Five of the best from the little champ

WONTHAGGI Power underscored its finals’ aspirations with a convincing 34-point win away to Maffra on Saturday, but the improving Eagles were no pushovers as they kept coming, especially during the first three quarters.

Power was on the board in the first few minutes of the match and it was notable that former coach, Jarryd Blair, was playing a distributor role out of the centre, setting up a number of the team’s forward thrusts.

The one that ultimately bore fruit came when Blair linked up with Kyle Reid barrelling forward out of defence and Aiden Lindsay on the move to Cooper McInnes, back in this week and providing a good contest up forward.

Lachie Ferguson seized on the loose ball, soccered it through and the Power was on its way.

The second came a few minutes later, again with Jarryd Blair front and centre, selling a bit of candy, and popping one through from 35 metres before taking a short rest on the bench.

Maffra pulled one back through Seth Smith when he looped around for the handpass in front of John Butcher, but the Power defence was tight, with Jakeb Thomas and Reid blanketing their opponents and the likes of Chugg, Muratore and Green clearing it out with plenty of support from midfielders Joyce and Bates.

Power even had the switch working effectively, displaying skills by foot and hand as they moved the ball out of defence and into attack.

The rucks, Daniel Bourke and Tom Scott, were having a ding-dong with Scott staying accountable on Bourke away from the ball and getting a chop out from Butcher.

Noah Christy snapped one through off a Wonthaggi error but a late one by Ollie Dawson, collecting an outlet handpass from Shannon Bray after centring work by Lindsay, kept Power’s nose in front close to quarter time.

Maffra had its most productive burst for the day at the start of the second quarter, with Tom Scott taking advantage of some disorganisation on the Power backline to kick one on the run and a busy Max Stobie combining with Harper Walker and John Butcher for their second.

But when the Power went coast-to-coast via Muratore, Reid, Chugg, Jai Williams, Chugg on the overlap and finally McInnes judging the fall of the ball perfectly to kick one from 50 metres, Wonthaggi looked to have the class to prevail.

The deckchairs, shorts and t-shirts were out at Maffra with the temperature in the mid-20s on a brilliant day for sport.

Jarryd Blair was hunting the packs and kicked the Power’s next from 45 metres out and it was sometime before Jett Killoran got out the back to a long ball from Danny Butcher for the answer.

There was still only two points in it.

Again, it was a fleet-footed Chugg linking up off half back with Glenn and Bates who created the next chance for Jarryd Blair, who was the right man in the right place.

Ferguson rounded out a productive term for Power with a laces out pass to McInnes as Wonthaggi skipped away again.

He repeated the dose right after the restart, setting up Bates with another perfect pass and the lead was 21 points all of a sudden.

Jarryd Blair demonstrated his elite stoppage work when he hit a tap from Bray at pace and slotted through his fourth for the day.

Bray slipped his opponent moments later to put Wonthaggi in front by 34 points.

There were to be six more goals in the third term in free-flowing play, four to Maffra and two to McInnes but Wonthaggi finished with three goals to one in the last to maintain their control, the first of them making it a bag of five for the day from Jarryd Blair.

But it was earnt the hard way after a big Maffra bloke fell into Blair’s back as he tracked the loose ball.

It completed one of the former Collingwood champ’s best days in the black and teal, named best for Wonthaggi on a day when Power had no passengers.