The Greater Western Sydney GIANTS have secured their fourth win for the NEAFL season, defeating last year’s Canberra league runners up, Eastlake Demons by 63 points at Manuka Oval. The GIANTS dominated the play throughout the match, maintaining the majority of possessions with the midfielders working hard to ensure that the ball rarely reached the Eastlake forward line and ten separate goal scorers converting their efforts on the scoreboard.

GIANTS head coach Kevin Sheedy was impressed with his side’s performance and said that the squad achieved the goals that they set earlier in the week. He also commended the young playing group on the way that they handled the physicality of Eastlake in the first quarter and continued to enter the tough contest despite being hit hard.

“That’s the first time that we’ve won all four quarters in a game and that was our target for this week.

“Last week, we let the opposition come back and win two quarters. That’s something that we will need to work on because you just cannot allow that to happen in AFL.

“It was a physical game early, a lot of our younger boys were getting smashed. It was good for them because it forced them to face that physical challenge and they came through it.

“We’ve got five or six kids in this team that are still at school so we really thank them for their performance today.

“We also had a player out there who hasn’t played a game for almost eight months coming off injury in Nathan Wilson so to see him get through the game was a great result for the team.” Sheedy said.

The second half of the match was similar to the first with the away side holding on to the ball, putting pressure on the opposition around the ground and converting their efforts easily on the scoreboard. A piece of play that summed up the GIANTS performance saw Hombsch pick up a loose ball in the back line, handball to Cameron. Cameron got the ball to his boot as he was tackled to the ground, kicking it up the corridor to Casley. Casley booted the football to Folau who slotted his third goal of the day on the run.

Sheedy was impressed with Israel Folau’s performance for the third week in a row, saying that the NRL convert’s football knowledge and ball skills are developing each week.

“I think that he probably could have kicked five or six goals again this week. I think that his general game awareness and his ground level ball skills were a lot better today.

“A lot of people don’t realise that he didn’t have pre season training so he’s really just starting to play AFL footy now and get used to what the game is all about,” he said.

The Bruce brothers provided an entertaining match up in the GIANTS forward line with Josh attacking and leading to the football with Aaron close behind. Sheedy joked that the pair looked like they had returned to playing football in their backyard and said that the sibling rivalry between them was clear.

“It’s like two brothers having a crack at each other in their backyard. Both of them are from Canberra, they’ve both got a lot of pride and they can both play footy which is really good.

“Josh played a good, solid game; he led up to the ball and took some strong marks. If he’d kicked straight he probably could have kicked three or four goals today,” he said.

Sheedy also praised the efforts of Eastlake Football Club but said that training full time as a team was a huge advantage for the GIANTS, stressing the importance of the closeness of the playing group to their on field success.

“We actually train full time as a team, with the exception of a few players that come into the team as top ups each week so that’s a big advantage for us.

“The great thing about selecting players from all over Australia and moving them to Sydney is that they all live together. That camaraderie is very powerful, when they’re out on the field and they lift, they all lift as a unit.

“This team is getting better, bigger and stronger every week and they will just keep getting better as the year progresses,” he said.

GWS GIANTS

16.17.113

Eastlake

7.8.50

GIANTS goal kickers

Israel Folau 3

Jonathan Giles 3

Jake Olsson 2

Jacob Townsend 2

Dylan Shiel 1

Andrew Phillips 1

Stephen Clifton 1

Lonnie Hampton 1

Alex Carey 1

Josh Bruce 1

Bests

Carey, Cameron, Hombsch, Darley, Shiel, Clifton