Euroa’s star duo guided the Magpies to a memorable elimination final win against Mooroopna and have set up a do-or-die semi-final against arch nemesis Seymour.
“It was great that we played a good brand of footy to finish the game and we’ll take a lot of confidence out of it and carry it into this weekend,” JD said this week following his fifth senior match of 2023.
“Seymour are a well-drilled outfit and they move the ball really quick.
“I’ve never beaten Seymour in Seymour, so I’m glad they haven’t got a home final. We’ll throw the kitchen sink at them and hope they don’t throw the bathtub back at us.”
The former Magpies coach lined up in his first senior final alongside his twin brother Will in the win.
Perhaps the most memorable part of the match came in the first quarter for JD.
“Their tagger came to me at the start of the game thinking I was Will and I went along with it and ran him about 50m away from the contest before telling him ‘sorry mate, you’ve got the wrong brother’,” he said with a laugh.
“It was really nice to be able to play alongside Will and hopefully we get a few more games in.”
Check out what the final four coaches had to say ahead of this weekend’s semi-final matches.
Echuca v Kyabram
Kyabram coach Paul Newman
“It’s exciting, there’s a lot of hard work to get to this stage of the season.
“Got to be playing our best football now, we’re under no illusions, Echuca are the best team in the comp, we need a lot to go right ... the last few times, we’ve had a couple personnel have little to no impact, to beat Echuca we need our great players to be at their best, so we need a strong even contribution.
“Jase (Morgan) puts his hand up and Nic (Denahy) comes in for Cooper Vick (concussion).
“(Speaking on Kayne Pettifer’s tribunal decision) We’re all disappointed for him personally.
“He announced his retirement at the start of finals.
“He feels like he’s let everyone down. Been unbelievable for our footy club. For someone who has played at the top level for as long as he did, then for him to come back and give 140 games back to his junior club is just something you don’t see any more. ‘Walks’ is doing it now for Echuca, but apart from those two you don’t see it ― it’s sad it’s ended this way.
“We’ve appealed (the decision) and it’s going to an appeal next week.”
Echuca co-coach Sam Reid
“They have some key players that we’ll put some time into. We watched some of their stuff on the weekend and they looked like they have a bit of speed and run, especially their younger guys,” Reid said.
“Mansfield looked like they were running over the top of them at stages; a couple of calls didn’t go their way in the last quarter, but they were right in the game for a long time.
“We know how to play them, we know their key players and we run pretty deep. Lachie Smith is obviously one of their main players down back, so we’ll be looking to make him defend.
“We have a couple of blokes who are pushing for selection like Cam and Ben Reid. Everyone’s pulled up well, which is good.”
Seymour v Euroa
Seymour co-coach Ben Davey
“The boys picked up pretty quick from Saturday’s loss, obviously it was really disappointing to not put in a four-quarter performance,” he said.
“We took a lot of positives out of it; our ball movement, our work around the footy was really good ... for 17 of our 22 it was their first senior GVL final, they got a lot out of it. Really looking forward to this weekend.
“Blokes that are older than me, have a real hatred for Euroa, but it mellowed out a bit in my playing days. There’s plenty of guys I’m good mates with and I get along really well with Scotty (Rowan).
“It’s no longer hatred and it’s more a competitive thing now. There’s definitely a rivalry. No way we want to lose to Euroa.
“Will Brock comes in from suspension, Angus Murray comes back from Bushrangers and Nic Quigg will look to put his hand up after he missed last week. Got a bit of juggling to do.”
Euroa coach Scott Rowan
“We had a really good session last night (Wednesday) and then we’ll have another one with the whole group on Friday. We’ll have a full squad together which will be good,” he said.
“Jake Penman trained, but pulled up sore, so he won’t come back in, Cohen Paul is available now the Bushies are finished up. Erish (Uthayakumar) will train Friday night, try and get through the last session and be available.
“We know that the past couple of games the opposition have wrote us off at three-quarter time with our legs, but I think we’ve finished off better than both of them. We’re under no illusion though, Seymour is a massive challenge and we’ve got to be at our best.”
