Australian Football

Match Report

The games kicked off a bit early this weekend, a 1pm start would be the order of the day and first we head to the Maughan Thiem Kia Oval at Woodville between the Eagles and the Bulldogs. Earlier this year the Eagles put a hurting on their noughties rivals at the Ponderosa, winning their Round 5 outing by 50 points. The premiers' second term proved to be the game breaker, scoring six goals to one and only building their advantage little by little from there. But at Oval Avenue, it was the site of one of Central's worst performances for sometime, hammered by 104 points to close the 2021 season. The Eagles were fresh off their bye after surviving a dirty encounter with South at home by a point, while the Dogs were unlucky against the Magpies, dropping off in the final term to lose by 17 points. It would have gone down as no surprise that the Eagles were favourites even with their head coach in quarantine, but in a shocking turn of events it was the Bulldogs on the front foot. They were on the goals column within 20 seconds and by quarter-time were ahead by 13 points, with the board reading 3.4 to 1.3. There were more than a few chances for both sides in the second quarter, but in uncharacteristic fashion from the Eagles they repeated their first quarter return of 1.3 while the Dogs added 2.3 to their tally. At the half-time break, the unfancied Bulldogs were up by 19 points. The Dogs were putting in what would be considered to be their most complete performance for over a year, while the Eagles were just not looking like they were defending a premiership. Man-on-man pressure was the order of the day for Centrals, laying 30 more tackles than the home side. Sure, the Eagles were winning the centre hit-outs, but everywhere else they were left wanting. The Eagles' third term was especially filthy, they peppered their goals to score 2.5 while the Dogs scored a further 4.1 to take their advantage out to 27 points come three quarter-time. The final term wasn't as score plenty, but it was ecstasy and equally shocking for the Centrals fans in the end as they went on to win by 35 points after kicking 2.4 to 1.2 to finish off the game. Travis Schiller was the stats king for the Dogs, earning best afield honours with a tally of 34 disposals, nine marks and seven clearances. The Eagles named Riley Knight as their best with 26 disposals, seven tackles and six clearances.