Southern Districts’ bid for historic back-to-back senior flags needs a lot of meticulous planning

SOUTHERN Districts utility Ed Barlow has learnt a lot in his time in football, including the importance of match preparation.

Southern Districts trio Jesse Koopman, left, Ed Barlow and Brandon Rusca before training at Norbuilt Oval. Picture: Grey Morris

SOUTHERN Districts utility Ed Barlow has learnt a lot in his time in football, including the importance of match preparation.

Barlow and his Crocodiles go into Saturday night’s NTFL Grand Final against minor premiers Nightcliff as the defending champions.

Betting firm Ladbrokes have Nightcliff $1.60 favourites to win their first Premier League flag since 1965, ahead of Districts at $2.25.

A win over the Tigers will also present Districts with back-to-back Premier League flags for the first time in the club’s 31-year history as an NTFL side.

But 32-year-old Barlow, who played 34 games with AFL clubs Sydney and the Western Bulldogs, said planning and preparation came before any pre-match predictions.

“Anything can happen in a grand final, no matter who you play and you’ve always got to go in well planned, well prepared, all that sort of stuff,’’ he said.

“Winning back-to-back flags is something that is in your head, but you don’t want to think about it too much. You just want to treat it like any other game and winning it for this season and once that’s done you start thinking about winning two in a row.’’

Barlow sidestepped questions on changes to the Districts side for the grand final, saying he would leave that to the coaching staff.

“We played really well as a team on Saturday night and if someone does miss out it will be quite hard, because tough decisions have to be made.’’

Districts’ big loss to the Tigers the last time they met in Round 18 created its own storyline.

The Crocodiles were without Barlow, No.1 ruckman Seb Guilhaus, Jared Brennan and Tim Brook in the 90-point loss.

“You can probably look at it both ways,’’ Barlow said. “Bearing in mind Nightcliff is a very good side and not to take anything away from them, we did have some quality players who weren’t there.

“Hopefully when they come back and if we plan and do things right going into a grand final, it will be a different game and a different result.

“I haven’t played against Nightcliff this season, so there’s a lot of unknown there for me, even if I know they have definitely got some very good talent.’’