Mildura 4.3 8.5 12.6 14.6 (90)
South Mildura 0.0 3.3 7.5 12.6 (78)
GOAL KICKERS: MILDURA: Regan Cavallaro 6, Dylan Murphy, Ethan Slater 2, Josh Dean, Sam Gorman, Jack Howarth, Cameron Kiel 1. SOUTH MILDURA: Deklan Loveridge 4, Tyler Curtis, Anthony Gauci 2, Matt Lutz, Kevin McDonald, Mason Fitzgerald, Thomas Fiorillo 1.
BEST: MILDURA: Josh Dean, Regan Cavallaro, Brodie Jones, Jesse Gosman, Zac Nelson, Daniel Carmichael. SOUTH MILDURA: James Parker, Mason Fitzgerald, Liam Wood, Domenic Scullino, Tyler Curtis, Nathan Nolan.By Matt Taylor
MILDURA secured their first points of the 2022 SFNL seniors’ football season with a well-deserved victory over a depleted South Mildura at Brian Weightman Oval on Saturday.
In truth, the 12-point margin of victory did not reflect the Dees’ dominance against the bottom-placed Bulldogs on a chilly afternoon for spectators.
Ilario Cavallo’s men led by seven goals at one point, but the Bulldogs rallied late in the final term to make the score look more respectable.
Josh Dean had a blinder for the home side at half forward, while Regan Cavallaro converted some strong marking with six goals.
The tireless Dylan Murphy has been one of Mildura’s most consistent performers this season, and he put in another good effort with 27 disposals.
Cavallo said he was glad to “get the monkey off our back” after the Dees had gone winless in the opening five rounds.
“Other than that last five minutes, I’m really happy with how we played,” the coach said.
“We’ve been working hard on our run from behind and our ability to switch the ball, and I thought we did both really well today.
“I thought Josh and Regan really straightened us up in attack. And the young blokes like RJ Watson and Brodie Jones, coming off half back, played well.”
Asked whether he thought his players clocked off early, Cavallo said: “I’d say so.
“I’ll let the boys enjoy the win tonight, but it’s something I’ll address with them during the week.
“We need to be running out games, not letting in five late goals which made it look closer than it actually was most of the day.
“That five or 10-minute lapse is what’s happened every game this season. But because we played such good footy before it happened in the last quarter, it allowed us to get home.”
Senior Bulldog Tyler Curtis lamented his side’s slow start, where they didn’t hit the scoreboard until early in the second quarter.
“Slow starts are the story of our season,” he said.
“We were down by 40-odd points at one stage and ended up going down by 12 after we finally started playing our game.
“Once we started to use our structure, look at what happened. But that was only in the last five to 10 minutes of the game.
“When you’re only getting 12 blokes to training, it takes half of the game to get things going.”
Curtis was one of three trump cards in the side, including Matt Lutze and Kevin McDonald, who was largely unsighted during the game.
In terms of where it fell down for the Dogs, Curtis said: “We just didn’t use the ball well.
“And we didn’t stick to our structures. Our width was poor where we had too many blokes going into the one contest and not allowing us to have players ready to release.”
The Dogs are now 0-5, after having the bye in the previous round, and face an uphill battle for the rest of the season as they have several players on the injury and sick list.
This includes playing coach Ben Dalton, who Curtis said was still “at least two more weeks” away from returning to the team.
“Not having a win yet hurts, especially after last year when we won five straight (from round 2 in the shortened season),” Curtis said.
“But we’ve lost a lot of personnel too through illness, and senior players like Benny through injury.
“It’s not an excuse we want to run with, because you still have a full team out there. It’s just that these slow starts are killing us.”
