SANFL 2016: Woodville-West Torrens take out Port Adelaide by 39 points

EAGLES coach Michael Godden has praised his side’s growing maturity for being able to cope with transforming its game plan midway through Saturday’s six-goal win over Port Adelaide.

Nicholas Hayse escapes while team-mate Marc Borholm shepherds as the Eagles go forward. Photo: Matt Turner.

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EAGLES coach Michael Godden has praised his side’s growing maturity for being able to cope with transforming its game plan midway through Saturday’s six-goal win over Port Adelaide.

After trailing by two points at halftime, Woodville-West Torrens was able to halt the Magpies’ run off half-back and unleashed a third-quarter burst in which they kicked 6.5 to no score to blow the game open.

“The last two weeks against Glenelg and today we’ve had to make major adjustments at half time and both times they’ve adapted really quickly, and that’s the sign of maturity,” Godden said.

“The first quarter they (Port) clogged that back 50 up, there was nowhere for us to go and when they got a hold of it they had a plus one and were able to chip it.

“Obviously in the third quarter we were able to address that.”

Matthew Goldsworthy was outstanding, with three game-breaking goals from defence while Luke Jarrad, Chris Hall and Jarred Allmond basically got the footy at will through the middle.

There were few positives for the Magpies who had an all AFL-midfield in Dougal Howard, Sam Gray, Jesse Palmer and Kane Mitchell who put up a fight but they lacked the firepower up forward to finish the job.

At the other end however, Logan Austin did a good job on Andrew Ainger to keep him goalless.

A clearly furious Magpies coach Chad Cornes said his team had failed in simple skill execution and couldn’t even hit targets. “Not being able to do the basics well, wasn’t good enough,” Cornes quipped post-match. Howard competed well in the ruck and finished with eight marks at both ends of the ground but he was also reported for kicking while taking a mark in the second quarter.

That gave the Eagles an easy goal to Lachlan McGregor who bobbed up with two in two minutes to give the home side some breathing space.

But Port still offered some resistance and after kicking 0.4 in 25 minutes they responded with goals to Louis Sharrad and Jonathon Ross to put their noses in front at the long break. It was all the Eagles after that and brilliant crumbing goals to Jared Petrenko — who had close attention from Mitchell all day — and James Boyd extended the lead to 37 points and it was game over.

SCOREBOARD

EAGLES 3.1 5.2 11.7 12.10 (82)

PORT ADELAIDE 3.0 5.4 5.4 6.7 (43)

BEST — Eagles: Goldsworthy, Jarrad, Boyd, Hall, Allmond, Giuffreda. Port Adelaide: Howard, Mitchell, Colquhoun, Austin, Biemans, S. Gray.

GOALS — Eagles: Goldsworthy, Gaffney 3; McGregor 2; Boyd, O’Brien, Petrenko, Borholm. Port Adelaide: Young 2; Mitchell, Sharrad, Butcher, Ross.

UMPIRES — L. Haussen, G. Lewis, J. Broadbent.

REPORTS — Port Adelaide: Dougal Howard (kicking).