Round 9 Hostplus SANFL League Match Previews

Here’s a blockbuster to look forward to, deserving of standalone rights on the King’s Birthday public holiday. Will the side that wins this end up being king of the SANFL this year?

The clash between last year’s premier and this year’s top side will add another episode to the local rivalry that kicked off 125 years ago in Sturt’s first game – that happened to be the Redlegs’ debut appearance at Norwood Oval.

This match-up pits the top attacking team in the league, Sturt, averaging 91 points a game, against the SANFL’s No. 1 defensive side, Norwood, keeping the opposition to a meagre 48 points per game.

In last week’s battle for top spot the Legs could afford to concede the last three goals of the game to the Eagles and still prevail by a smashing 13.15-to-7.7 margin to make it six wins in a row.

That the Redlegs are on a roll is hardly surprising considering the way they are controlling games with a wonderful balance between defence and offence. They are remarkably the biggest possession-winning team in the league – 352 per game – at the same time as being the top tackling side (66 per game). Because of all that they have an outstanding percentage (63.4).

The numbers of the past couple of meetings between these rivals adds to the thought this will be a ripper contest. Sturt won by five points at The Parade in Round 1, despite the Legs giving them a big scare by kicking the last three goals. And the Blues won by four points in Round 9 last year at Unley after they banged on three goals in the last six minutes in a miracle finish.

Sturt is also on a winning run with powerful performances against Adelaide, Central and South, topping 100 points in each game.

The Blues’ and Legs’ opposing coaches from last week appreciated they were up against impressive teams and their comments add to the excitement around this match-up. South coach Jarrad Wright said Sturt was “strong around the contest … they were much cleaner”. Eagles boss Sam Jacobs said, “Norwood is a good outfit and was really slick”.

Who will be strongest around the contest this week? And slickest?

This contest between these strong rivals of the early 2000s looked lopsided a fortnight ago. Not any more.

Two weeks ago the Eagles were flying high. And the Dogs were feeling pretty low. The Eagles had just smacked Port Adelaide by 86 points and were top with a 6-1 record. Central had just lost to Sturt by 74 points and only had one draw to show for the first seven rounds, stuck on the bottom.

But last week the Eagles were thumped by Norwood by 44 points and slipped from top spot, while the Bulldogs stormed home in stormy weather from 25 points down at half-time against West to snare a courageous 10-point win.

In between these contrasting performances and results, of course, there had been an event that changed everything. The AFL mid-season draft.

The Eagles lost key players Max Beattie, Lukas Cooke and Liam Puncher to Victorian clubs – while co-captain Riley Knight was ruled out with a knee injury – and the repercussions were there for all to see as they trailed the Legs 4.7 to 13.15 heading into time-on of the final quarter.

This stage of the season is enough to give Eagles fans the shudders.

Their side was 6-2 at the start of 2024. And they were 5-2 to kick off last year. Both years they only won two more games for the rest of their campaign, finishing fifth in ’24 before last year missing the finals.

Sam Jacobs was proud of the way he coached the Eagles in the second half of last season as they battled a horror injury list, and rightly so, his efforts helping ensure the club retained its key players and added some targeted recruits so, with a decent injury run, they could be right in the fight for the flag.

Now Jacobs faces another challenging time as he tries to plot the downfall of a rival his club faced in six grand finals between 2000-11.

One of the Central stars of that remarkable era will be feeling better about his club’s position as it sets its sights on the Eagles, coach Paul Thomas helping spark things against the Bloods with some “adult” chats at half-time with the Dogs’ season just about on the brink. The talk was around, “Who wants the footy more?” and the answer right then wasn’t the Doggies.

Their effort to turn that around was impressive, Thomas saying it was “reward for effort for a lot of people at the footy club”.

Who will want the footy more in this clash of modern-day rivals?

Glenelg is promoting Saturday’s clash as ‘Reliving the Rivalry’, a highlights reel on Facebook of Tigers and Magpies clashes and crashes showing they have pretty regularly been the best of enemies.

A turning point for the Bays came when they faced Port Adelaide in the 2019 grand final as since then winning silverware has become a pretty regular occurrence. They won another trophy with a 45-point victory last week against one of their old rivals North Adelaide, snaring the John Sandland Cup, a win that has strengthened their spot in the top three.

It took a while to get into the swing of it against the Roosters but when they did, there was no holding them back, the Bays stringing together seven consecutive goals from midway in the second quarter to late in the third.

Port had been improving strongly before being thumped by the Eagles pre-bye, beating Adelaide and Central in its previous games.

But the Magpies were beaten by the Bays by 47 points at Alberton in Round 1 and while Glenelg is the No. 1 clearance-winning side in the league, averaging 37, Port is ranked 10th (29). Evergreen Corey Lyons, Cam McGree and Luke Partington are in SANFL’s top 10 for clearances.

And, after having given plaudits to North Adelaide Iron Man Mitch Harvey, it’s only fair the Tigers’ Matty Allen gets a mention. He had 18 touches and booted two goals last week against Harvey and his Roosters in his 128th consecutive game for Glenelg.

Since making his league debut in Round 1, 2020, he hasn’t missed a game, along the way winning a couple of flags, a best-and-fairest gong and making The Advertiser SANFL Team of the Year four times. Harvey and Allen, a couple of modern-day champs.

This is an important clash between sides with their eyes on fifth spot.

The Panthers again showed they are around the mark and on the up as they gave premier Sturt a run for its money at Noarlunga, starting impressively and pushing the Blues hard at the end.

Ollie Davis pretty much matched it with Sturt’s Dynamic Duo Tom Lewis and Will Snelling with 27 disposals and two goals, while Ben Shillabeer and Jack Delean are exciting forward dangers.

South coach Jarrad Wright said “we are a young side and have to keep learning”. If they’ve learnt from this game and can put that to good use to beat the Crows this week they might just be starting to create a gap between them in fifth and the chasing pack.

Both South and Adelaide have beaten a strong Glenelg side at the Bay in the past month but the Crows won’t be helped by Taylor Walker at Noarlunga.

The Adelaide great bagged five first-half goals in his first SANFL game in 12 years to set up a seven-point win against the Tigers and leave the Crows just a win out of the five with a game in hand.

There hasn’t always been a fierce rivalry here but anyone whose memory stretches back as far as the 1991 grand final will recall that was reasonably fierce.

Both clubs suffered with rucks in the mid-season draft, the Roosters losing Alex Van Wyk – along with gun midfielder Oli Francou – and Westies having key big man Caleb May selected.

So time for a moment’s tribute to Roosters Iron Man Mitch Harvey.

He just keeps on keeping on, up to an incredible 161 games in succession and last week against Glenelg he stepped up with Van Wyk gone to win a monster 43 hit-outs to go with 24 disposals and seven clearances in about as whole-hearted performance as you could see.

He helped give North a strong start against Glenelg – “I thought for a quarter and a half we were on top and we played a really good brand of footy,” coach Josh Francou said – but suddenly the game was gone from their grasp in a 45-point loss.

The young Bloods had the game against Central on their terms much longer and appeared certain winners at half-time, winning clearances by a staggering 30-5 and as a result earning 31 inside-50s to 11, leading 5.7 to just 1.6 with Jesse Thackeray and Kobe Ryan leading the way.

They didn’t concede the lead until halfway through the final quarter, again showing they aren’t far away.

The club keeps on battling the odds and making progress and there’s more to come with the imminent return to footy at its Richmond headquarters in Round 12.