By Julian Pitts
The Rococo Noosa Tigers have suffered their second consecutive home ground loss to begin their QAFL debut season. The culprit this time was Gold Coast heavyweights Palm Beach whose 4 goal victory opened their account for season 2021.
Nothing separated either side with regard to attack on the footy and pressure with the Noosa boys more than gallant in this department, in fact it was a vast improvement from two weeks ago from Adam Bovalino’s men whose attack on the footy and opposition was super impressive. Palm Beach were just able to play to their game structure for longer and were cleaner particularly by foot. They had plenty of tall and exciting options up forward and that’s not taking anything away from the Noosa backline who were superb for the most part. Tigers coach Adam Bovalino saying, “Palmy were just better for longer“. I thought when we were able to play our game with quick transition and ball movement we looked every bit as good as them. Even at the end we had our chances to really steel it and unfortunately some poor choices cost us. We are a new outfit with regard to playing together and of course in a top level competition, we will learn from this and go forward. We expect to be competitive and what better way to test ourselves than against our arch rivals Maroochydore on Anzac weekend this Saturday.
As mentioned earlier Noosa’s backline was outstanding with skipper Aaron Laskey in everything the entire day, his will to make second and third efforts to win the footy a standout, again Riley Buntain was exceptional with his reading of the play and ability to evade and attack from a negative position whilst Riley O’Dwyer also had a terrific game playing on some very dangerous opponents.
Ruckman Riley Rickard battled manfully again the entire day against much taller opponents whilst the class of Meredith, Fitzpatrick, Stack and young debutant Cooper Langan were the reason the Tigers were able to surge forward and look like causing an upset throughout periods of the day but particularly in the final quarter, 16 year old Langan, son of Noosa great Reece and brother of 2020 premiership player Mitch was terrific in his debut Senior Match, more so in the final quarter when he gathered 8 quality touches to give the home side a fighting chance. Jack Harper and Mav Pettigrove booted two goals apiece however Aaron Wilson (4 goals) played a lone hand up forward the entire day for the Tigers. He was super dangerous from the outset and was double teamed pretty early in the second half as was his influence on the contest. Not only his goalkicking and general presenting was impressive but his general recovery and forward pressure fantastic to watch also. Another big day at our Weyba Rd headquarters as we embraced our sponsors on the Heads of Noosa Brewery lawn with all having a great day and enjoying a very good standard of footy. Noosa need to bounce back quickly and open their account for season 2021 and who better to do it against than Maroochydore at Fisherman’s Road from 3.30 pm this Saturday. One not to be missed and no gallant losses accepted, also a big weekend for our defending women’s team who play Alexander Hills on Saturday afternoon in Brisbane also our junior teams who start there 2021 campaigns on Anzac Day.
A big reminder than we have VFL/ AFL legend Doug Hawkins as a first special guest speaker on Saturday May 1st. Doug is a Footscray (Western Bulldogs) legend, vice captain and wingman in their Team of the Century, a club champion, All Australian, AFL Hall of Famer, numerous Victorian representative matches who played an amazing 350 games of AFL football, and more to the point is an absolute larrikin with hundreds of great footy stories to share with us. For all information regarding upcoming games, events ,team selection etc please head to our social media platforms (website/Facebook) by googling Noosa Tigers AFC
Massive Anzac weekend coming
See you at the footy!
Go Tigers
