Mirabella's bag stuns Dons
A bag of nine goals from forward Tony Mirabella was the difference in the Eagles’ 22.5 (137) to 14.4 (88) victory over Donnybrook at the Collie Recreation Ground on Saturday.
Mirabella marked strongly both overhead and on the lead all afternoon, providing Collie with the kind of reliable target up front that was missing for the Dons.
After falling to lowly Augusta-Margaret River in Round 14, Collie came out of the gate firing and had five unanswered goals inside the first ten minutes, leaving Donnybrook reeling and at risk of copping a fourth straight 100-point hiding.
But the visitors dug deep and worked themselves back into the game through cousins Curtis and Jarryd Guglielmana as well as stalwart Chris Sheehan, who spent most of the day at half-forward where he found a lot of the ball.
Curtis Guglielmana opened Donnybrook’s account with a booming shot from just inside 50, gathering a loose ball before kicking off one step surrounded by Collie defenders.
Donnybrook won the second quarter convincingly, ramping up the midfield pressure to force the hosts into numerous errors which resulted in goals to five different players, the best of which fell to Sheehan who reeled in a desperate Jason Brennan hand ball to kick a rare major.
The third term was evenly split, with both sides creating opportunities but also committing a lot of turnovers with poor decision making and inaccurate kicking a feature throughout.
The Dons entered the final quarter trailing by just 15 but hope of an upset was dashed when the Eagles piled on three goals in as many minutes, Mirabella kicking two to make the most of Simon Parry‘s move from defence to the midfield.
Parry was a shining light for Donnybrook all game, marshalling the back line and spoiling inside 50 after inside 50 to prevent Collie from overwhelming the visitors.
His move forward, a necessary gamble, spelled the end for the Dons with the Eagles finding it much easier to pick out targets near the goal square resulting in eight final quarter majors.
Scoreboard
Collie Eagles 7.2 10.4 14.4 22.5 137 def Donnybrook 3.1 8.1 11.3 14.4 88
Goals:
EAGLES - T. Mirabella 9, R. Chappell 3, C. Cross, A. Seeber, T. Michael, M. Michael 2, L. Kinsella, A. Bignell.
DONS – J. Brennan 5, C. Sheehan 2, C. Guglielmana, J. Parker, J. Guglielmana, J. Smith, J. Odine Kahn, T. Gregory, S. Cristaldi.
Best:
EAGLES – T. Mirabella, C. Griggs, A. Bignell, T. Michael, M. Michael, S. Cox.
DONS – S. Parry, C. Guglielmana, J. Brennan, C. Sheehan, J. Smith, J. Guglielmana
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