Rough patch for Redlegs

By Gavin Staindl
DANDENONG Redlegs coach Brendan Allen admitted he was a “little bit” worried about Dandenong’s form heading into the first week of finals after losing to Sandown by five points at Greaves Reserve.
Dandenong lost last week to last-placed Cerberus and this week’s loss is now the second time in as many weeks the highly fancied Redlegs have been beaten by a team lower on the Division Three ladder.
Donning the old Dandenong West jumpers for the heritage game and honouring 450-gamer Michael Reid, the Redlegs crumbled and trailed early in the second quarter.
Knowing that his team was finals bound regardless of the outcome, Allen used the opportunity to test players out in different positions but was still disappointed in the first-quarter effort.
In the last four weeks, the Redlegs have lost all four games by less than four goals and in three of those games they were soundly beaten in the first quarter.
“Our starts are a worry. It is good in a sense that we’ve got the fitness to run out the games but we need to start games better,” Allen said.
He hinted at the demanding training regime as a possible reason for his team’s poor performances.
“A fair portion of our training has been heavy running and they have been a little bit sore from that … we’ll taper it off now and focus on skills this week,” Allen said.
This will be a much-welcomed message to the players who have felt the effects of a tough training regime.
“We have had a few injuries … we’ve had an average player turnover rate of five players per week over the last four weeks.
“But I was speaking to some of the old timers and they said that this side is the fittest Dandenong side they had seen in a long, long time,” Allen said.
Dandenong will need every bit of that fitness when they meet the fast and fit Southern Dragons in Sunday’s elimination final.
For the rest of local Southern League football teams, Saturday was the final game for season 2010.
The soon-to-be-relegated Springvale Districts played their final game in Division One and it was not a game to remember, losing to Chelsea Heights by 113-points at Newcomen Road.
Dingley did not finish much better, but they will live to fight on in Division One next year despite going down to St Kilda City by 42-points at Souter Oval.
Lyndale will finally be demoted after years of floundering at the bottom of Division Two. In a spirited last hurrah, Lyndale went down to Black Rock by 16-points at Barry Powell Reserve.