THE Box Hill Hawks will meet Geelong in this year’s VFL grand final after an impressive 52-point win over the Werribee Tigers at North Port Oval in the preliminary final on Sunday.
The Hawks have been branded as under rated and the under dog in this year’s finals series despite finishing in the top four and deserving of a first home final.
Coach Damian Carroll, who celebrated the preliminary final win on his birthday, was jubilant after the win which was inspired by Shane Savage with five goals.
“It’s been a terrific effort, we want to make sure that that’s guided into next week but full credit to the boys for what they’ve been able to get out of the last 20 weeks,” Carroll said.
“I think today for us it was definitely a lot of guys playing their role to get us over the line.”
He said there were several players eyeing off the chance to compete for Hawthorn in Friday night’s AFL preliminary final.
“I think a lot of that stuff they can’t control, they’ve just got to go out. It’s a tough time of year for selection at senior level and VFL level and I suppose, wherever you’re playing, you want to put your best foot forward and those guys did that today,” he said.
“It’s great that we’ve got both clubs still playing deep into September and the vibe around Hawthorn and the vibe around Box Hill has been terrific.”
The Hawks may face a dilemma at the selection table this week. It is likely Matt Spangher will return to the VFL grand final line-up if he isn’t picked in the AFL squad. And they will be hoping to squeeze in their skipper – Daniel Pratt – who will undergo a fitness test.
“It’s going to be a hard one for us…he’s (Pratt) got the opportunity to play. He certainly hasn’t played the amount of footy over the last 11 weeks as we would’ve liked but we know he’s a competitor and he’s a proud person and he’s a captain. Along with Daniel, we’ve got Luke Andrews, Michael Thompson, blokes who have been regular senior players but unfortunately this year it hasn’t worked out with injuries,” he said.
“We’ve just got to pick our best side that we think is going to win.”
Three years ago, Carroll took TAC Cup team Gippsland Power to a grand final and will do so now at the Hawks. He believes the Hawks deserve this opportunity given their season.
“We feel that throughout the course of the season, we’ve probably been labelled in that way various times but we’ve been able to string eight games in a row now…we know we’ve played some pretty good footy. We definitely deserve this opportunity with our 15-5 season and we did win three more games than Werribee throughout the season,” he said.
He said his team need to play a committed brand of footy for four quarters to beat Geelong.
“I think it’s going to have to be a committed, even performance from all our lines and it’s going to have to be constant for the entirety of the game because they can cut you open…obviously their ability to transit the footy to their key talls is certainly exceptional, we’re going to have to be at our best,” he said.
GEELONG made it through to this year’s grand final on the back of an 82-point win over Williamstown.
The win was simply pure Geelong.
“Full credit to the players, it was a professional performance. When you finish on top, there is a lot of expectation to win. To win our first two finals and make the grand final is a really big achievement for the players and to give ourselves a chance of winning another one,” coach Matthew Knights said.
“To keep Williamstown to maybe nine or 10 goals for the game on the back of them scoring so heavily last week against Port Melbourne, I thought it was a really good defensive effort,” he said.
PRELIMINARY 2
Geelong Cats 24.16-160 def Williamstown 11.12-78
2:10 PM, Sat 14 Sep at North Port Oval
GOALS
Geelong Cats: J. Walker 5, S. Kersten 4, J. Murdoch 3, B. Hartman 2, R. Bathie 2, B. Smedts 2, J. Schroder , J. Barham , L. Howe , T. Selwood , T. West , G. Burbury
Williamstown: F. Roberts 2, J. Johnstone 2, A. Anastasio 2, J. Tutt 2, D. Pearce , C. Wood , C. Lockwood
BEST
Geelong Cats: G. Horlin-Smith, J. Murdoch, M. Brown, C. Eardley, J. Walker, M. Sully
Williamstown: W. Wheeler, B. Jolley, J. Johnstone, L. Markovic, A. Anastasio, J. McNamara
PRELIMINARY 1
Box Hill Hawks 22.12-144 def Werribee Tigers 14.8-92
2:10 PM, Sun 15 Sep at North Port Oval
GOALS
Box Hill Hawks: S. Savage 5, L. Tobin 2, J. Ceglar 2, M. Osborne 2, S. Grimley 2, W. Langford 2, T. O”Brien 2, L. Lowden 2, X. Murphy , B. Retzlaff , J. Simpkin
Werribee Tigers: J. Bolton 5, B. Brown 3, L. McDonald , M. Sodomaco , A. Maric , B. Ross , B. Warren , B. Speight
BEST
Box Hill Hawks: S. Savage, W. Langford, M. Osborne, L. Lowden, M. Hallahan, K. Cheney
Werribee Tigers: A. Kennedy, B. Meredith, J. Bolton, D. Currie, S. Clouston, L. McDonald
NEXT WEEK:
VFL Grand Final
Box Hill Hawks vs Geelong Cats
2:15 PM, Sun 22 Sep at Etihad Stadium
Image courtesy of and with permission by Jenny Owens. All rights reserved.
