Wangaratta coach Dean Stone admits his team didn’t handle North Albury’s early intensity, before blasting 15 of the last 18 goals on Saturday.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The Hoppers stunned the premiers with a blistering second term, grabbing a three-point lead, before the favourites raced home to win, 19.10 (124) to 8.8 (56).
“They hit us really hard with the pressure and intensity around the footy and I thought we just fumbled a bit early and we weren’t clean with the ball and full credit to North Albury,” Stone said.
“I’m not sure having a game against Wodonga where there was really no pressure (the Pies won by 185 points), we didn’t handle it that well early on and we just went back I suppose to playing the way we want to play.
“We got a bit cleaner with the footy and I thought our run on the outside, once we got it there, was too strong for them.”
Despite North’s pressure, it simply had no options up forward, as the Pies kept the home team scoreless in racing to a 28-point quarter-time lead.
However, Jesse Johnston turned the match in the second quarter.
A superb Josh Lloyd kick handed the big man a chance and he nailed it from 40m.
He took a second strong mark opposed to Zac Hedin in landing another just three minutes later and then rounded out his work with an unbelievable mark against rep defender Jamie Anderson.
Johnston was long odds but, somehow, he was able to reach for the ball, seemingly surprising himself.
He kicked his third for the quarter and with Clay Moscher-Thomas and Lloyd, who’s bounced back from a serious kidney injury last year to be somewhere near his best, adding majors, the Hoppers hit the front.
But a Dylan Van Berlo intercept to set up Frazer Dent and a Michael Newton goal after the siren restored the Pies’ momentum.
“I think we played 2½ quarters of really good footy, probably in the first quarter, we didn’t really get it on the scoreboard, but our pressure and intensity was right up,” co-coach Chris Schmidt said.
“The second quarter we probably beat them (5.2 to 2.1) but in the last quarter we fell away.”
Footscray VFL premiership player Mitch Jensen kicked four in the final term to finish with five after he was quiet for most of the match, while ruckman Zac Leitch and the dangerous Joe Richards played well.