Final round action is as follows Macquarie Island Whales vs Maralinga Atoms - 4th playing 5th with a double chance on the line Nangkita Bucks vs Heard Island Shags - the first of a trio of matches sees the coveted 8th and last finals position determined Walpole Woylies vs Wedge Island White Pointers Neptune Island Noahs vs Useless Loop Virgins Port Lincoln Power vs Jan Juc Ducks (UOC) - Ducks striving for 11 straight wins Black Swamp 29ers vs Cockburn Avengers - 29ers fighting to avoid a 13th consecutive loss Drouin Dropbears vs Rutherglen Fugitives Mt Thirsty Boozers vs Mole Creek Glow-Worms
Also a shoutout to @Dale Duivesteyn as your Round 15 team is currently empty and tonight’s AFL match has Ethan Hughes named from the Bucks list. It would be great to see a full Bucks squad for the last match of the year particularly as it impacts on the finals race.
Mole Creek Squad DEF: Z. Williams, B. Williams, Laird, Ridley (Short) MID: Petracca, Cripps, Kelly, Pendlebury (McCluggage) RUC: Darcy FWD: Heeney, Hind, Sidebottom, Walker (Dangerfield) INT: Perryman, Saad (McCarthy)
Black Swamp Round 15 (AFL18) Ballard Wilkie Long O'Connor - Hardwick Bont Viney Higgins Selwood - Lazarro McCartin C Brown Schoenberg JDG - Fogarty Sinclair - C Jones Hayward Daniels - no emg The 29ers match committee have named their Round 15 lineup for the match with Cockburn @Len in a battle of the ORFFF’s 2 youngest squads.
Following the Saturday night AFL match the progress score is Cockburn 10/793 leading the home side 8/615. Running out on Sunday will be De Goey, C Brown, McCartin, Hayward, Daniels, Schoenberg and half a Chayce Jones for the 29ers vs D Fogarty, Mills, S Taylor, Ward and Flynn for the Avengers who are favoured to take out the choccies.
29ers now 10/777 to Cockburn 10/793. Late drama with Mills failing to take the field for the visitors and no emergency defender named @Len
heading into the final match the 29ers have hit the front 12/897 to the visitors 11/854 Black Swamp’s McCartin, Hayward and Daniels will be striving to hold onto a 43 point lead against S Taylor, Ward and Flynn for the Avengers, who are still favoured to salute despite a highly unfortunate 0.5 player disadvantage.
Congrats to the Fugitives @tyze1 Jackson Macrae who polled a clutch 4 votes in the annihilation of the Dropbears and leapfrogged the previous leader Brody Grundy (who went voteless against the Power) to win the 2021 Dangerfield Medal by 2 votes and spoil the Jan Juc big man’s attempt to add a second victory to his 2019 effort. The White Pointers Sam Walsh was foiled in his late charge towards the medal despite a superb 5 vote display against the Woylies which saw him tie Grundy in equal 2nd. Rounding out the top 6 for 2021 were the Avengers Jack Steele, Boozers Touk Miller and 29ers Marcus Bontempelli. With Miller and Walsh making their top 6 finisher debut in season 2021 all 16 clubs have now had at least 1 top 8 finisher across the first 6 seasons of competition and Maralinga and Port Lincoln are the only 2 teams (by the barest of margins) not to have a player crack the top 6.
In the feature match of the final hone and away round the Macquarie Island side were set 136 to win from their final 2 players in Swans duo Hickey and McInerney and were required to field one of them as an out of position defender due to the late withdrawal of James Harmes. McInerney rose to the occasion following his late call up scoring 92 (halved) while Hickey managed a spirited 85 leaving their combined score just short and handing the visitors the final top 4 finisher for 2021 by a meagre 4 point margin, providing the tightest margin of all 120 home and away matches of 2021. Elsewhere the Shags scored a regulation victory to finish in 8th and the 29ers managed a flukey 15 point win over a 14 man Cockburn side who lost Callum Mills due to dubious Tenterfield Municipality COVID-19 regulations and then also suffered an unfortunate injury to Matt Flynn as they appeared poised to fall over the line against the 2021 wooden spooners who were jubilant to break their unwanted 12 in a row losing streak. Other final round winners were Mole Creek, Jan Juc, Walpole, Rutherglen and Neptune Island. Congrats to the 8 teams who make the 2021 finals and commiserations to the 8 also-rans who can look forward to holding their COVID safe Mad Monday festivities, resting their most talented for the upcoming 2021 ORFFF All Star Game at Jan Juc and also commencing the painstaking planning required to rise up the ORFFF ladder in season 2022.