PEEL Thunder’s 44-point victory over South Fremantle means they have already passed the amount of wins they had last year, after just eight games.
The Thunder sit third on the ladder with a five and three record and are in a good position to make their maiden finals appearance following the win against the Bulldogs in front of about 500 people last Saturday at Fremantle Oval in wild weather conditions.
South Fremantle was kept to their lowest score ever against Peel as the Thunder ran out 12.13 (85) to 5.11 (41) winners.
Fremantle Docker Tendai Mzungu reminded AFL selectors of his impressive form after a best on ground with 29 disposals, nine tackles and two goals. The performance is likely to earn Mzungu an AFL recall. Dockers Connor Blakely, Jacob Ballard and Ed Langdon finished with 28, 26 and 25 disposals respectively.
Thunder coach Cam Shepherd was pleased his side bounced back following two consecutive losses.
“We just focused on our intensity and our effort that we didn’t bring to the table,” he said. “We were asked to respond after a couple of poor performances. We had 22 contributors with some of the better players being Mzungu, Blakely and Josh Bootsma.”
The Thunder kicked the ball straighter earlier on, enabling them to put pressure on from the outset.
The Thunder kicked 7.7 to 2.6 in the first half, keeping the Bulldogs goalless in the second quarter. The margin was 31 points at half-time and despite South Fremantle’s best efforts in the third term the deficit was still 28 points.
Dockers Jonathon Griffin and Craig Moller won the hit-outs 64-43.
Shepherd said he was impressed with the way Moller has been progressing after adding three goals to his 20 hit-outs and 14 touches.
Kyle Hams was impressive for South Fremantle with 28 touches while Ryan Cook had 26 touches and a goal and Cory Dell-Olio kicked two goals.
Now that Peel has seen all the other eight WAFL sides, Shepherd said the competition was quite even.
“We thought in the pre-season we trained 30 per cent harder and we’re starting to come together,” he said. “Subiaco are quite clearly the leading side then there is a leading bunch below them so we got to keep working hard to hold our position.”
There will be no WAFL games this weekend as the Western Australian state team will play against South Australia at Lathlain Park in Perth.
Peel Thunder will play against Claremont on May 30 at the Showgrounds and play at home the week after against West Perth.
