A SEVEN goal to two third quarter helped Lake Boga record their third win of the season, with the Magpies overcoming a determined Balranald at Greenham Park on Saturday.
After holding a four-point lead at the main break, the visitors turned it on in the second half with a dominant midfield performance from Braden Padmore, Kadek Irvan and Koben Ryan helping Lake Boga open up an insurmountable 33-point lead at three-quarter time.
Padmore was enormous in the 15.10 (100) to 10.12 (72) victory, with the Magpies joining Tooleybuc-Manangatang and Kerang in sitting just outside the top five.
It was an important result for Lake Boga, who after heavy losses to Cohuna and Woorinen in recent weeks, needed a strong performance to regain their confidence according to Lake Boga coach Dean Helmers.
“It’s games like these that a lot of people expect you to win, but we got the job done and that’s basically what we we set out to do, just get the four points,” Helmers said post-match.
“Even if we had to win ugly, we would have taken that.
“We had an idea of what we wanted to do and how we wanted to go about it, but our biggest issue is that we don’t really have the depth to go through the midfield at the moment.
“We sort of thought if it was a tight game and we had to break it open, we’d go with Padmore in the middle and our three best midfielders and leave Mardy McDonald and ‘Ding’ (Nathaniel Holmes-Brown) in the forward line and keep it open.
“It was a very physical and hard-fought game, it was tough footy, but that little plan we had before the game seemed to work when we executed it after half time.”
Mardy McDonald and Nathaniel Holmes-Brown would both finish the game with three goals each as Lake Boga took control after half time, with Padmore finding plenty of the ball in the crucial third term.
Irvan was also influential in the middle during this period, along with Ryan and Xavier Sherlock as the Magpies started to get their hands on the ball around the contest according to Helmers.
“We were playing some really good footy in patches, but we’ve sort of struggled in the centre of the ground this season,” Helmers said.
“Between the arcs have been an issue and we addressed it at half time and just said we’re not getting enough run through that area.
“I give them a bit of a spray at half time collectively and we put a big emphasis on all of them getting moving, that they needed to get in and out.
“We went away from having stationary guys inside our forward 50 as well, they all got moving too, I think once we got busier we were just a different side.”
With just one win from the first eight rounds, Saturday’s match against the Magpies was also seen as a winnable one for Balranald, especially in front of a parochial Greenham Park crowd.
Although the Roos found enough of the ball to give themselves a chance to win, it was their poor disposal which once again cost them any chance of victory, according to Balranald co-coach Jack Salau.
“Certainly an unfortunate result, but we were happy with a large portion of the game,” Salau said.
“It was a good, solid effort for three and a half quarters, but we let them have a patch where they scored a few in a row which put the pressure on.
“We had plenty of the play on our terms, we just failed to connect through the half forward line with poor ball use burning our forwards and creating turnovers, which gave (Lake) Boga most of their scores.
“If we can clean up that part of our game, we’d have been really damaging going forward I think.”
Tanner Coulthard was among the better players on the ground for the Roos, along with Ian Fuller, Jarryd Stead, Daniel Harris, Ryan Middlebrook and Salau.
Marty Parsons, Andrew McDonald and Will Gardner were also strong contributors in defence for Lake Boga, while Hunter Hartland was also impressive in the ruck.
SCORES
| Team | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 | Q4 | Final Score |
| Balranald | 3.3 | 6.7 | 8.10 | 10.12 | 72 |
| Lake Boga | 3.2 | 7.5 | 14.7 | 15.10 | 100 |
VOTES
3 – Braden Padmore (Lake Boga)
2 – Koben Ryan (Lake Boga)
1 – Tanner Coulthard (Balranald)
