Oakleigh’s U/19s began their finals campaign against Ormond on Saturday at EE Gunn Reserve and gained an insight into why Ormond are flag favourites. The young Krushers were found wanting against a faster and stronger Ormond outfit. The Oaks seemed overawed by the both the occasion and the opposition and couldn’t get their game going, fumbling and making basic errors as the Monds just swept them aside, losing two players to knee injuries before half-time didn’t help the cause either. The Ormond forward line were simply too big for the Oakleigh defence and brushed the Krushers aside as they piled on 7 unanswered goals in the second term to effectively book a spot in the grand final.
Oakleigh battled hard but conceding another 5 goals in the third term made an already unlikely recovery even more difficult. Despite a spirited last term, the Oaks were soundly thrashed by 74 points. Jake Benoiton booted 3 goals for Oakleigh with Luke Pappon, Brodie Weymouth and Ryan Henderson all hard workers. Oakleigh now meet Hampton Rovers in the cut-throat preliminary final next week.
Comic relief for the day was supplied by one of the field umpires after the long break. Anyone who has ever thought that umpires had no control over a game would have loved to seen an umpire trying to bring a halt to proceedings without a whistle. After finally stopping play and then calling on his umpiring partner to blow time-on, he dashed from the field to find his whistle much to the amusement of the large crowd. The sight of the umpire’s advisor with face buried in hands was priceless.
