Match Reports 18th October

Table is updated, final scores below, and reports; and a massive congratulations to UQ lovers, they've been putting 10 points on a lot of teams this season without getting a win, and its paid off. 

Dojo over Blitz (15-7), Bugs over Heroes (15-4), UQ Lovers over Cobras (15-9). 

Heroes - Matt B

Some nights you and your team oozes confidence and every throw and catch turns into gold.  Other nights you compete in a hard running equally matched contest.  For the Heroes last night nothing like this happened.  We were very very ordinary.  And as BPL has demonstrated, if you turn up ordinary you will get beaten. Turn up very very ordinary and you get spanked.  It was somewhat of a positive is that we were not decimated.  It looked for a while that we would be.  Fortunately we avoided the 10-1 ratio required to be technically decimated.  Although the roster was a few key players down, we need to be, and as we have demonstrated are better than what happened.  

Well played Buggers.  I am embarrassed that we provided you with such little contest.  Across the park we failed to match you and we deserved to get spanked.

A couple of highlight passages do come to mind, George getting a layout D, both Dan’s taking excellent grabs and Carl hitting two pinpoint cross field hammers.  Thanks for these moments guys, it gives some enjoyable memories from the evening.

The beer was also very nice.

Blitz - Chris

So Dojo has had a bit of a yoyo season so far. To say that the reigning champs haven't been playing to past form is an understatement, and this weekthey were coming off a loss to Heroes whichputsome questionmarks over whether they'd even make the finals and let alone be able to defend their title, plus their was no doubt desire to get some revenge for their first round loss to Blitz, and bolstered by a full strength rosterthey definitely took it to the young Blitz boys to school.

To use a cliche, it was definitely a game of two halves. Inthe first half, there was a lot of the traditional and intimidating Dojo zone, but too Blitz's credit they handled it well, and for the most part both teams traded for the majority of the halfwith Dojo taking it 8 v 6 at half time.

Blitz came out pumped in the second half and got a quick break to bring it to within one, and I could sniff a roll coming on (but alas the roll was not to be Blitz's). That was the last time Blitz would trouble the score keeper, Dojo gave up on their tried and true zone (perhaps fearing that Blitz was handling ittoo well) and decided to go back to oldschool hard running man, Blitz were a bit dazed and confused by the unexpected change in strategy and struggled to get any flow on man and Dojo ran away with it 15 v 7.

Blitz's hucks often fell out of reach by a few inches, where as Dojo squeezed nicely through gaps by inches, Blitz's deep defence wasalways just an inch short of getting a block in the aerial contests, whereas Dojo's aerial defence was always just an inchin time... in short it was a collection of Dojo's small victories all over the field that made up their large win. They deserved it, they were playing like the Dojo of old, and maybe they will look back at the season and say this was the game that righted their capsized season. 

UQ Lovers - BW

After the first half of the season was over, UQ were feeling that our position on the ladder may have been correct but we hadn't quite got the points we probably earned. With 2 universe point games and another 2 games we threw with leads of 5 and 4 to more experienced teams coming home strong on us the aim was to improve our closing of games and try and get some points on the board.

We had the Cobras on Thursday, and it was a game that although we weren't too far off the scoreboard in round 2, we were never really in the game. This time around Cobras were missing 3 of their key players - Wetnose, Dan and Dan. The game started out well for us grabbing a couple of points against a cobras zone. Our zone seemed to be generating enough blocks and our offense was steady enough to go up 7-3. By this stage Cobras had switched to a man defense and were able to shut down a lot of our options and intercepted nearly every one of our long throws to even it back up at 7s. We were able to finally take an offense point to go up in to half 8-7. We persisted with our zone defense, which had been getting beaten pretty easily, and with a couple adjustments and quite a few bad options by the cobras in the second half we were able to take it away in the second half to win 15-9.

Not falling away through the middle period of the game when Cobras went on a run was a big step up for us as well as a lot of clutch, pressure grabs across the board really helped. We were also able to get in a lot of 50-50 contests on defense and turn a lot of them in our favour. 

Bugs - Mat

Natural order has been restored.

The Buggers are back in the top 4.

It was always going to be a strange night.  Due to a convergence of unlikely co-incidences, Buggers had 5 out for the night leaving them savage and facing a Heroes team with plenty of form on the board and plenty of confidence.  But the Heroes roster was also significantly depleted, with 3 of their top players absent in Perth on AMUC duties.  So it was going to be a case of which team had the depth to absorb the changes and play on regardless.

And the Buggers answered in fine form, taking half 8-1 and then getting out to 9-1 before trading for a few and eventually taking the game 15-4.

The Bugs played a zone which strangled the Heroes O and forced numerous turns in the Heroes half, giving the Buggers a series of easy scores.

Burwell did everything he usually does, throwing a lot of goals and creating so many options for the cutters in the field.

Jangles ran riot in the middle, unmarkable and getting a million touches.  Special G was too strong at the back on D, cleaning up anything long.

Special mention to Tim Ferg who absorbed a couple of lunchtime steins at the German Club to chase on puppy all night and then handle error free on O.

The Heroes tried, but their roster losses upset their structures and patterns too much and they were unable to maintain any pressure on D or create options on O.  The question for them will be whether they can find their early season mojo when the Brown boys and Myall return, or whether their confidence has been irreparably crushed after a couple of losses.  It’s up to them to prove they are worthy of a finals spot.

With 3 teams equal on 4 wins, and Blitz just behind on 3, there is plenty of time left in the competition for things to change.

And after a review of last night’s results, there’s bound to be a few twists and turns before the end.

Ps:  The “Beer Round” was an inspired innovation.  A brilliant piece of initiative from Adz. 

Dojo - ads

Dojo were pretty pumped up for this game, and it showed with 13 at the fields. Last time we played Blitz, we were 5 or so up and slacked off, and let them back in the game and win. Last few weeks haven't been that great, with losses against Heroes and Bugs. The team were exuding positivity, and even though we traded during the first half and not getting more than a point or two away from Blitz, it felt like we were on top.

Unfortunately Sean hurt himself at some point in a collision, but we had the numbers to take control of the game - after 8-6 at half, Blitz scored once and Dojo scored the next 7 points. 

Handlers looked good with the disc, mid-recievers were running hard and getting the disc often in good positions, Dan Walls did an awesome job deep. It came together nicely, and it felt like Dojo. 

On D we seemed to have their measure - Cola getting a few people up to 8 or 9 before they threw it away. Our Man D was working, and Dojo intensified this in the second half with hard running. 

Man, it feels good to win. We should do this every week!