THE Mallee Eagles have extended their winning streak to five with a dominant 171-point thrashing of Swan Hill on Saturday.
It was yet another impressive display from the Eagles, who not only kept the Swans scoreless in the first term, but piled on the pain in the second half with 18 unanswered goals.
It was always going to be a challenging afternoon for Swan Hill, who went into the match without several key players, including Kal Heslop, Sunny Handy or Matt Pearse, with Tom Corridan also a late out prior to the game.
With key defender Corridan missing, Mallee key forwards Darcy Hourigan and Andrew Mead-Harding ran amok with the pair booting seven goals each for the game.
Compounding Swan Hill’s woes were in game injuries to Harry Scott (back) and Jack Brown (quad), with the Swans ending the match with just one rotation.
The home side showed no mercy however, especially after half time, with the final score of 28.19 (187) to 2.4 (16) proving to be the Eagles’ largest of the season.
It was a result that pleased Mallee co-coach Harry Allen, who was impressed more so with his team’s second half than their first.
“We spoke pre game about there being a bigger picture at hand, obviously you still need to get out there and perform, but we wanted to make sure we were ticking the boxes and focusing on what needed to be done during the game,” Allen said post-match.
“The first half we were clearly pretty dominant really, as we were the whole game, but we fell into that little trap of trying to move the ball too quickly when we got the turnovers and almost overusing the ball.
“We said to sort of calm down a bit at half time and I think the score reflected that, particularly in the second half.
“The first half we still gave ourselves plenty opportunities, but we were just rushing our disposal thinking that we’ll win a turnover in the middle of the ground.
“We just wanted to get the ball back in and catch them off guard going the other way whereas we just needed to control the ball better and have a bit more poise.
“Once we did that, which was what we reflected on at half time, we kicked away after that.”
Although Saturday’s win was a comprehensive one for the Eagles, it didn’t take long for Allen and fellow Mallee co-coach Brent Macleod to turn their attention towards this weekend’s encounter with the Cohuna Kangas.
With Woorinen almost securing top spot, this Saturday’s highly anticipated clash between the second and third ranked sides looms as a likely qualifying final preview.
“We’ve been evolving this year and just trying to make the ground wide and spreading and get our uncontested game going and as much as we had to focus on yesterday’s job, we certainly had next week in mind as well,” Allen said.
“It’ll be a massive game and we’re all pretty pumped to get there and get into it.
“It’s obviously a big deck and they’re (Cohuna) travelling really well also and it’s looking like it could be a qualifying final match up as well.
“We just wanted to make sure we were keeping on top of that area of the game and even though we know we have the players this year to be able to adapt and evolve, to do it against Cohuna at Cohuna will be a great challenge, but it’s one we’re pretty ready for.
“That was the big focus (on Saturday), making sure our structures were in check all game, which they were, and then obviously making sure that the way we moved the ball was with next week in mind as well.
“We know this Saturday will be a good dress rehearsal for that first final potentially, if that’s the way it shapes up.”
Although Hourigan and Mead-Harding were dominant up forward, it was the game of Zac O’Meara which really impressed, along with attacking half backs Isaiah Bull and Clinton Cummins.
Also among the Eagles’ better players were Jonah Devlin, Brady Fordham and Brett Thomas, while Brenton Halligan, Will Simpson, Tom Holdstock and Cooper Angus were the best for the Swans.
SCORES
| Team | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 | Q4 | Final Score |
| Mallee Eagles | 5.10 | 10.11 | 21.15 | 28.19 | 187 |
| Swan Hill Seniors | 0.0 | 2.0 | 2.3 | 2.4 | 16 |
VOTES
3 – Zac O’Meara (Mallee Eagles)
2 – Isaiah Bull (Mallee Eagles)
1 – Clinton Cummins (Mallee Eagles)
