Northcote Park produce remarkable upset win over Macleod
Last time Northcote Park and Macleod met, the Cougars were forced to forfeit the reserves and suffered a humbling loss. Seven weeks later the club produced a remarkable upset to remain in the finals hunt.
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Seven weeks ago Northcote Park was on its knees.
On Saturday, it completed a remarkable turnaround.
The Cougars were on the receiving end of a 73-point hammering when they last met Macleod and the reserves were forced to forfeit due to a lack of players.
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But Northcote Park produced a stunning 16-point upset at Bill Lawry Oval at the weekend in a significant blow to the Roos’ NFL Division 1 finals hopes.
The reserves were well beaten but celebrated stalwart David Ienco’s 300th game, while premiership captain and two-time Frank Rosbrook Medallist Bronik Davies played game No.150.
After “bottoming out”, Cougars coach Matt McLennan said the 9.7 (61) to 6.9 (45) victory was just reward for the club’s hard work.
“It’s been a big season on and off the field,” he said.
“It was fitting. Last time we played Macleod the twos couldn’t field a team and the ones handed us a convincing defeat.
“It was just a super positive day for the footy club.
“With that win our hopes are still alive, obviously we’ve got Hurstbridge and Heidelberg over the last two weeks, they’re games we must win.”
The only dampener was Davies suffering an early concussion in his milestone match.
Northcote Park welcomed back captain Paul Dirago as well as Kyle Galloway, Charles Le Fanu, Michael Naldrett and Jackson Starcevich for the clash and all made important contributions.
Jake Mills was the Cougars’ best in victory, while Jordan Perry and Ben Augustus also impressed.
“We had five handy inclusions this week … everyone shuffles down and your bottom five or six are a lot stronger and 50-50s start going your way,” McLennan said.
“Jake brings so much energy and last week I thought we needed a bigger body in the midfield and it worked quite well.
“He came up trumps in the second half. We lost Matt Perry and Bronik Davies, but we were still able to have that up our sleeve.”
Miraculously, Northcote Park remains in finals contention with two games left in the home-and-away season.
The Cougars sit seventh but are just a game behind West Preston-Lakeside in fourth and two points behind Macleod in fifth.
Elsewhere, Fitzroy Stars snapped a Division 2 six-game winless streak with a 29-point triumph over Epping.
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