By: Joseph Arthur
BAYSWATER currently sits third on the Division 1 ladder, 4 per cent in front of Lilydale ahead of a Saturday night showdown this weekend.
After a slow start to the season, Bayswater has flown under the radar and turned itself into a genuine finals contender.
The last six weeks for has seen a string of three wins in a row, a close loss to the top side and a narrow victory this past weekend against Mooroolbark.
Senior coach Tom Roach has been satisfied with his side’s recent form and said it bodes well for their finals campaign.
“It’s going along really well; we’re definitely playing better footy than we were at the start of year,” Roach said.
“We’re starting to play the way we want to play but look, the games are close, no doubt about it, it’s a couple of goals either way so you can play well one week and lose by a point, then play well next week and win by a point, so it’s pretty close.”
Roach said he has been impressed with the players’ ability to run-out close games and finish them off strong in the second half, something he hopes will continue for the remainder of the season.
Roach credited his rotation scheme and productive use of the interchange as a catalyst for keeping the squad fresh throughout the second half of games.
“We rotate pretty heavily from the interchange and we’re quite evenly matched across the ground where we can rotate evenly across every aspect,” Roach said.
“I suppose the boys having about a hundred rotations a game, you can run out the game quite well and I suppose match fitness comes into that, we’ve got some pretty seasoned bodies.
“We find that’s the best way to do it and the most effective way to make sure the boys do run out the games.”
A mainstay of Bayswater’s season thus far has been a strong defensive effort, currently ranked number two in the competition, only conceding an average of 60 points a game.
Roach said the back line has really gelled throughout the year and consistency among players who are down there has allowed a strong chemistry to build among them.
“We started off not scoring heavily at all and we relied on our back line to be relentless and not give up too much score and we’ve sort of kept that same back line and now been able to score a little bit going the other way which is great,” Roach said.
“Our backs have been pretty consistent; I’ve sort of only used the seven or eight blokes for the whole year down there, so they sort of have gelled really well together.
“They know when to zone off and when to be hard up on a man and they cover for each-other really well.
“They’ve got a really good relationship down there so that does help.”
Bayswater has struggled to keep the ball inside its forward 50, averaging roughly 35 entries a game and last weekend, matched up against an in-form Mooroolbark, was a danger game.
Mooroolbark’s defensive structures from Round 7 to 14 had it conceding only 46 points a game, so Roach and his side had to find an answer for the Mustangs’ defence and capitalise on their opportunities.
“Yeah look, we don’t go inside too heavily,” Roach said.
“I suppose I’ve got a lot of my better players down there so when it does get down there they do happen to score and it’s vital for us that we keep it in there so it doesn’t come back out quickly.
“From rounds one to six they (Mooroolbark) were getting 90 points scored against them on average and from rounds 7 to 14 they’d only had 46 against them which is a huge discrepancy, so we sort of looked at their tape and how they structure up.
“We looked at that and noticed we sort of had to hang on to the ball and not kick it back to them, so when we got it we just made sure we kept it longer than we normally would.”
The win against Mooroolbark made a finals berth for Bayswater a sure thing and in a division where no win comes easy, it’s time for Roach and his boys to start gearing up for season’s end.
Roach said success in finals starts with finishing off the season strong and Bayswater will look to retain third on the ladder this weekend when it comes up against fourth-placed Lilydale.
“As many tough games going into finals as you can is handy,” Roach said.
“There are no easy games in first division; we’ve actually lost two games this year to the team who was on the bottom of ladder.
“You can’t take any game lightly and every game’s a good tune-up for finals
“They’re (Lilydale) in fourth, we’re in third and we know if we lose that game they’ll take our spot so it’s a really important game.
“It’s a night game next week so we hope we’ll get a bit of a crowd out in Lilydale and hopefully the weather’s not too bad.”