Anakie finds itself in unfamiliar territory, fourth on the Geelong & District Football League ladder and with a huge test to come this weekend against East Geelong.
But with almost nothing separating the Roos from ninth placed Inverleigh, coach Jayke Mawson knows there is still a lot of drama to unfold.
“I think they’re (East Geelong) the best team in the comp,” Mawson said.
“And they will be a massive test for us, obviously coming off three wins we’re pretty excited to see how we’ll go against someone who we rate very highly.
“We’ve got a few back in as well so we’ll see exactly where we’re at.”
With just one win across three seasons from 2021-23, East Geelong would represent a huge scalp, but the Roos have already knocked off a previously unbeaten Belmont and lost narrowly to reigning premier Thomson.
“At the moment, we’re pretty happy with how we’ve been competing,” Mawson said.
“It’s a good sign. We think our best is right up there and good enough to be competitive with any of the good sides. But this week will probably be the biggest we’ve had.”
After this round, Anakie has three games against lower ranked teams – the dangerous Inverleigh, Corio, which won the corresponding round 1 fixture, and Geelong West.
However, Mawson knows the evenness of the competition means there is no point looking too far ahead.
“It’s a tight squeeze,” he said.
“There’s no game you go into and think that we should win this easily. But we do think that in the next block or so, we should be really pushing to cement our spot and then see how we go from there.”
Anakie’s impressive 26-point win against Bell Post Hill on the weekend highlighted its scoring power.
Four goals to Oscar Barter, who was coming off a starring role in the interleague clash the week before, three each to Josh Alessi and Andrew Boseley plus a couple of each from Luke Dahlhaus and Jay Lever means the Roos have firepower.
“He (Barter) just loves footy,” Mawson said.
“He’s been pushed up into the ruck. Obviously he’s a gun key forward but he’s been playing in the ruck. He did it in the interleague as well and he’s another avenue we have.
“Just the way that he can get the ball at ground level and how explosive he is with his change of pace. We’re pretty happy to have him.”
THOMSON inflicted North Geelong’s first loss of the season with a one-point thriller. Andrew Jarvis was superb in the ruck while Billie Smedts found plenty of the ball and Darcy Troop booted four goals.
WERRIBEE Centrals continued its resurrection with a 17-point win against Bannockburn. Key defender Liam Robertson was best for the Centurions while Bailey Kelly was best for Banno with four goals.
INVERLEIGH showed that it can’t be discounted for the finals with a 100-point win against Corio with Scott Condy bagging six majors and Guy O’Keefe five. Despite the margin, Corio still had 19 shots on goal and were far from disgraced with Blake Natoli-West named best.
BELMONT returned home from Winchelsea with a 20-point win with Ben Evans starring with four goals.
EAST Geelong proved too good for Geelong West, but it took a final quarter blitz to achieve it. The Eagles led by 14 points at the last break, but booted 5.7 to zero in the last with Sam Lowe starring and former Newcomb gun Andrew Steele booting four goals.
