Altona’s year came to an end in the cruellest way, knocked out of the Hockey Victoria premier league men’s finals in a penalty shoot out.
Facing Doncaster in the semi finals on Saturday, the Seagulls had to fight hard after Doncaster took control of the game in the middle part of the game.
The Seagulls managed to force the game to overtime, with scores locked at 2-2 at the end of regular time.
The match would go to a penalty shoot out, with Doncaster winning 4-3 on penalties.
Seagulls president Alex Tyrrell said the group would be disappointed for it to end that way.
“It was a really good game,” he said. “It was a super high quality game and I thought we were better early in the game.
“We let them score and they led 2-0 and were really on top in the game. We then managed to score an equaliser with one or two minutes to go.
“We fought back well before losing in the shoot out.”
Cooper Burns continued his good form, scoring both of the Seagulls goals in regular time. The young Australian star finished with 40 goals for the season from 15 games.
Tyrrell said the coach was rapt with some of the performances of the young guys in the game and the way they were able to respond.
The semi final appearance backs up a preliminary performance last season, having won two finals on penalty shoot outs to get there.
“It was a bit of a shame though to go out the way that we did,” he said.
“Overall it’s been a positive season and we played some good hockey yesterday [Saturday] “They will be disappointed not to go further.”
It was a tough weekend for Seagulls reserves side which lost its semi final to Doncaster, 7-0 having caused an upset win in the first week of finals.
Tyrrell said overall it had been a strong season for the club, with both their premier men’s sides making finals and their premier women’s side finishing just outside of finals and avoiding relegation.
In women’s premier league, Footscray’s finals run is over in straight sets.
Having lost in the first week of finals, the Bulldogs faced Southern United in a knockout semi final on Saturday.
Despite having won the only game between the two teams in the regular season, the Bulldogs lost 2-0 to be knocked out of the finals.
Tara Murray
