SPOTSWOOD is the form team in the countdown to the Western Region Football League division 1 finals.
The Woodsmen have rolled top side Deer Park and premiership contenders Sunshine Kangaroos in consecutive weeks to secure a top-two finish with a round to go.
PICTURE GALLERY: Spotswood v Sunshine Kangaroos
Woodsmen player-coach Chris O’Keefe said his side had achieved its first aim of the season.
“We use the home-and-away season to secure a top-three position to give ourselves a double chance and our best opportunity to play deep into the finals,” he said.
“It was important the last couple of weeks to have two good wins against top-four sides.”
The Woodsmen stared a 16-point deficit in the face at half-time against Sunshine at McLean Reserve on Saturday.
They came out sluggish and second to the ball, and their forays forward were disjointed.
The Woodsmen reassessed at half-time and returned to produce some of their best football of the season in a six-goal-to-zip third term before holding on for a 28-point win.
“It was a good win after a disappointing start,” O’Keefe said. “We were a little bit slow to get into gear … Sunshine came out really hard as we expected they would.
“We just didn’t execute very well early on, but after we addressed a few things at half-time we were able to turn it around fairly quickly and assert ourselves.
“Guys started to work hard for each other, we were able to put a lot more pressure on Sunshine and starve them of the footy, and then execute better going forward.
“When you do that, the scoreboard takes care of itself.”
While modern day football is increasingly about midfield rotations, the big men don’t get any shorter.
Jason Cloke, in a roaming role forward and back, and Murray Boyd, in the ruck, were dominant for the Woodsmen.
“They were both fantastic,” O’Keefe said. “Cloke played up the ground and he played at centre half-back for a bit, and when he did that he rebounded well for us. Boyd did 90 per cent of the work in the ruck and was outstanding all day.”
Young defender Bryce Miles was a calming influence coming out of the back half and performed a lock-down role admirably.
Full-back Ahmed Souki was the opposite, keeping dangerous Kangaroos forward Patrick Wiggins goalless and getting into a wrestling match with Macauley Goring in which the latter ended up over the boundary fence.
“He’s pretty funny like that – he’ll get fired up a bit every now and then,” O’Keefe said.
“He [Souki] was pushing him [Goring]backwards and when the fence came he just kept pushing him back and he [Goring] ended up going over.” While there was a bit of aggro in a game of importance to both clubs, O’Keefe was adamant neither side stepped over the line.
“You’ve got to have controlled aggression and we base our game around that,” he said.
“Especially this close to finals, there’s too much to risk. If you get rubbed out now for two weeks, you miss the first two weeks of the finals and you’re probably not going to get straight back into the team.”
The division 2 senior finals start this weekend, with Parkside taking on Manor Lakes in the qualifying final at Chirnside Park on Saturday, followed by an elimination final between Wyndhamvale and Sunshine Heights at the same venue on Sunday.
– ljenkinson@mmpgroup.com.au
