Sophie finds her feet in Cats’ win

DYNAMIC forward Sophie Van De Heuvel had an inkling she was in for a good day on Saturday just minutes after the ball was bounced.

A superb tackle on Carlton’s Amelia Mullane was just the catalyst to get her into the match, and she did not disappoint.

The teenage sensation showed Geelong fans why she is so highly rated with some superb passages of play, none more impressive than her chase-down tackle of Chloe Dalton in the second quarter, which resulted in her first goal at AFLW level.

Van De Heuvel admitted it had been a tough initiation following games against the Western Bulldogs and Adelaide, but said she felt she had found her feet on Saturday against the Blues.

“I was hoping I would play a good game soon to try to get me through, so I am really happy with how I played today and hopefully I can keep up the consistency and keep playing well,” Van De Heuvel said.

“It has been a great experience to play against Adelaide and the Western Bulldogs, probably two of the top teams in the competition. It has been good to see how they go about it and play their roles.”

Van De Heuvel formed part of a match-winning forward set up, led by the one-two combination of Phoebe McWilliams and Maddie Boyd, and complemented by Danielle Orr and Jordan Ivey.

The dual sports star, who was in the mix for a WBBL cricket contract this summer, said there was a positive vibe at the Cats after the team’s second win of the season.

“The atmosphere was awesome, and obviously being the top two it was going to be a hard game going into it but we knew if we stuck to our structures, we knew what our roles were, so we stuck to that really well throughout the game,” Van De Heuvel said.

“It was really good to see and to finally come out on top and beat Carlton.”