Historic day as Drouin plays in FFA Cup
Saturday was a historic day for Drouin Dragons Soccer Club, participating in the Football Federation Australia Cup for the first time in its history but unfortunately going down to Dandenong White Star 3-1.
The club is participating in the FFA Cup as part of the joining the Football Federation Victoria state league with senior and reserves teams.
A good crowd turned up to watch the game against Dandenong White Star, including 2008 AFL Brownlow medallist Adam Cooney and his family.
Jeff and Fiona Kittelty announced they would continue their long-term support to the Dragons, signing as major sponsors for the 2017 and 2018 seasons. Both state league teams will display their business logo on their strips.
In an interesting day for the club, the Dragons welcomed new faces Ryan Semple, Brian Farmer and Aron Owen into the starting lineup.
The team was under the guidance of the new coaching set up of Mark Wood (senior coach), Greg Wyatt (assistant coach) and Lachie Wyatt (fitness coach).
The game started at a reasonable pace with both teams trying to feel what each other was doing with their game plan.
Drouin sat back for the first 5-10 minutes and let White Star have possession so they could see their system. Then Drouin got into the game, dominating the play and trying to move the ball around the park looking for gaps and getting forward.
Every shot at goal by the Dragons was either scuffed and went wide or scrambled out.
Drouin should have been 4-0 up by the half time point but to the credit of Dandenong White Star, they held their shape and against the run of play a ball kicked over the top of Drouin’ s back line and with their forward run, scored the first goal.
Drouin started to get tired but got to half time one down. The half time talk was based around playing tighter and not giving time.
At the start of the second half the team set up was the same, with just Simon Henry replacing the injured Lee Yuill.
Drouin started well again dominating play, putting some great combination plays together and gave White Star no time moving the ball well.
However, 10 minutes in White Star found a weakness down the Dragons’ left side with players starting to get tired, and Drouin found themselves 2-0 down.
Drouin was forced into a second change, putting Trey Dekker on the flank for Todd McConville to give more pace going forward and it started to work.
Drouin got a goal back through Chris Davis and great team play to make the score 2-1 and game on.
Drouin was forced into another change when Paul Gummer was injured, so on come Arjay in an unfamiliar role of left back, however he played well.
The team gave everything getting forward pushing for an equaliser but it wasn’t to be when White Star got forward and scored a third goal with three minutes left.
The score didn’t give justice to the game, but it’s very exciting for the club to see the performance for only their second game together.
The adventure of State League football looks promising for the Drouin Dragons Soccer Club.
A Drouin Dragons information and registration day will be held at Bellbird Park on Sunday at 11am.
As well as fielding two men’s teams in the State League, Drouin Dragons will continue playing under six, under eight, under 10, under 12, under 14, under 15 girl’s, under 16, senior women and senior men in the South Gippsland Soccer League.
SGSL games are played on Sundays with training Tuesday and Thursday nights.
All are welcome to come down to the club on Sunday to meet the 2017 coaches and committee.