R19 - South v Sturt @ Noarlunga

[Dutchy]

SOUTH
South Adelaide has added two in-form players to its squad to face Sturt at Hickinbotham Oval on Sunday.
Midfielder Nic Schwarz and utility Ben Haren have been listed on a five-man extended interchange bench which must be trimmed by two before the bounce.
Schwarz racked up 40 disposals, eight marks, nine clearances and two goals in the Reserves last round while Haren finished with 18 disposals, five marks and ten tackles.
Key defender Tom Fields will play his 50th IGA League match after spending last season on Carlton’s rookie list.

League
F: Seccull, Eddy, Gotch
HF: Overall, Ellison, Barnes
C: Brown, Veide, Rankine
HB: Taylor, Fields, Gulden
B: Rose, Crabb, Durdin

R: Bass, Cross, Liddle
INT: Haren, Schwarz, Hitchcock, Newell, McMahon
IN: Haren, Schwarz

Reserves
Steffe, Bartram, Trembath, Moyle, Jolly, Cailotto, Nichols, Wray, Fairlie, Hawkins, Szust, Irra, O’Shaughnessy, Heaslip, Daniel, Blackwell, Anderson, De Visser, Haines.

Under-18
N. Beenham, Coleman, Sampson, Whitbread, Lock, Scanlan, Colwell, Bruce, Fitt, Mountford, Daniels, Tyllis, Whimpress, Krueger, Manuel, L. Beenham, Wilkinson, Steele, Snelling, McKinnon, Lawrie, Fitzgerald, Wright, Albanese, Edwards, Fitzpatrick, Draper.


STURT
Sturt has reshuffled its back six to cover the absence of star defender Fraser Evans in Sunday’s clash with South at Hickinbotham Oval.
Evans, who has been cleared of any structural damage to his knee, was unable to be passed fit to face the Panthers.
As a result, the Double Blues will look to Jack Stephens, Sam Jonas and Rune Gilfoy to close down the Panthers’ tall forwards.
Ruckman Andre Parrella has been added to the extended interchange bench, together with Sean Samblich, who hasn’t played at IGA League level since Round 1.
Youngster Campbell Wildman, 19, has been recalled to the forward pocket.

League
F: Penfold, K. Beard, Wildman
HF: Greenslade, M. Evans, Hone
C: Crocker, Kirkwood, Slimming
HB: Paprotny, Jonas, Page
B: Gilfoy, Stephens, McMahon

R: Osborn, Battersby, Martin
INT: Hansen, Carey, Samblich, Lienert, Parrella
IN: Wildman, Samblich, Parrella
OUT: F. Evans (knee)

Reserves
Applebee, Callins, Dodd, Elms, Gamble, Habljak, Haren, Hargreaves, Hayden, Hayes, Houlahan, Langridge, Musolino, Pansini, Powell, Telford, Thiele, Voigt, Wiech.

Under-18
F: Badger, Grundy, Parker-Boers
HF: Houlahan, Ellis, Hone
C: Stokes, Trenorden, Rigney
HB: Welsby, Grieve, Lines
B: Fielke, Edmonds, Weidenhofer

R: Thatcher, Aitchison, Collins
INT: Scott, Trevorrow, Smelt, McDonald
EMG: Prosser, Smith, Yunupingu

[therisingblues]

I notice the name"Rigney" in the U18s.
Any relation to a certain great man who once graced Unley Oval?

[johntheclaret]

Good game of SANFL footy I the cards
Panthers too strong though. South by 25-40 points

[Magellan]

Match o' the round. Perhaps Sturt to bounce back just, but I'm not too confident given it's at Southland.

But if it's really wet and the ground's sodden, then my money's on the Panthers. Bass and Crabb are natural underwater performers, and Eddy can be used to stem the flood. Overall, their Rankine would be pretty high.

[saintal]

South have had the better of the Double Blues at Noarlunga in recent years. Hopefully that trend continues.

South by 3 goals.

[DOC]

At unley we were insipid. Yet to lose at home and I think we can prevail. Couple of players to be dropped. Possibly McMahon and Newell.

[therisingblues]

Sturt is getting thumped by about 4 goals. I just managed to get the radio working though, and it sounds as though Sturt just kicked the goal of the day through Slimming. About 25 minutes first quarter.
Score is about 5:2 to about 1:1 I think

[therisingblues]

Okay, Sturt have what is supposed to be a killer breeze now.
South 5:3
Sturt 2:1

[therisingblues]

South completely outplayed us for two quarters and prevented us taking advantage of the breeze in the other two.
Serious worries at Unley heading into the final rounds before finals.
I would say Sturt were helped a lot by the draw in the first half of the season; sides like the Ravens and South who play better on large ovals had to play us on our deck, which we create space on very well. The Eagles on the other hand don't really need a specified oval on which to beat us, interestingly they beat us by the same margin in round 1 on PMO as they did at Pecker land last week. Sturt have now lost 3 of our last 4, all against likely finals opponents.
I guess we should be happy with outstripping expectations, as most had us finishing bottom this year. To have held top position for as long as we did, and so late in the season is a great achievement for the likely spoon candidate with a first year coach. Unfortunately, we may have reached the pinnacle of our season already. Looking like an Eagles v South grand final, providing that the Ravens don't take it too seriously.

South 16.6: 102
Sturt 7.11: 53

[Keefy]

South completely outplayed us for two quarters and prevented us taking advantage of the breeze in the other two.
Serious worries at Unley heading into the final rounds before finals.
I would say Sturt were helped a lot by the draw in the first half of the season; sides like the Ravens and South who play better on large ovals had to play us on our deck, which we create space on very well. The Eagles on the other hand don't really need a specified oval on which to beat us, interestingly they beat us by the same margin in round 1 on PMO as they did at Pecker land last week. Sturt have now lost 3 of our last 4, all against likely finals opponents.
I guess we should be happy with outstripping expectations, as most had us finishing bottom this year. To have held top position for as long as we did, and so late in the season is a great achievement for the likely spoon candidate with a first year coach. Unfortunately, we may have reached the pinnacle of our season already. Looking like an Eagles v South grand final, providing that the Ravens don't take it too seriously.

South 16.6: 102
Sturt 7.11: 53

Was just reading the report on Adelaide Now and Mattner said too many of your senior players were poor today and need to rely on more than 2 players to kick your goals.

From a South point of view we seem to have a very even spread across the ground and don't have to rely on Cross and Liddell to do all the work in the guts. We can rotate so many through the middle, the back half is very settle and once again we had a good number hitting the scoreboard.

The way we tackled and created pressure today was what you guys did to us earlier in the season at PMO

Apparently the crowd was only 1279 that is utter BS. I think someone had a case of dyxlexia on the keyboard. Had to be over 2000 there today.

[therisingblues]

1200 odd?
On Life FM they really talked the crowd up. One of them said possibly in excess of 3,000...

[saintal]

Goal Kickers: B. Haren 3, C. Hitchcock 3, B. Eddy 2, J. Mc Mahon 2, J. Cross, T. Fields, M. Rankine, D. Bass, R. Barnes, A. Gulden
Best Players: T. Fields, T. Brown, R. Newell, B. Seccull, J. Cross, A. Gulden

Really good win, albeit against an opposition missing a few key men. Slammed on the opening four goals inside 7 minutes and were never headed. Sturt had their moments but South's strong opening to the third term put the result beyond doubt.

A case of all played well. Really liked Brown's game, and it was good to see Haren play well in his first senior game in 5 or 6 weeks. Hitchcock was missed during the team's recent flat patch.

Beard, as he usually does against South, presented very well and booted 4. Evans was Sturt's only other goal-kicker, a rather damning stat. Although perhaps fittingly there isn't much of him, young Slimming showed a bit.

Crowd had to be 2000+. One of the better Noarlunga crowds in recent years, lots of Sturt supporters on the hill and a much better turn-out of South supporters than usual.

An enjoyable day!

[zipzap]

1200 odd?
On Life FM they really talked the crowd up. One of them said possibly in excess of 3,000...

Definitely one of the bigger crowds I've seen there in recent times. No way there was any less than 2K

(unless there was some major cargo-hold smuggling going on!)

[therisingblues]

There's been a few crowd anomalies at Noarlunga this year. I think I remember reading about some supporters just walking in while there's no one on the gate earlier this year. On that day the crowd figure was lower than expected also.
Then, I believe they've had one or two crowd figures much larger than estimated by people who actually attended.
I'd be interested to see a list of figures for this year, and compare them to assessments made on the day. I'm sure that people who attend regularly would have a fair idea, I can estimate crowds at Unley to within 200, I'm sure Southies would be pretty good doing the same at Noarlunga.

[Panther Pack]

1200 that can't be right.

From my estimates I thought it was closer to 2500 the most cars I've seen at the ground this season, hill was reasonable full and grandstand also pretty full.

[Wedgie]

Maybe South drive a few hundred cars in there and leave them empty.

[southee]

There was actually a decent line up to get in the ground before the game. Car park around the ground was closed as it was full, the grandstand was pretty full and the hill had good numbers on it.

I was at the infamous 938 crowd when we played the Port ressies. To say that there was about 300 more people there can not be correct.

It was more 2000 to 2500 IMO .

Something ain't right with the ticketing system.

[darley16]

Presented my season ticket, waiting waiting for the scanner to work, it didn't, "in you go" she said as there was a line forming behind me, easily 2,500 + at the game, if i wasn't counted (second time at Noarlunga) i can only presume other weren't also. South's best 4 quarter game all year, Sturt were undermanned and will be a whole tougher in the finals with 4 of their best out yesterday. Thought Joel Cross showed what 3 MM votes looks like, outstanding player.

[Scoop]

When I arrived half-way through the second term the card reader said "140" and I'm fairly certain that there were more people than that there, given the number of players and officials that were there in addition to the spectators. Gate numbers have been a bit of a mystery this year and I agree that there were definitely more than 300 people more than the Port game, as Southee said. Not been a good year for those in the Ivory Towers of AO so far...

[Scoop]

Cross didn't figure in the votes at all at presentations. Fields, Brown and Newell at the club, but I thought Cross and Gulden were exceptional.