This was an away game against Sydney Rocks at the beautiful Rosedale Oval in Warwick Farm. The weather was perfect and the home team very welcoming. Redbacks were there to help support Sydney Rocks on their Call to Arms day and all money raised will be donated to charities which help the fight against male cancers. We had 15 players who made the trek – only ½ hour on a Sunday morning. Our team was bolstered by Brook Hatherley, Steve Coleman, Danny Ardu, Rod and Sam Grasso from the Rocks club and we thank them for their contribution. They played hard for us and were great sports about it.

It was great to see the Redbacks have a game against another club and I am sure it helped team cohesiveness and club spirit. We were captained by John Reece, who played hard, as always, and ran the ball out of defence all game. Steve Sheil, Brett Arnold and Daryle Roberts ran well from the middle and supported big Steve Coleman who rucked with gusto. Shane Sweep and Paul Gregory swept up and down the wings and defended and tackled all day. JJ, Rowdy and Jason Toman (first game back from injury) stopped as many goals as they could with the 4 big Rocks centremen running down the corridor at them constantly. Great enthusiasm and plenty of puff was also shown by Matt Smith, Phil Scandizzo, Brownie and Col Amos through the middle of the ground and all scrapped well. We didn’t get too many opportunities up forward, but when we did Paul Smith and Ray McConnell were great targets – Paul because he moves around and has great hands, Ray because he is big and ugly and hard to miss. Poor Ray busted his little finger pretty badly in the dying seconds – gotta watch the ball all they way into those big mits, mate.

Anyway, as I have intimated, we were overrun most of the game by their running, tall, young centremen and had to defend our hearts out. Tony Nixon ran the bench well with everyone who did any work (Ray was the only one who didn’t get a spell) getting a rest when needed. All the players put in a great effort and it was a good learning experience for us as a team.

Sydney Rocks put on a fine day for us with a BBQ and drinks, presentation and raffle afterwards. Well done Brownie (Mrs) and Phil for taking home something for us by winning raffle prizes.

Rainman.

* Click here to view the team photo from the day