Old Paradians fought off a determined Fitzroy Stars outfit to win by 22 points at Garvey Oval and keep their unbeaten start to the 2024 Heidelberg Golf Club Division 3 season intact.
Scores were within a kick at each change, but the Raiders booted three majors to nil in the final term to secure the 10.11 (71) to 7.7 (49) victory. The win consolidates their spot at the top of the table as the only team to register three victories so far in 2024.
The match was similar to the previous week for the home team, which was also tight at the last change before the Raiders gained ascendancy.
“Very happy to win against a team we consider one of the yardsticks of the competition,” Old Paradians coach Ben Turner said.
“We are learning more about ourselves and the competition on a weekly basis. We feel good about being in the NFNL and look forward to seeing how far we can go.”
Turner liked the work of the defence, led by Lachlan Murdoch and Jack Nicolo. These two repelled many Stars attacks with the latter taking numerous intercept marks.
Further afield, Turner had praise for midfielder Joel Tolli and forward Lachie Kerr who slotted three goals in his first senior game in the league.
Blair Healy marked well and put an exclamation mark on his side’s triumph with the final goal of the match, which kicked from heavy traffic at close range. Kyle O’Sullivan got plenty of the football through the midfield, while Sean Desmond was another Raider defender that impressed.
The contest lived up to its match of the round status and both sides fought hard for its superiority.
Defences were on top early, with both combatants moving the ball through the middle of the ground, but often just bombing long into the forward 50 without kicking to the advantage of a teammate.
In their first look at Garvey Oval, the Stars were without key forward Patrick Farrant who was called up to play for Collingwood’s VFL side this weekend.
Kicking it to Farrant was the obvious play in the previous weeks, but the Stars players had to work out other strategies this week, and it soon became apparent that Jai Burns would rise to the occasion, kicking five goals from the midfield in what was a brilliant display, three of those majors coming in the third quarter.
Only two other players hit the scoreboard for the Stars, with Rivva Karpany and Tony Mullett each managing a goal. Mullett particularly impressed his coach with some tough contested marks.
“Old Paradians are good at the contest and spread really impressively,” Fitzroy Stars coach Lionel Proctor said.
As well as best-on-ground performer Burns and fellow goalkicker Mullett, Proctor gave a big tick to ruckman Allan Norris and star midfielder Kain Proctor in the centre.
Hayden Welsh did well for the visitors in defence as well as giving Norris a chop out in the ruck at times. Josh Wanganeen got plenty of it on the wing, while Michael Brown was solid for a third consecutive week
The loss drops the Stars just out of the top five, but teams from positions 3 to 6 are all on two wins with the percentage gaps being relatively small.
With the fixture for Round 4 having two teams above them playing each other, the Stars will be back in the top five immediately if they can return to the winners list against Reservoir next week.
But for the Raiders, they are so far paralleling Kinglake’s efforts 12 months prior in starting their first season in the NFNL 3-0, and with Kilmore to come, there’s a chance the winning feeling will continue for Old Paradians.
