Cougars Round 2, Kalamunda V’s Thornlie at Ray Owen Oval

With this loss, the Cougars have fallen to ninth spot on the C1 ladder and are faced with a hard road ahead to regain some credibility after being relegated from ‘B’ grade last season.

Our spectators would have been buoyed in the first minute of this game when the Cougars through ruckman Cormac White and skipper Trent Pottinger took the ball from the middle to forward Jackson Bowen who goaled!

This move must have jolted the Thornlie Lions into action as they had been soundly beaten by Swan Athletic by 40 points in Round 1.

From then they made life miserable for the Cougars, who may have thought Thornlie were going to be an easy team to beat.

Thornlie who finished in 6^th position in C1’s last season, field a number of tall veterans and seasoned mid-fielder’s who applied plenty of pressure around the ground in this first quarter, restricting the Cougars to 2.4 while kicking 2.3 themselves.

The Cougars continued to struggle against the Lions pressure in the second term, with poor disposal by hand and foot leading to a number of missed opportunities in their forward area kicking 3.3 to the Lions 3,1.

Coach Chris Bolton would have stressed at half time, that the effort to hold the ball in our forward area was lacking, as the backline was placed under terrific pressure during the quarter when Thornlie were allowed to stream down the ground unopposed.

Thornlie continued to apply their physical strength in the third quarter with their backline holding firm, forcing the Cougars into an indirect approach to goal to kick 1.5. The Lions replied with 2.2 for the quarter.

This score had a serious effect on the outcome of this game! 

This was a very ugly game to watch in the final term as the Cougars resorted to their old tactic of trying to defend by kicking the ball down the clubroom-flank,  only to see the lions take telling marks and kick back to their forwards.

Fortunately, our backs held firm restricting them to 1.3 for the quarter, while Leo Lambert gave us some hope in the dying minutes with a blinding dash to score our only goal for the term, a minute or so too late!

Fundamental errors cost the Cougars this game, composure being one of them, however skill errors dogged the Cougars all game and these factors will no doubt be addressed by coach Bolton through training.

Final scores: Thornlie: 8.9 – 57, Kalamunda: 7.13 – 55      

Best players: Max Fasolo, Trent Pottinger, Leo Lambert, Cormac White, Ethan Olsen.

Special mention: Cormac White in ruck – against heavy odds!

League Coaches Report

In ideal football conditions, Kalamunda Cougars hosted Thornlie up the mountain for the first home game of the year. Spirits were high amongst the league side as they aimed to make amends for the narrow defeat the week before. From a selection viewpoint, some forced changes due to injury and unavailability saw league football opportunities go to Cooper Boyd, Kaiden Pisani and a club league debut to Conor Faulds. 

When a coach receives a phone call at 1pm on game day from a player unable to make the game, it creates a very interesting environment for the league and reserves coach regarding player movement.

Thankfully, our two senior sides are on the same page from game style and selection, meaning that it was a very simple decision to see Ethan Olsen also make a league debut after completing 3 qtrs in the reserves game. Having the senior program with such cohesiveness will see success at the club for years to come.

Following a strong week of education, the league team had a definitive focus on front half pressure and leading patterns to aid our ball movement. With 8 tackles inside the F50 in the first quarter alone along with the midfield dominating clearances, Kalamunda demonstrated how damaging they can be. It was unfortunate that Thornlie also played some great footy, taking an incredible 6 marks inside their forward 50 for the quarter. A stat that I’m certain the suburb of Lesmurdie was made aware of at qtr time as the defenders were ‘encouraged’ to punch the ball. 

The pressure from the Cougars resumed in the 2nd qtr, however, the Thornlie midfield got on top in the stoppages (2-9 for the qtr) which proved challenging to overcome. Poor discipline and some over enthusiastic tackling from the Cougars saw Thornlie gifted opportunities to score, kicking 3 goals for the quarter; including uncontested marks on the goal line. Clearly not acceptable by our league defenders. At no point did the Cougars players lower their intensity and they continued to pile pressure on a physical Thornlie team. A highly celebrated goal from Max Fasolo just before half time saw the Cougars take a small margin into the second half.

The seesaw continued throughout the second half as Thornlie continued to assert themselves on the contest and disable Kalamunda’s desire to control ball movement. The second half for Kalamunda saw them kick 2.7 as opposed to Thornlie’s 3.4. This would suggest that there will be some practice around goal accuracy throughout training this week as we set the goal to kick more goals than points in future games. Better players for Kalamunda included Ethan Olsen, Leo Lambert, Trent Pottinger, Cormac White with Max Fasolo being adjudged best on ground. 

Thanks to those who came and said hello during the day yesterday, I look forward to seeing more of you at next week’s game against Jandakot.

See you at the footy, Bolts

Womens Round 2 V’s Coolbellup

‘The Wrap’ 

After a dominate win in round 1 our ladies were under no illusions that we would need to play even better against a talented Coolbellup side on Saturday. 

The opposition had the help of a strong breeze, were a bit better hunting the ball, and had some strong skillful forwards which meant the ball rarely made the Cougars forward 50m for the entire first stanza!

Our determined group of ladies held on to limit Coolbellup to just one major score! The breeze died off and Coolbellup were still the better side for most of the second qtr. 

At half time, we discussed the need to welcome these hard, arm wrestle type games, as that’s what finals look like and women’s footy has its own down to the wire consistency!

In the 3rd the tussle remained tight and we went into the last break still down…

BUT!!!! Our ladies never gave up, got harder around the ball, our backline defended like their lives depended on it, our ruck and mid’s went non stop, and our forwards helped lock the ball in our forward 50m to get us a couple of good chances. 

With about 6 minutes to go, a captains goal from Grace Allison put us in front for the first time in the match and the girls courageously held on to win by 4 points! 

This weeks awards: 

Best: Holly Touchell, 2nd Best; Juliet Clark, 3rd Best; Tia Miller, 

4th Best; Channy Myburgh (And Players player) 

Special thanks to Brayden Becker who took the girls training Thursday night while I was unwell and thank you to Jackson for being our runner. 

Once again, I’m super proud of this group of ladies and excited for what can be possible in 2024 and beyond !  

We will be working hard all week to make sure we prepare for a Scarborough team coming off a big win this weekend ! Aitch 

Other results from round 2

This round: see Alex Haight’s reports in ‘This Weeks Topic’

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