Silence golden for Newcomb
NEWCOMB coach Rory Nicol could sense the stress.
Nicol’s players had entered the rooms 13 points down at halftime to Portarlington.
For the first time in a long time, Newcomb had entered the game as an overwhelming favourite.
It was a tag that hung heavy through the first half against a physical Demons.
Nicol knew he had to get his players to hit the refresh button ahead of the third quarter.
“The players were really stressed, they didn’t know what to do,” he said.
“It’s uncharted waters. We are sitting in a different half of the ladder . . . Round 1 and 2 we were underdogs, but leading into the game the players didn’t look comfortable to me.
“I let the boys sit at halftime and nobody was allowed to talk for two, three minutes. They just had to think about their role and how they are going.
“We calmed it down and I said to them, ‘I don’t care if you win or lose, I just want you to show some character in the second half and if we lose, so be it’.”
Nicol’s words worked wonders, with Newcomb slamming home five unanswered thirdterm goals to run out a 36point winner at Portarlington Recreation Reserve.
“They outnumbered us in the contest and we just tried to lengthen the ground out a little bit too early,” Nicol said of the first half.
“They tried to get lots of numbers around the footy and slow the game down, which they did really well — their pressure was through the roof. They put us under stress and forced us to make errors.
“They ran out of legs, which we thought they might, so we just needed to stick at it and stay calm.
“Once the pressure was off them (the players) and we got some more numbers around the footy, they were able to play the way we wanted to play.”
Tom Smith was electric with four goals, while Andrew Mead-Harding kicked three.
Peter Plummer was tough in the contest when his side needed it early and Joel Ladlow also handled the pressure well. Nathan McDonald, James Hussey and Logan Wagener were other standouts for Newcomb.
The victory continues its undefeated start to the season, taking its 2019 record to 3-0.
“We are a very young group and it’s all about learning and we learnt a lot in the first half. This is our most pleasing win of the three,” Nicol said.
“We will put that three behind us now . . . the expectation is probably coming externally, we know where we are at internally. We know we are not going to win every game of footy. We don’t speak about finals. We just look at every week (as it comes).”