After a massive season, the Greater Western Sydney GIANTS 2011 NEAFL campaign has come to an end. A vastly depleted GIANTS side lost the first elimination final against the Eastlake Demons at Manuka by 68 points today.
A number of GIANTS listed and young Academy players showed flashes of brilliance today with Josh Bruce taking a screamer in the forward line and Kurtis Steele chasing down an opponent over 30 meters to turn the ball over in the midfield.
GIANTS head coach Kevin Sheedy said that while the club was disappointed with the loss, the opportunity that was given to some of the younger GIANTS Academy players to test their skills in the NEAFL finals was immeasurable.
“All in all it was a disappointing result because we lost our first final and we hoped that we might keep going but losing a couple of players late in the year with a broken leg and a knee reconstruction hurt us a bit.
“There was a stage in the game when we had as many shots at goal as they did and we believe that we could have been probably two or three goals down at half time.
“Missing the first four shots at goal really hurt us.
“We had so many young players from our zone playing for us today. That’s one of the great things that we got out of this year is that we’ve played around 75 players.”
The GIANTS will hold reviews at the club this week before the squad all head home to different parts of Australia for a well-deserved break.
“This week we will give reports to every player on how we think their year has gone, where they’ve played well and where they’ve got to improve.
“That will all be done this week, then they’ll go off and have a well deserved break. All of these boys have had to shift to Sydney and get to know each other so it’s been a big task.
While the NEAFL season is over for the GIANTS, 2011 is far from over with the club’s list set to be finalized over the next few months and the AFL Draft coming to Western Sydney.
“We’ll be working 12 months a year for the next three years to build this club.
“Our focus will now be to watch a lot of games in the AFL finals as a coaching group.
“We have player announcements coming up in the next few weeks and that will be very important to the players that we’ve already got at the club that are hoping that they’ll get some really good senior players who have played in the AFL.
“We will then head in to the draft. Straight after the Grand Final I’ll be heading to the draft combine in Melbourne so there is a lot of work to do.”
GWS GIANTS
9.14.68
Eastlake
20.16.136
GIANTS goal kickers
Ben Reid 3
Kurtis Steele
Josh Bruce
Ben Casley
Harry Collins
Harry Cunningham
Simon Tunbridge
Bests
Reid, Townsend, Steele, Phillips, Schulz, Bruce
