SFNL: East Brighton still have Nicholas Corp to add to stacked tall forward stocks

East Brighton has assembled one of the most fearsome tall forward lines in local footy, and the task for opposition defenders is only set to get more daunting despite successive wins to start the season.

Ben Reid has enjoyed a strong start to his time at East Brighton - but there’s still room for improvement. Picture Yuri Kouzmin

East Brighton has assembled one of the most fearsome tall forward lines in local footy, and the task for opposition defenders is only going to get more daunting.

Throughout the opening two rounds of the Southern league Division 1 season, the Vampires have boasted a three-headed monster of tall ex-AFL timber in Thomas Lamb, Ben Reid and Alex Keath.

Reid and Lamb have been ominous forward, while Keath has been rotated through the forward line, in the middle, and at half back.

After Easter, Nicholas Corp, who has been absent due to work and family commitments, will be welcomed back into the side.

Another towering tall himself, Corp has booted 114 goals for East Brighton in the past two seasons.

“Exciting to know we can slot him into the team,” said East Brighton coach Nick Jewell.

“If we throw them all up forward there’s some big boys up there.”

Nicholas Corp is expected to return to East Brighton by round four. (Photo by Josh Chadwick)

Reid has begun his Southern league career in fine form, booting nine goals across the opening two rounds after a year off playing to hone his coaching skills with the Wangaratta Magpies in 2024.

He kicked five majors against Narre Warren on Saturday, but by Jewell’s estimate had 12 shots at goal.

“He kicked 5.6 maybe, he didn’t have his kicking boots on,” Jewell added.

“He’s marking the ball beautifully, moving really well, he’s really fit.

The 35-year-old is now a development coach with the Western Bulldogs and has been training alongside the club’s AFL group, something Jewell said was enhancing his fitness.

Southern league footy: East Brighton player Thomas Lamb. Picture: Valeriu Campan

“He’s in great nick for a bloke in his mid-30s, we’ve just got to make sure we get the ball to him often enough.”

Lamb, who played one AFL game for West Coast and has kicked 108 goals himself over the past seasons for the Vampires, has kicked five goals across the opening two rounds.

“Tommy hasn’t really hit his straps yet,” Jewell warned.

The Vampires ran over the top of Narre Warren at Hurlingham Park to finish 25-point victors in round 2, but were wasteful in front of goal kicking 14.20 (104) to the Magpies’ 12.7 (79).

Alex Keath. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

“It was really tough conditions with how hot it was, certainly a test for our fitness, we’ve done a lot more work than last year over pre-season, you get tested in those conditions and we came up with the answers which was good fitness-wise,” Jewell said of the win.

“We felt like we were covering the ground really well, the feedback from the boys was they thought we were running on top of the ground a little bit better. It’s just a matter of converting, we had 34 scoring shots and 10 more scoring shots at half-time, we just didn’t finish our work off.

“We probably could’ve maybe broken the game open a little bit earlier, you save some petrol tickets, but it could be down to (Narre Warren’s) pressure as well so credit to those guys.”

Sean Downie, Ben Dessent, and Blake Cochrane all enjoyed strong games in the middle, while Alex Keath clunked 17 marks after spending the second half at centre half back.

“Some of the midfield numbers were huge, we had five guys in the 30 possessions … we really started to get on top with the weight of possessions,” Jewell said.