They’re the only team to have the wood over Myrtleford this season.
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Boomers will line up in their first senior men’s cup final since 2009 against the two-time reigning league and cup champions at Jelbart Park on Sunday, and the belief is well and truly there to cause a major upset.
Despite winning both meetings, 1-0 and 3-2, during the league campaign, Boomers have embraced the underdog tag for the final game of the season.
Boomers’ attacking threat Noah Spiteri has full confidence the group can clinch the title.
“It’s a special day to play against a team like that, they’ve obviously been very good for the last few years and have higher expectations than anyone else,” Spiteri said.
“All the big players want to perform on the day against Myrtleford.”
While Spiteri hopes Boomers don’t concede first in the cup final, they know they have what it takes to turn things around, given they reversed a 1-0 deficit against Albury City just two weeks ago in the quarter-finals to win on penalties.
“The second time (we played Myrtleford) we were 1-0 down and 2-1 down, so there’s definitely belief we can come from behind and win,” he said.
“We played pretty well for 90 minutes (against Wangaratta last week) and if you can play like that for 90 minutes you can go a long way towards winning the game.
“I know we’ve beaten them twice, but they’ve played in three cups in a row and it (the pressure) is completely on Myrtleford.”
Boomers’ coach Andrew Grove is expected to play the full 90 minutes after being restricted by injury in the second half of the season and not at full fitness during the finals thus far.
“He got suspended in the 2009 one they won, so he’ll be raring to go in this one,” Spiteri said.
“He’s definitely looking a lot fitter this week than he was last week on the track, he trained on Tuesday, but didn’t train last Tuesday, so he’s definitely ready to go (for Sunday).”
After battling through in golden goal against Melrose last weekend, Myrtleford midfielder Jesse Stephens is expecting another tough contest.
“It would be nice to have beaten every club, obviously we don’t take losing very well and having lost to Boomers twice definitely still stings,” he said.
“It would be a good way to end the year getting one back on Boomers.
“I think the pressure is still on us after finishing top and winning it last year, but the fact we’re not playing (second placed) Wangaratta slightly takes the edge off.
“We just want to win every game we play, we set ourselves to win the (league and cup) double at the start of the year and the fact it’s three-in a row means it will be a little bit more special, but I don’t think it changes too much.
“We’re definitely just as hungry as the first and second year.”
The forward combination of Spiteri, Grove and Pieter Noordewier is among the best in the league, but Stephens didn’t suggest there would be a specific plan to curtail them.
“We’re very wary they’re the main threats and every time I’ve played Boomers, no-one else (outside those three) has really scored a goal,” Stephens said.
“The first game we lost it to be honest, we missed a heap of chances and the ball didn’t really fall our way.
“The second time we probably didn’t play to our strengths and they probably deserved it in the end, they had a much better second half.”
Kick-off is at 3pm.
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