WEDDERBURN’S late-season resurgence has turned into finals dominance, with the Redbacks defeating Donald by 12 points to book their place in this year’s North Central Football League preliminary final.
It’s the first time the Redbacks have gone so deep into a season since 2014, the year of their last senior premiership.
Wedderburn will meet the loser of this Saturday’s second semi-final between Sea Lake Nandaly and Birchip-Watchem.
It continues a remarkable turnaround by Tom Metherell’s men, who had to win five of their last six games of the home-and-away season to qualify.
That included a 10-point win in the final round over the Royal Blues, with that result now coming back to haunt Donald after falling 7.13 (55) to 6.7 (43), despite Jamie Papalia and Trent Grant returning to the side.
The final margin could have been much wider if not for the Redbacks’ wasteful second quarter, where they kicked 1.5 to take a four-point lead into the main break.
Wedderburn found their range in the second half, however, with both clubs throwing everything at each other with their seasons on the line.
Redbacks coach Metherell was thrilled to know his team were just one win away from the big dance.
“It was very similar to last week’s game to be honest, it played out very much the same,” Metherell said.
“That win will give us a great deal of confidence, we’ve won six out of our last seven now and we know there’s still a big job to do, we’re not getting ahead of ourselves, but it’s bloody exciting.
“We had to change things up a little bit down back from last week due to Adam Postle missing through injury.
“Corey Lowry played on Todd Stevenson, which is a match up you wouldn’t necessarily see with the size difference, but Corey stood up really well.
“I thought we had a big impact on Andrew Browne’s game as well and Jordan Hargreaves in the ruck was unbelievable.
“His fight and effort against a big fella like Andrew Browne was second to none, (Hargreaves) can definitely hold his head high.”
Although the margin rarely got out past two goals for the entire day, it always felt as through Wedderburn were in control of the match, with Jackson McEwen, Danny Benaim and Lewis Holt running amok, while Ross Young, Ryley Barrack, Logan Geddes and Blake Grant worked overtime to keep Donald in the contest and bridge the gap.
“I felt like we had the majority of the play and when you get repeat entries and repeat stoppages in your forward half, it will often generate scores,” Metherell said.
“Our skill level probably wasn’t where it needed to be, but that’s finals footy, it’s always scrapy and it’s always hot, but just gaining territory with the footy helped us a lot.
“It was the same plan as last week with using those short kicks and opening the play up for us, which gave us a lot more looks down forward.”
Holt was one who came in for special praise from Metherell, with the wingman kicking the sealer in time on to give Wedderburn a 13-point lead and a well-earned victory.
“(Holt) kicked a couple of goals and it was by far his best game of the year,” Metherell said.
“He has really good wheels and is very quick, at the start of the year I gave him a bit of a licence to take the game on and yesterday he just took grass, took the game on and broke some lines, which helped a lot.
“It was a little bit close for comfort I suppose, but I was pretty calm with where the match sat because I felt we had a bit of a stranglehold on the game.
“Late in the game, I thought with the grasp we had the game, I felt it was about to break and in the last 15 minutes you could see our boys still running on top of the ground.
“I was confident we’d get over the line, the boys have been playing on instinct and confidence for the back half of the year which has held us in good stead over the last six weeks coming into a final like that.”
Jayden Jones returned for his first game in three weeks after straining a hamstring and was a solid contributor, along with Jacob DeAraugo, Darcy Jackson and Lowry, who were all named in the Redbacks’ best players.
With Postle also set to return for the preliminary final, the Redbacks will be well placed against either the Tigers or Bulls, according to Metherell, who was quick to emphasise that his team would still be the underdogs no matter who their next opponent was.
“We’ll go in as underdogs I’m sure, which is fine by us, we’ll just take the game on and play our style,” Metherell said.
“We enjoy being the underdogs lately and I think it’s bringing the best out of our boys.
“We’ve shown against both sides (Sea Lake Nandaly and Birchip-Watchem) that we can go with them, we just need to make sure we’re producing a four-quarter performance.
“If we’re consistent across four quarters, then who knows.”
