Tomorrow, the local rivals will go head-to-head for the second time this year but at the Redeyes’ home ground.
As the final round of the Picola League home and away season, there are several reasons to play well for both teams.
Blighty is coming off a significant loss to Jerilderie last week - 6.1 (37) to 19.15 (129) - but coach Dane Leyden said the boys are hungry to finish the season with a win.
The Jerilderie game was a challenge for the team, but they improved their performance as the game went on.
“Accurate kicking probably made the game look closer than it was.”
“We came out a bit rusty coming off the bye. I did try and get the boys up for it, but it is a bit hard at this stage of the season with a few of them doing a few different things on their week off.
“We played better in the second half, but they (Jerilderie) were too good.”
Motivation should not be an issue this weekend for the senior Redeyes playing against district rivals.
But adding some significance is a significant milestone, with quality clubman Sam Singleton playing his 200th senior game.
“We always want to put on a good performance against (Deni) and the boys know that.
“Hopefully, the boys come to play and are switched on from the start.
“I’ll be telling them it is one more effort, then they can switch off for a while.
“As for Sam, he has been an absolute blessing for us this year.
“He plays footy for the right reasons; he’s a good, talented, hard worker.
“I think its fair to say he has been one of our best, really consistent midfielders this year, and it’s a credit to him to be able to do that without much of a preseason.”
Tomorrow is also Blighty’s Sponsors and Life Members Day, with celebrations to continue after the game.
In contrast to Blighty, the Rovers are buoyant after a 169 point win last weekend against Mathoura and with all football and netball teams securing finals placings.
Rovers coach Alex Hay said while the win was against a team placed 15 on the ladder, the Deni side played a positive brand of footy in front of a solid crowd consisting of many past players.
“We know that Mathoura has been doing really well to continue to field a side, with 60+ players moving through their list due to injury or otherwise, but we were really steadfast on trying to focus on how we play rather than the result.
“Having said that, there were obviously some outstanding individual efforts and I thought that our mid-forward connection was positive as well.”
The last time Deni and Blighty met earlier this year for the Warner Tasker Cup, the Rovers won by 38 points despite trailing by four points at three-quarter time.
Hay reaffirmed that when the Rovers and Blighty play, it doesn’t matter where the two teams are on the ladder.
“It really doesn’t matter what’s happened throughout the season, you can count on a pretty physical contest and it to be a fair arm wrestle,” he said.
“You only need to cast your mind back to round two, where it was only until the last 10 minutes of the game where we were able to get some ascendancy in the contest.”
Hay said another aim is to continue to build good form leading into finals.
“Unfortunately, we coughed up an opportunity to secure the double chance, so everything from here on will be sudden death.
“The mentality will just be to play the best football that we are capable of for the next couple of weeks, finding some form individually, but also there’s probably not a lot that you can really improve on this time of year so we just turn to application and consistency.”
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