Below: Lion Dean Blake (with ball) receives a shepherd from Kym Jones (left) and words of advice from Tom O’Loughlin as he sends off a handpass.
By Mark Gullick
THE warning signs were there for Pakenham after Cranbourne had beaten fourth-placed Berwick by 123 points and second-placed Narre Warren by 57 points in their previous two contests.
And, on Saturday, the Eagles were simply unstoppable, taking it out on the Lions to the tune of 124 points, annihilating the fading Pakenham with a comprehensive display at Casey Fields.
Pakenham began brightly with the first two goals, via Kym Jones and Russell Lehman, in the opening minutes.
Captain Luke Walker accepted a handball from Jason Fisher and slotted a 40-metre goal, completing Pakenham’s perfect start.
The Lions were displaying good form with swift ball movement and tidy skills.
Michael Theodoridis, who’d missed two early chances, scored Cranbourne’s first goal with a clever soccer kick, before promptly adding another from the next bounce.
Justin Berry replicated Walker’s earlier goal with a similar effort from 50 metres.
Cranbourne caught Pakenham on the scoreboard and then blasted past them.
Goals to Jarrod Murphy, Curtise Barker, Berry, Marc Holt and Leigh Holt put the Eagles 35 points up at the first change.
Cranbourne’s pressure forced Pakenham to lose its composure, and several goals resulted directly from the Lions defenders losing their poise.
The only negative was an ankle injury to Marc Holt, who limped from the ground late in the term.
There was sparse Pakenham resistance over the ensuing three quarters as Cranbourne piled on 15 goals to two.
“It was a slow start, we gave a couple of dumb free-kicks away,” Cranbourne coach Doug Koop said.
“Three of the first four goals were from free-kicks. It’s a good sign, we’d like to be on our game from the start, but if we aren’t, we have the ability to turn things around.”
Cranbourne’s inaccuracy has been an ongoing issue for Koop, with the Eagles’ season goalkicking efficiency at just 57 per cent.
“(Theodoridis) kicked about 2.7, Berry kicked about 2.7, (Matthew) Fletcher kicked about 2.5,” Koop said.
“It was a perfect day, and our blokes who normally kick goals, didn’t kick goals. It’s certainly something we’ll work on over the next couple of weeks. Blokes that are a little bit down, we tried to get them into the game more by giving them a run on the ball. We didn’t have anyone who was poor and that’s been one of our great strengths this year.
“Normally, you might have three or four blokes that you think might struggle to hold their spot, but there wasn’t a bloke in the side that didn’t make some sort of genuine contribution. Fletcher, Holt and Berry, our three biggest goalkickers, kicked six between them. We still kicked 23 goals and had 50 shots on goal. From an opposition point of view, who are they going to cover?”
Murphy starred for the Eagles.
“He played a couple of weeks ago and we dropped him after one game, which we don’t really like to do,” Koop said.
“Unfortunately, some experienced players came back. He was angry with that and two weeks ago he got another opportunity. He’s another Theodoridis in that he’s added another dimension to the forward line. He had seven tackles in the forward line and finished with five goals.”
The only concern for Cranbourne was Marc Holt, who suffered a knee and ankle injury, but he was cleared of major damage.
Pakenham coach Michael Holland is at a loss with his team’s form.
“When we won seven in a row, maybe it was false form, maybe we were getting away with things that have been exposed in the last couple of weeks,” Holland said.
“We can’t put a finger on what’s happened, but we’ve got a couple of weeks, so hopefully it will turn around.”
The Lions have lost their past three matches by a combined margin of 323 points.
“I’ve never experienced beatings that we’ve been involved in, during my 20-odd years at Pakenham,” Holland said.
“It’s hard to accept. I’m the leader of the group, so I’ve got to try and find a way to address that. (The bye has) come at a good time, at least we can get a win. We have to do a lot of soul-searching and have a few chats.
“At the end of the day, we’re sick of hearing all these words. We want to see some action. The players have to start accepting responsibility for what’s going on. People can hide (the players) behind things, but they’re the ones being exposed to what people see.
“We’ve got to try and find a way to get a more even spread. We’ve been relying on too few and getting found out.”
Jared Goldsack worked tirelessly for Pakenham.
He held Marc Holt early in the match, before running through the midfield in various stints in an effort to win a clearance for the Lions.
Jones was another Lion who was respectable as the big man battled hard in the ruck.
Other Lions who tried hard were Fisher, in his first season of senior football, the busy Lehman, Paul Gramc in the forward line and the rangy Nathan Lieshout, who filled numerous roles.
Pakenham takes the bye this weekend before facing Keysborough in the final round.
@BT Sub Sport Gaz:NARRE WARREN v
KEYSBOROUGH
NARRE Warren compounded Keysborough’s woes with a 152-point shellacking at Kalora Park.
The high standard first-quarter proved to be a false dawn as the Magpies took control over the next three quarters to record an emphatic win.
“We went goal-for-goal with Narre and it was a really entertaining first quarter,” Keysborough coach Brad Canavan said.
“Our match-ups really worked and we probably should have gone in two or three goals up at quarter-time; we just lapsed late and they kicked three goals in five minutes.”
Regarding the first quarter, Narre Warren coach Chris Toner said, “they’re big and they’re strong, certainly around the contest.
“They were good early and dropped off a little as the fitness kicked in. Around the stoppages, we got beaten pretty convincingly in the first quarter.”
Narre Warren piled on 25 goals to four after quarter-time in a brutal display.
“The biggest worry we had was being complacent, and applying the pressure and doing all the things we’ve done over the last month, but as it turned out, they snapped into gear pretty quick,” Toner said.
“We’re extremely fortunate we’ve got a bloke by the name of Alex Sakadijan, (Melbourne FC and Casey Scorpions strength and conditioning coach) who looks after our strength and conditioning. He’s just a real guru, he really looks after us.”
The Magpies, who kicked the highest score of the season, had 13 goalkickers with Ben Wragg, Justin Marriott and Nick Scanlon each booting five.
“It’s a positive,” Toner said.
“We don’t rely on any one player, we had three (players) that kicked five (goals). It makes it a little bit more difficult for the opposition when you’ve got an even spread.
“It looks good when you see blokes kicking 100 (goals), but it’s probably not necessarily the best thing for the team.”
With two matches remaining, Toner is finalising his finals squad.
“We’ve used 41 players, which is ridiculous,” he said.
“We’ve had eight or nine under-18s play (seniors). We’re pretty much down to (a squad of) 23, 24, 25 players. We’re had no real injuries to speak of, and we’ve only got “Azza” (suspended Aaron McIver) to come back.”
Midfielder Marriott was Narre Warren’s best player, along with ruckman Matt Olney.
Scanlon, Wragg, winger Josh Tonna and Col Harvey were dominant around the ground, regularly extracting the ball from the clinches and skilfully advancing the ball forward.
Canavan was pleased with the opening term, in which the Burras kicked five of the 12 goals scored.
“They were a lot better than us; they ran over the top of us and we just lost our way a little bit,” he said.
“In the second and third quarters, we just chased butt. They were quicker than us; their kids outran us and they spread really well from stoppages.
“But it was strange to watch because it didn’t look like a complete destruction; we were still competitive.
“Our last 15 minutes of the game was really competitive. We had a crack, but we were just slower than they were and some of our tackles didn’t stick.”
According to Canavan, Narre Warren looms as a challenger to Cranbourne.
“They’re the best spreading side from stoppages that we’ve played all year,” he said.
