The club triumphed in all eight grades on Saturday, showcasing the depth through the club. All players acknowledged ANZAC round with bravery on the field, including some incredible personal performances to drag their teams over the line.
A shock ran through the community on Monday as it was announced that a young footballer in South Australia tragically lost their life in a freak on-field accident. This is not something that we expect to happen when we step out on to the field each week and it is devastating to hear the news. The University Football Club sends our condolences to the family of Antonio Loiacono and his community.
Spill Crew A Grade
Uni 11.8 74 defeated Scarborough 6.5 41
The University A Grade continued their strong start to the season with a hard fought win on the road against Scarborough.
Despite having control of the game in the first, Uni was unable to convert any of this hard work to the scoreboard. In fact it was the complete opposite with Scarborough gaining momentum for the final 8 minutes of the quarter and piling on 3 goals.
Uni trailing by 18 points at the first break had a big challenge ahead and it was great to see the group rise to the occasion. Uni proceeded to wrestle back control of the game and win the quarter 4 goals to 1 evening up the scoreboard by HT.
The 3rd quarter was a real arm wrestle between the two sides setting the stage for a tight finish. It was early in the last however that Uni pulled away kicking 4 goals in the first 10 minutes and eventually running out 33 point winners.
Uni fought hard for this win. Scarborough were tough around the contest and made few mistakes for Uni to exploit on the counter. In the end, lead by a resilient midfield division we managed to grind away and run over the top.
The highlight of the match would have to be young ruckman West Love flushing a 60m set shot through post height right in the heart of Uni’s second quarter comeback. Ben Fitzgerald looked back to his best in defense and young prospects Kyle Lim and Josh Ledger gave up very little to their respective opponents. Isaac Barton was in and amongst the contest all day alongside a strong cast of fellow midfielders. Sean Trombetta and captain Tim O’Hara continued to produce with 3 majors each and were complemented nicely by a cohesive forward unit.
Overall it was a great contest that will no doubt help fast track the development of such a young team. We look forward to a strong Wesley Curtin outfit next week at McGillivray oval. Would love to see all our supporters turn out!
Goals: Trombetta, O’Hara (3), Culloton (2), Love, Wilson, Donaldson.
Best: Love, Barton, Lim, Mentink, Fitzgerald, Upson, O’Hara
Steinepreis Paganin A Reserves
Uni 8.11 59 defeated Scarborough 8.5 53
The Reserves have continued their winning ways with a pulsating 6 point victory against Scarborough at Millington on Saturday. The side had 3 changes to the one that knocked over Wanneroo last weekend welcoming back Lowey and Pat Don, in addition to the debuting Flynn Bailey.
Off the back of last week, the main message was to continue building on the second half of the game and to ‘prove’ to ourselves that our style of play could be sustainable in this competition. Unfortunately, last week’s second half was not replicated with Scarborough taking the early “ascendency” by kicking 4 goals to 0 in the first quarter. It was not reflective of what he have seen in the preseason and to Scarborough’s credit they just outworked us across the ground. An early sign of things to come, ‘Air’ Joe Rohr was spectacular repelling anything and everything that came his way.
The coaches demanded the boys lifted and the second quarter reflected this with Charlie and Quincey getting us on the board and Cass King starting to work his way into the game. Our stronger second quarter across the ground, with Joe at this point having taken approximately 11 marks (he was counting them), started to wrestle momentum in the game towards us.
The third quarter was much the same as the second, with Uni adding another 3 goals. This time Quincey and Charlie Caldow got in the action. A resistant backline continued to be effective, with young Crudeli getting some valuable midfield minutes providing us a desperately needed spark. As such, we held a 5 point lead at the final break.
Despite this lead, Scarborough came out stronger in the fourth and kicked the first 2 goals of the quarter. This gave them a lead of 7 point with less than five minutes left. We kicked one quickly and then narrowly missed an attempt with about a minute to go. At this point, Scarborough cleared their defensive lines, and created a stoppage. The great Pat Don, using dad strength, wrestled his opposition number out of the contest, grabbed the ball out of the ruck and scrambled a kick forward to the Charlie Caldow who took an unbelieve mark in front of his opponent. Cool as anything Charlie has gone back and jailed it with the final touch of the game to give us the win by 6 points.
An incredible result considering we were playing last year’s grand finalists, on their home deck and were down by 4 goals at QT. The game required the entire team to pull us back into it, but quite honestly, Air Joe was nothing short of spectacular. He commanded the half back and showed an ability to read the ball in the air to near perfection. His performance, as well as the entire team lifting, was very heartening to see.
The challenge for the boys will be to come out early like they have played the second halves. This week we take on Curtin at home in what will be another major test for the group. If we bring that determination like we did for the final three quarters Saturday, we will position ourselves to challenge one of the major contenders this year.
Fun-O-Meter scale of the day – 7/10
Goals – Caldow & Qunicey (3); Chaz (2)
Votes – Air Joe (5); Cass (4); Howard (3); Gaj (2); Pat Don, Con and Cruddy
Red Cloud A Colts
Uni 6.12 48 defeated Scarborough 4.7 31
Bike Bar Stormers
Uni 4.7 31 defeated Piara Waters 2.8 20
GPA Engineering Peacocks
Uni 6.4 34 defeated Curtin Uni Wesly4.4 28
4 Pines Pirates
Uni 11.13 79 defeated Curtin Uni Wesley 9.7 61
After a sobering start to the year, the Pirates faced an old foe in the recently promoted Curtin Wesley at home on MCG1. Curtin knew they had sailed into treacherous waters from the first bounce, with Daddy Sarge serving the ball on a silver platter to Ric. The first clearance from Ric was placed in Captain Smally’s lap. Our forwards looked dangerous early, with Jam Jam and Blackers getting on the end of some exciting ball movement, and Smally installing a shiny new hook hand after dislocating his finger.
Curtin struggled to chart a course through the sea of Pirate flags, in a promising sign for the season, with the likes of Frenchy, Bilf, Andy, Kettle, and Barbs breaking up their transition ball movement. Our midfielders were all over Curtin’s ball movement and were quick to set sail each time they looked to switch the ball. This made life easy for our backline with J-Mo, Apples, and Benno mopping up some sloppy inside 50 entries.
The Pirates continued to impose themselves on the contest through the majority of the first half and owned the footy at the coalface. Strong defensive displays from Dan “Dasher” Dyer and club favourite Snicko ensured Curtin’s few forward 50 entries were swiftly repelled.
Some hot weather coupled with a new demanding brand of footy led to late lapses in concentration to end the first and second quarters. This allowed Curtin some good looks at goal to keep them in the contest. The boys addressed this at halftime and were able to steady the ship whenever Curtin started to build momentum in the second half.
Curtin turned up the pressure dial in the last quarter, and Coach Ken was getting nervous until Frenchy took the game by the scruff of the neck, winning multiple 3 v 1s in a row, taking intercept marks, and sticking big tackles to put a halt to their momentum. Strong final quarters from coach’s favourite Vet, Pirates debutant Noz, and player-coach Ari helped the team come home with a wet sail.
It was a complete performance from the team and the perfect way to respond to a disappointing round one performance.
The team will be boarding the ship down to the great Gil Fraser Reserve to take on North Freo this Saturday in what looks to be a good test of consistency. Our Ruckman Nicholas ‘Sarge’ Haslem will play his 150th game for the club, congratulations mate.
Best: (5) Jam Jam; (4) Ric and Frenchy; (3) Vet and Barbs; (2) Dasher and Snicko; (1) Noz and JN
Goals: Jam Jam (5); JN (3); Fleabag, Blackers, Smally (1)
Byfields Dingoes
Uni 11.6 72 defeated Curtin Uni Wesley 7.8 50
The Dingoes bounced back from a loss in round one to record the first win of their title defence against Curtin. It was an even performance across the board with standouts from the extremely fit and handsome Blake “Buckets” Barrow and Declan “Smitty” Smeed.
Subiaco Hotel C-Gulls
Uni 19.21 135 defeated Trinity Aquinas 1.1 7
Word on the street is that round 2 is the new round 1 and for our Gulls boys this was the case, heading out to Bill Grayden Reserve after an impressive showing against The Bye last week. Having counted our blessings that we were playing at TA’s glorified swimming pool on a sunny April day, rather than late July, spirits were high. Pregame began with some quickfire icebreakers, finding out interesting fun facts about each other to help cohesion and friendship. This enhanced connection set our game up well.
The first half was one of the most dominant showings of football you will ever see, with every player impacting the contest and absolutely slicing apart our opposition by hand and hitting dangerous spots in the forward line, aiding Oscar the Grouch on his way to 4 first half goals from 6 shots. Any attempt of a rebound 50 was immediately repelled by the likes of Fossil, A Colt and Woody caused TAs to drop their heads early. Extremely clean ball use by foot by Messi and pure excellence from YumBuckMan in the ruck were highlights. We went into the main break up 12.7 79 to TA’s 0.0.
The second half was a continuation of our dominance overall, however we certainly took the foot off and allowed TAs to have slightly more effective ball use in the contest and through the middle.
Thankfully, the class of our team allowed us to continue piling on points despite our pressure drop off. Khabib was a level above all day and Angry flew the flag, getting one back on his old club. While we can be very happy with our performance, there are certainly big areas for improvement which we must address before we come up against stronger sides in upcoming weeks.
Goals: Oscar (5); Yom (3); Howling & Messi (2); Hodgey, Khabib, Cooky, Bowlsey, Menzies, Pago, Wheat (1)
Votes: Khabib (5); Oscar (4); Bowlsey (3); Molly & Buckman (2); Remi & Messi (1)