AFL Outer East 2019: New-look Cranbourne aiming to play finals

Cranbourne coach Steve O’Brien says the “muck around” of not knowing which league his club would be playing in cost it recruits for the 2019 season.

Brandon Osborne will captain a new-look Cranbourne in AFL Outer East this season. Picture: Chris Eastman

Cranbourne coach Steve O’Brien says the “muck around” of not knowing which league his club would be playing in cost it recruits for the 2019 season.

When the SEFNL disbanded last season, Cranbourne wanted to join the Mornington Peninsula competition but was knocked back in August.

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For almost two months the Eagles’ future was up in the air until they were accepted into the newly-created AFL Outer East in October.

O’Brien said prospective recruits didn’t want to commit — and five months on, Cranbourne has no recruits to speak of.

“It was just really difficult given what we went through as a footy club with virtually not knowing what footy league we were going to,” O’Brien said.

Cranbourne Steve O'Brien: “We expect to be competing in finals again.’’ Picture: Chris Eastman

“We couldn’t recruit. You’d sit down with players and while I spoke to a heck of a lot of players it was pretty hard to get them to commit when we couldn’t even tell them what competition we were going to be in, with the muck around of the Mornington Peninsula, that was pretty disappointing from our point of view because it definitely cost us a few recruits.”

Also, a raft of senior players left Cranbourne and joined other clubs.

The biggest name to walk out the door was champion full forward Marc Holt, who has crossed to MPNFL Division 2 club Karingal.

Cranbourne will be without champion full-forward Marc Holt this season. Picture: Chris Eastman

He went past 1000 goals for the Eagles last season and O’Brien said life after Holty would be challenging for Cranbourne.

“I don’t think you can cover him, he’s been such a great player for so long,” he said.

“He’s a pretty rare talent and I’m not sure you can replace him. It’s just more about changing the way we bring the ball into our forward line I think.”

Also gone from the Cranny forward line is Nathan Gardiner, who kicked 33 goals last season. He’s joined Cora Lynn.

So, who will kick Cranbourne’s goals in 2019?

“It’s more just about trying to spread the load and the way we bring the ball inside,” O’Brien said.

“We will do a few things differently this year and hope we can continue to score.”

Tom Marks takes a kick for Cranbourne last season. Picture: Valeriu Campan

Other key Cranbourne departures include Troy Tharle (Cora Lynn), Jake Carosella (Oakleigh District), Ryan Davey (Karingal), Chris Ramac (Oakleigh District), Brandon Wapshott (Karingal) and Zak Roscoe (Noble Park).

O’Brien said Cranbourne fans would enjoy watching exciting youngsters Luca Bellinvia and Kyle Nunn this season.

He said Bellinvia, who was on the Stingrays list, is a running player who can develop into “a really nice player”, while Nunn played in Cranbourne’s two finals games last season.

Cranbourne kicks off the season hosting Beaconsfield at Casey Fields on April 13 and O’Brien is remaining upbeat.

“I think if we can have a good run with injuries I think our best side will still be competitive,” he said.

“We expect to be competing in finals again if we can keep everyone on the park.”

*Cranbourne has already suffered an injury blow. Promising player Lewis Vella injured his knee in a practice game against Dingley last week.

“We’ve had that confirmed that it’s an ACL, PCL so it’s not great,” O’Brien said.

“He played a couple senior games last season and we were looking for him to step up this year and he was working pretty hard towards that, so it’s really unfortunate for him.”

Cranbourne

Coach: Steve O’Brien.

Captain: Brandon Osborne.

Last year: 3rd, 12-7, in SEFNL.

Ins: none.

Outs: Marc Holt (Karingal), Nathan Gardiner (Cora Lynn), Troy Tharle (Cora Lynn), Jake Carosella (Oakleigh District), Ryan Davey (Karingal), Chris Ramac (Oakleigh District), Brandon Wapshott (Karingal), Zak Roscoe (Noble Park).

Surprise packets: Luca Bellinvia, Kyle Nunn.