We were greeted by a howling cross wind for our round 5 away game against St Kilda City at Wattie Watson Oval. Our pre-game centred around better decision making and taking more advantage of our opportunities. We knew the opposition would come at us from the word go and we weren’t wrong. After Matt read out to the team a few words from our club recognising and celebrating the contribution of which Indigenous players and culture have made to the game, our team ran out ready to go. Our backline in Gus, Gibbo, Harry T and Jem were under enormous pressure against the wind in the first and combine that with St Kilda’s running ability and frantic ball movement made for an intense opening. To our players’ credit we held the opposition to only two goals in a five-goal wind for the quarter. Having the wind in the second we knew that it was our turn and it didn’t take long to score our first major from a terrific mark and set shot from Jacob. Two more goals for the quarter courtesy of the strong marking and long-range kicking Luke and we were down by only one goal at the half time break. An awesome first half, probably the best half of footy we have played all year. We just had to keep the intensity up in the third and we would be right in it.
As it happens in this game though the opposition seemed to always be in the right spot, and they kicked a further four goals in the third. There was a lot of work to be done in the final quarter and we knew a couple of quick goals and we would be right back in it. Unfortunately, those goals never came but the never give up approach and attitude to our game stayed. Our players kept working hard and the endeavour shown by our team not only in the last quarter but for the entire day will certainly put us in good stead going forward into the season. It was a day where the score line didn’t really reflect the game. The sportsmanship awards for the day went to Jamie and Tom who certainly both played in the spirit of the game and of the day.
We look forward to hitting the training track again this week and to our next encounter with Prahran at home.
Rovers 3.3-21
St Kilda City 7.13-55
