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Strong finish means Falcons’ future bright

Tuesday, August 29, 2023 - 3:52 PM
Strong finish means Falcons’ future bright
John Townsend
 
West Perth had plenty to play for when they took on archrival East Perth in the final home-and-away match of the season.
The most critical factor was the result.
Victory on Saturday would keep their premiership defence alive but defeat would guarantee a bottom five finish.
Then there was the chance to honour a retiring premiership coach and several of his departing senior players.
And thirdly, but carrying just as much weight, was the desire to rectify the WA Day derby result from earlier this season when the Falcons produced one of their most limp displays in coach Darren Harris’s successful tenure.
Assistant coach Andrew Strijk confirmed before the game that the earlier loss had burned the players and they were eager to provide a suitable response.
“The boys have got a bee in their bonnet about the last time we played East Perth,” he admitted on SportFM’s Before the Footy.
“We didn’t put up a fight … and the boys took that to heart.”
Any questions about motivation, focus or intensity were answered in the first minute of the match when Sasha Kernutt, whose three-month injury absence contributed to West Perth’s stuttering season, opened the scoring with the first of his career-high five goals.
West Perth had come to play but they were forced to dig deep into their reserves of resolve and energy to eventually hold off the desperate Royals by 15 points, 15.10 (100) to 13.7 (85).
Claremont’s comfortable win over Perth meant there would be no vacancy in the top five for the Falcons but they were determined to see off Harris and retiring veterans Blake Wilhelm and Aidan Lynch in suitable fashion.
West Perth also claimed an unwanted prize given that the win, their 11th this season, meant they became the first team in WAFL history to win more than 60 percent of their qualifying matches without making finals.
Harris, who coached West Perth to premierships last year and in 2003 after earlier captaining the club to a flag in 1995, retires as a modern-day club great.
And he left new coach Jason Salecic, also a premiership captain, with the ideal springboard to start a new era at the club.
Kernutt had four goals on the board by early in the second term to build a substantial lead at half-time
before East Perth produced a stunning second-half comeback to cut the deficit from 52 to just three points.
That period may have coincided with the West Perth players discovering at half-time that their finals dreams had been dashed but it also set up a frenetic finish on a par with the great clashes between the clubs over more than a century.
Senior midfielders Luke Meadows (34 disposals and 1.1) and Shane Nelson (35 and 1.0) sensed the danger and capped their strong seasons with outstanding finales that could see them in a tight tussle on the Sandover Medal leaderboard next month.
Lynch also hit the finish line hard and his goal just before the end - to give his team valuable breathing space - was a timely exclamation mark on a solid career.
Big forward Tyler Keitel landed two goals to finish with 57 and collect his third Bernie Naylor Medal but his greatest contribution came from his creative and cohesive performance that allowed the small forwards like Kernutt, Nathan Murray and Darcy Dixon to have their own shining moments.
Keitel’s on-field leadership and impact will be critical for Salecic next year and beyond.
The emergence of a group of promising youngsters, including Dixon, Griff Julian and Riley Sprigg, and the presence of an established cohort of senior players like Nelson, Meadows and Zac Guadagnin, means the new coach should be confident that the absence from September action should be short-lived.
 
WEST PERTH 5.2 8.7 11.9 15.10 100
EAST PERTH 3.2 3.4 11.4 13.7 85

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