Drouin receives lesson in hard running football
A depleted Drouin offered little resistance to a fleet-footed Traralgon at Traralgon on Saturday.
The Hawks started brightly enough in the opening few minutes and looked as if they were there to play.
Six minutes into the game Drouin led 2-1 to one goal after a Dan Nicholls conversion from a free kick and a running goal by Nathan Guy.
But it wasn’t until the last quarter that Drouin got its next goal.
In between Traralgon ran in 19 unanswered goals on the way to a 2115 to 7-8 win, nippy forward Lee Stockdale helping himself to six of the goals.
The Hawks “won” the last quarter 5-3 to 4-5.
They did play a bit better at the finish but part of the change in fortune may have been due to Traralgon’s Ben Amberg, who’d dominated the ruck contests and fed his on-ballers, hitting his head heavily on the ground late in the third quarter and spending most of the last term stationed in the forward goal square.
Amberg’s ruck ascendancy was in no little way due to the absence of Drouin coach Bob McCallum, representing VicCountry at the weekend.
McCallum was one of five forced changes to the Hawks’ winning lineup of the previous week, the others including Todd Beck also on representative duties with the VicCountry Under 19 team.
Traralgon was missing its playing coach Mark Collison, a team mate of McCallum’s in Sunday’s Country versus Metro match, but the Drouin absences were felt much more.
The Maroons gave Drouin a lesson in hard running.
Other than Amberg they are not endowed with overly tall players but compensate by never staying still.
They had the Hawks ‘defence confused and trying to second guess as they swept the ball forward and also were able to slow down Drouin most times it tried to push forward.
The last quarter was the only time the Hawks were able to get the ball into attack quickly and it enabled Ben Hughes, Nathan Guy and Liam Anderson to mark oneon-one and kick goals.
At no stage did Drouin throw in the towel.
It was just that they were unable to find answers to the way Traralgon played or to match the Maroons’ skills with foot and hand.
Drouin’s delivery of the ball was a stark contrast, Nicholls a clear exception with some penetrating and constructive kicking into the forward area.
On-ballers, Luke Duffy, Jordan Kingi and Brad Virgona did put in for four quarters, Duffy getting involved more around the ground as well as his typically hard work in close.
Nicholls had one of his best games for the year patrolling one side of the ground with some stints on the ball.
Guy in only his third senior game was impressive with some strong marks and involvement at ground level but he and key forward Hughes were victims of not getting enough opportunities to move freely with space around them.
Nicholls, Guy and Anderson each kicked two goals for the Hawks and Hughes one.
Drouin is one-and-ahalf games - six premiership points - out of the “five”.
It’s not impossible for them to get there but it will need a lot to go right.
The Hawks probably need to win four of their remaining six games, possibly only three if some other results fall their way, with next Saturday’s home game against Maffra the first hurdle in front of them.