Women’s Seniors
UHS-W 1.5-11 – Preston Bullants 4.6-30
Goal Kickers:
Written by Cassy Grapsas
UHSW arrived at our home away from home at JJ Holland Park in Kensington, hungry to get our first win on the board against Elsternwick. Spirits were high, aided by a pre-game change room dance party to ABBA.
The game was off to a good start in the first, thanks to an opening goal from Hannah Greaves. Two more goals coupled with three behinds took our score to 3.3-2 at the quarter time break, with UHSW keeping Elsternwick goalless in the opening quarter.
The second term saw the game kept to our forward half, with the forward line creating many opportunities to have cracks at goal. Zoe Julian Best was keeping busy and wreaking havoc on the Elsternwick defence, kicking two. The backline certainly had a couple of minutes to catch our breaths and enjoy the efforts being put on by the rest of the team. A little bit of inaccuracy up forward saw us end the term with 5.8-38.
Despite confidence riding high at the half time break, the team were determined to start off the second half with a clean slate and keep the pressure on Elsternwick. The Buddy (I mean Bella) show that started in the first half was on full display in the third quarter, with Bella and Amy ‘Parksy’ Parkinson, kicking 3 and 2 goals respectively across the game.
Marlo Zambelli and Abbey Mills were dominant through the middle, with their clean hands allowing us to get repeated entries into the forward 50 to put more scoreboard pressure on Elsternwick.
However full credit to Elsternwick who showed their grit in the last quarter, with a couple of great efforts that allowed them to add 2 points to their score—with our backs working hard to keep them goalless. There’s nothing like a 70-point lead to encourage the coach to move around the magnets, with backline superstar Kim ‘Crabby’ Crabtree being put up forward (and making the switch up look a little too easy), slotting a goal to round out the scores at 10.16-76 to 0.3-3.
UHSW will now take the Easter long weekend to build on their great work at training, have our new players learn the UHS song, and celebrate the win at iPod shuffle night—where we can only assume their dance floor performance will be just as strong as it was on field.
Men’s Seniors
UHS-VU 7.7-49 – Hampton Rovers 28.18-186
Goal Kickers: P. Brookes 2, F. Campbell 2, W. Barnett, B. Jackson, J. McGee
Written by Todd Cracknell
The club this week was honouring the recent loss of a Rocke family member and the ANZAC spirit. Whilst the scoreboard did not in the end reflect the efforts of the team, we felt a sense of pride that we never gave up. There were some valiant efforts from our young players who showed grit and willingness to take the game on. Patrick Wernert, Noah Siederman, Fraser Campbell and Matt Dimattina to name just a few. Unfortunately, Matt “Big Dog” Dimattina copped a tackle that has done damage to his shoulder, fingers crossed for a swift and full recovery.
The midfield group worked together and hard all day, providing much needed supply to our forward line. Two goals apiece to Fraser Campbell and Patrick Brookes reflected the class and energy they both bring to every contest. Whilst Fraser Campbell had a Eddie Betts-esque crack at a goal, it was the running snap goal by Will “Barnesy” Barnett that cemented his cult favourite status in the UHS line up.
The score line could have been much worse if it were not for the persistent and bruising work of Spencer Horton, the overlap running work of James Dimattina, long kicking by Tom Rocke and patience with the ball by Ben Cracknell.
Let’s all help out and cheer on the UHS Women this Saturday. See you there, 9:20am at JJ Holland Park (Men have a bye).
Men’s Reserves
UHS-VU 4.2-26 – Hampton Rovers 23.17-155
Goal Kickers: M. Cafaro, J. Muscat, L. Star, H. Tomas
The third game of the season saw a solid but patchy performance by the reserves side. With one of our coaches out this week, it was up to Mr McGee to spin the magnets and rev the side up for our third hit out of the season. While the team struggled with the outside game, getting overrun on an oval with large wings, the effort couldn’t be faulted all day, as we went down in a 129 point loss.
Despite the large margin, the game was full of competitive periods from the team, particularly in the third and fourth quarters which saw Hampton scoring in bursts but most of the quarter remaining a tight tussle. It was exciting to see Lewis Star in for his first game of the season and kicking a nice goal too, while new player’s Jackson Muscat and Matt Cafaro also kicked their first for UHS.
With a bye this week, we look forward to getting down to watch the Women’s team on Saturday and to start preparing for our upcoming clash with Mazenod.