young Garfield side will be put to the ultimate test when the Stars welcome Phillip Island on Saturday.
The Stars will have a crack, they have done all season, but less than a triple-figure margin would almost be considered a win.
Warragul Industrials will enjoy the step back in class when the Dusties welcome Korumburra-Bena to Western Park.
That’s no slur on the Giants, more praise for the Dusties opponents of the last two rounds, Phillip Island and Tooradin-Dalmore.
The Dusties will have learned a lot over the last two weeks and will put those learning to good use in a 35-point victory.
And Kilcunda-Bass will look to square its ledger at 2-2 when the Panthers roll out the red carpet for Nar Nar Goon.
The Panthers are looking pretty good this season, but will need to be at the top of their game against a Goon side that has numerous focal points up forward.
If Yawney doesn’t get you, McDermott might, or the Homfray’s might chip in as well.
It’s the Goon to get the choccies by 36 points.
