Traralgon marches on but second chance for Parrots' 16s

THE Leongatha Under 16s football team has come away from Morwell on Saturday with a 39-point loss against the runaway favourites for the premiership in the Gippsland League Fourths competition, Traralgon.

But, they were right in the contest up until half time after missed a couple of opportunities and kicked 2.3 to Traralgon’s 5.1 for the half.

They were being well served away from the stoppages by the likes of Noah Bradley and Linc Chila who were combining well, and Noah Cameron on the burst but they were being regularly turned away by the Traralgon defence with Archer Tangi racking up a ton of intercept marks and getting plenty of support from his mates.

Louis Read, Harley Storr, Chance Houston and Logan Misale were buys but opportunities were few and far between.

Chila and Read both had early goals but the Parrots were having trouble containing Jack Thomas (3) and Mason Chan (2) who constantly looked likely to score.

Traralgon dominated the possession in the third quarter but Leongatha had lifted and applied a ton of pressure up and down the ground, holding the Maroons to one goal but without having many chances themselves.

The last quarter was also well contested between the two teams but it was Traralgon that was getting reward for effort from their forward entry whereas it was more chaotic on the Parrots’ forward line.

The exception was Frazer Livingstone who bombed long towards goal midway through the last quarter for a nice goal.

Some great tackling by Leongatha, including by Cye Dale-Haywood and Lenard Mackie stopped their Traralgon opponents in their tracks. Mackie’s effort 25 metres from the sticks deserved a goal but when a point resulted, Traralgon went coast-to-coast finally through the hands of Lincoln Balcombe Matters to Hugo Macpherson and they stretched the lead again.

In the next passage of play, Leongatha’s Hugo Sweeney took a nice mark at half forward before driving it in but, once again, Tangi came forward to mark the ball and another attacking move was defused.

Final scores: Traralgon 10.4.64 to Leongatha 3.7.25.