PICTURE GALLERY: Calder Cannons v Oakleigh Chargers
Calder Cannons’ premiership dreams ended at the hands of Oakleigh Chargers at Etihad Stadium on Sunday.
After a promising start, the Cannons weren’t able to match the Chargers run and carry and quickly found themselves on the back foot.
The Chargers had one hand on the premiership cup at three-quarter time and held off an early final quarter comeback from the Cannons to win the premiership 17.15 (117) to 11.4 (70).
The Cannons’ day got off to a bad start with potential top 20 draft picks Peter Wright and Damian Cavka late withdrawals.
Wright who hurt his knee in his side’s preliminary final win last week, was always in doubt.
Cannons coach Andrew Jago said after the game despite saying midweek that he would play, Wright was never going to take to the field.
“If it was next week, he would have played,” said Jago.
“Cavka did his groin on Tuesday night.
“Cav has been sensational. To clock up the running kilometres that guy does means we had to change the way our forward line structured and that was always going to be a little bit difficult.
“If you take three top 20 draft picks out of any TAC Cup side it is going to make things hard.
“Saying that, I’ve said all this season that our strength is our depth. Full credit to our boys and full credit to Oakleigh.”
After leading at quarter-time by 17 points, the Cannons quickly found themselves trailing.
“In the second quarter, that was the big shift in momentum,” said Jago.
“They got their outside run going and we couldn’t shut it down. We acknowledged all week contested footy would be our strength.
“They have elite foot skills. We didn’t use the ball well going into forward 50 in the second quarter and they were running in waves off half back.
“That was the difference in the game”
After the margin getting out to six goals at three-quarter time, the Cannons decided they needed to try something.
“As you could see we had to throw [Rielly] O’Brien into the ruck to get some run and carry in middle of ground.
“He gave us a sniff in the last quarter.
“Yeah it was a dream, if we could have snuffed out their reply goal, then momentum is a great thing
“About 20 minutes of last quarter we started trying to get our 18s on the ground [as we knew the match was over].
Jago said James Latham was the best for the Cannons with Paul Ahern good up forward.
SCORES
Oakleigh Chargers 17.15 (117)
Calder Cannons 11.4 (70)
GOALS: Calder Cannons: Miller 3 Foster 2 Kerbatieh 2 Smith Ahern O’Kearney Goodyear
BEST: Calder Cannons: Latham Ahern Goodyear Miller O’Brien Allan
