Moody’s Match Report – Round 8

SANFLW League Match Report

After a tough weekend on the park against Norwood in Round 7, our girls faced another challenge this week at home playing League Leaders Sturt who much like us, were coming off a few rough weeks with a couple losses in a row and looking for redemption. We unfortunately lost ball magnet Jess Macolino during the week to Health and Safety protocols but welcomed into the team a few promising young guns in Tamika May, Grace McNicol and Tiana Fernandez as we look to inject and promote a few of our junior players for the remainder of the season.

From the first bounce our girls were going to be in for a tough day. Sturt brought the pressure early with 14 inside 50’s in the first quarter which meant our backline had to work hard to control the onslaught but unfortunately, we were unable to get the ball into our forward line. Zoe Venning found plenty of the ball early with 11 disposals and Beatrice Devlyn was holding strong down back with 7 disposals at 86% efficiency. Captain Madi Russell was impressive with her contested football and lead well down back against the pressure.

It took less than a minute in the 2^nd quarter for Sturt to hit the scoreboard and continued to run away with the game. We were no match against their intensity and pressure and Sturt managed to pull away further at the main break by kicking another 3 unanswered goals. Zoe Venning although a little wasteful by foot still found plenty of the ball and had 16 disposals at half time. Skipper Madi Russell again won a majority of her battles in the backline and Beatrice Devlyn continued her impressive workrate and delivery by foot each with 11 disposals at half time.

It was much of the same during the last half of footy. Sturt kept up the pressure in their forwardlines and our backline did what they could to stem the flow, but unfortunately with a rotation down on the bench we weren’t able to claw our way back into the game. Our only goal of the game came from young gun Lucy Boyd off a nice, clean assist with Tasmanian recruit Lily Johnson. Lucy was able to run into an open goal with only 3 minutes remaining in the game.

Zoe Venning was our leading disposal winner for the game with an equal game high 27 disposals, Beatrice Devlyn finished with 23 disposals at 75% efficiency and Madi Russell picked up a season high 19 disposals and impressed with her 1-on-1 efforts in defence. Kate Walsh also impressed with her ruck efforts and was in and around the contests for most of the day, Tiana Fernandez was also really impressive in her first league game back with her intensity in defense.

Another tough loss this week puts us at 1 win 7 losses for the season with 4 rounds left to go. We will travel to Elizabeth this weekend to face Centrals and look for revenge after a close loss last time we met.

Final Score:

West Adelaide 1.2 (8) def by Sturt 11.6 (72)

Goal Kickers:

Lucy Boyd 1

Best Players:

Madi Russell, Kate Walsh, Tiana Fernandez, Beatrice Devlyn