All of the pre-season talk centered around Sturt and Norwood being the chief contenders for a Hostplus SANFL League Grand Final berth.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Only three rounds have been played but Woodville-West Torrens has certainly joined the conversation as it became the second undefeated team \u2013 alongside Glenelg \u2013 with a nail-biting two-point win against the Double Blues at Thomas Farms Oval.<\/p>\n
Sam Jacobs\u2019 charges displayed plenty of spirit throughout the afternoon as they transformed an 18-point quarter-time deficit into a 13-point half-time advantage on the back of a statement-making six-goal second term.<\/p>\n
The visitors were able to contain the reigning premier, which had unfurled its 2025 premiership flag before the bounce, whilst edging ahead by as much as 19 points with Daniel Sladojevic\u2019s major in the sixth minute of the last term.<\/p>\n
But the hosts \u2013 playing in the absence of Magarey Medallist Tom Lewis who was a late withdrawal due to general soreness \u2013 came home hard with the next three goals, capped by a ripping long range effort from AAMI Rookie James White on debut.<\/p>\n
Giant Eagles forward Connor Ballenden steadied things up for his side after converting his set shot from 30m after marking a Kade Herbert clearance before Sturt\u2019s Sam Conforti have his side one last chance with a snap goal in the 30th minute.<\/p>\n
The Double Blues surged forward with a long ball deep inside 50m only for it to be marked by former Sturt key back Liam Puncher, who took an eye-catching intercept grab.<\/p>\n
Puncher was at it again as he put his fist through the Sherrin to send it towards the north-western pocket, where it was bottled up until the final siren sounded in the 34th minute.<\/p>\n
The Eagles had midfield trio Riley Knight (22 disposals), Ted Clohesy (18 disposals, seven clearances, eight tackles) and Herbert (18 disposals, five clearances and a goal) make their presence felt in the centre square as Ballenden hit the scoreboard with five majors from seven marks.<\/p>\n
Co-captain James Rowe and Sladojevic booted three goals each as the Eagles claimed their first win at Unley since Round 5, 2024.<\/p>\n
Sturt finished with 11 more inside 50 entries and eight more clearances, leaving it to rue an inefficient first term in particular.<\/p>\n
Magarey Medallist Will Snelling had 22 disposals on his return from concussion while Zac Becker continued to launch attacks with his 18 disposals as Conforti, Martin Frederick and Nick Sadler had 17 each.<\/p>\n
Blues forward Josh Hone booted three goals while Morgan Ferres, Oliver Grivell and Loch Rawlinson chimed in with two each.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"All of the pre-season talk centered around Sturt and Norwood being the chief contenders for a Hostplus SANFL…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":399953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-399952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=399952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/399953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=399952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=399952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=399952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}