Round 11, Swan Athletic V’s Kalamunda @ the Swan Athletic Sporting Club.
The past record of encounters with Swan Athletic have not favored the Cougars. In the two games they played in the 2024 season Swan Athletic were on top of the ‘C’ grade ladder beating the Cougars by 20 points and 5 points respectively. They went on to win the Grand Final and were promoted to ‘B’ grade. In round 2 against the Cougars this season, they won by 29 points.
Swan Athletic currently sit in 7th position on the B grade ladder, one rung up on the Cougars. With current form, the Cougars favored beating them in this round. Swan Athletic are always hard to beat on their home ground as they have an experienced tall side that takes energy from its supporters at home games
The Cougars started this game with great determination kicking with a strong breeze. Despite crowding in their forward line Trent Pottinger, Ash McGowan, Dustin Brown and Blake Thomas broke free to score while holding the Swans to 1.2
Despite desperate defence in the second term, Swan Ath, broke free and using the wind kicked 5 goals to lead by 9 points. It was during this quarter that the Swans took advantage of the Cougars skill errors and take telling marks to set their play up.
Damon Whitcombe with the responsibility of league coach, in the absence of Chris Bolton, would have urged the team to lower their eyes and find targets despite having the advantage of the wind in this quarter. It was apparent that the Swans height was a clear advantage in marking contests and to ‘bomb the ball’ into the forward line would not provide results.
The Cougars made every effort to do this; however, the Swans had changed gear and matched the Cougars score in this quarter with hard physical play, to lead by 10 points at the break,
In the final term the Cougars made a heroic effort to score against the elements with their mid field working overtime. However, they were inaccurate in their forward line missing close opportunities while the Swans continued to keep pressing with the strong wind. Fortunately, our backline stood firm restricting them to 1.1 for the term.
There were some great efforts made in this game, none better than Daniel Griffin who battled all day with Swans veteran ruckman Cameron Yukich, Steve Caccetta and Jack Jago showed great courage in and under all day and skipper Trent Pottinger worked his guts out once again.
I have said in the past that ‘size does matter. and in this game, it stood out. All in all, it was a gutsy effort with all members contributing and a definite improvement on round 2 earlier in the season.
Final scores: Swan Athletic 9.10 – 64, Kalamunda 7.9 – 51
Best Players: Pending
Goals: Cristiano Paduano 2, one each to Blake Thomas, Dustin Brown, Ash McGowan and Trent Pottinger.
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Next Game: Round 12, Kalamunda V’s Cockburn Lakes 01:10 PM Saturday 4 July, 2026 at Harmony Field.
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This post is dedicated to, MACA Mining & Orica Mining Services, proud sponsors of the Kalamunda ‘Cougars’ Football Club.
