SANFLW Development League Match Report – Round 4

In what would be our toughest test this year we faced a strong Glenelg team who has been performing well so far this year.

With several forced changes due to injury and the importance of providing opportunity to the young squad we made a number of changes for the game this week.

We began the game in exciting style with Molly Petersen and Lucy Waye creating early opportunities for our forwards which saw Emma Chapman mark and goal in the first minute and then Nicola Biagi soccer a goal a minute later. We had two goals in the first few minutes before Glenelg knew what hit them.

The game settled and unfortunately, we lost Izzi Rawley with a head knock due to a careless tackle halfway through the quarter which unsettled us. Glenelg responded with a goal and then with a lapse in concentration we allowed them to score again on the siren to enter quarter time even.

The second quarter saw both sides moving the ball well as Glenelg continued to play a strong physical brand of football. We scored with a mark and goal from Kendell Saffin but again conceded a late goal due to an error seeing Glenelg enter half time 8 points in front.

The next half saw us unable to score despite contesting hard. Glenelg managed one goal in each of the third and fourth quarters to extend their lead and take out the game comfortably by 23 points.

We could not question the effort and intent of the team and for the most part we matched it with the opposition. What cost us was some fundamental skill errors at critical times in this game and at times our inability to adjust to the windy conditions.

We saw some good performances notably Kendall Saffin, Phillipa Worthley and our on-ballers in Lucy Waye, Molly Petersen, Georgia Weatherspoon and Annie Brearley, while Emma Chapman had her best game for the club and young ones in Sienna Aldridge and Gracie Sim battled hard.

Final score: West 3.1. 19 defeated by Glenelg 6.6. 42

Best players: Saffin, Chapman, Weatherspoon, Waye, Worthley

Goals: Saffin, Chapman, Biagi (1)

Development League Coach – Michael Wakim