Cracker of a country footy final between Moe and Leongatha
YOU’D go a long way to see a better country football match than the Second Semi-final between Moe and Leongatha at Morwell on Saturday.
YOU’D go a long way to see a better country football match than the Second Semi-final between Moe and Leongatha at Morwell on Saturday.
Moe came out of the blocks like shot out of a gun with James Harmes hitting Declan Keity on the lead before finding Myles Poholke on the burst for the game’s first goal inside a minute.
And when Ben Crocker marked on the lead and squeezed one through from the boundary, the premiership-starved Lions were off to the perfect start.
In the next passage of play, Harry Pepper looked like repeating the dose but key Parrots’ defender Tim Sauvarin came off his man and cleared the danger zone.
And down the other end it was Nick Argento who broke the seal for Leongatha with a goal.
Not long after that Blake Mulane chased the ball out on the flank, after a clearance forward by Chris Prowse, out of the ruck to Myles Poholke, and the shot from Mullane on the run looked for all the world on its way to full points.
However, as Mullane skipped up the field taking high-fives from his team mates, the ball swung viciously in the wind and hit the post for a point.
Leongatha returned fire with points before Crocker got another goal for Moe. They had a three goal to one lead and looked every bit the team to beat for this year’s flag.
But from that point onwards, Leongatha slowly but surely started to grind their way back into the contest scoring goals through Garnham, Hume, toeing one through in the goal square and a late running goal to Fraser Phillips just before the break to make it six goal each at quarter time.
There were two goals each in the second quarter and great contests up and down the ground through until half time.
Goals to Jenson Garnham for Leongatha and Ben Crocker for Moe started the second half in similar fashion to the first half with nothing between the teams in a quality game.
Then a beauty by Phillips put the Parrots up by 10 points in the first five minutes of the quarter before another to Garnham on the lead made it 16 points.
