Lakes Entrance jumped a place on the ladder to sixth after recording its third win of the East Gippsland football season last Saturday against a struggling Paynesville at the Lakeside Oval by 69 points.
With gun midfielder Liam Carroll outstanding kicking six goals in a best-on-ground performance, the Seagulls were never
challenged, though their inaccuracy at goal
and inability to put together four quarters would still be causing coach Darren Martin some concern.
With plenty of centre clearances and stoppage victories, the Seagulls were quickly on top in the first term, opening up a 21-point advantage, despite only kicking four goals from nine scoring attempts the radar already off target.
The half backline were almost impassable with Oscar Brazzale, Mitchell Banner and
Jesse Gillam – the latter in his first senior game for the Seagulls – mounting plenty of attacks, which resulted in plenty of forays inside 50 for the Seagulls.
It was a similar scenario in the second term as Lakes Entrance added five unanswered goals, the Seagulls’ 9.13-67 half time score seeing them leaders by 58 points and looking set for a huge win if they could straighten up their goalkicking.
Thomas Hudson, Angus McKenzie and Max Stevens all ended up with three goals for the Seagulls, Hudson a solid contributer in his first senior appearance for 2025 after a nagging back injury derailed his preparation.
He was a shining light last season in a disappointing season and with some additional artillery running through the centre square in the back half of this season you can expect some solid output given he is an outstanding kick for goal.
It was Stevens’ best contribution goal-wise at senior level. The youngster will continue to get better with experience and senior match time, as will his brother Max.
Paynesville played its best football for the season in the second half, restricting Lakes to three goals in a busy third term while adding one of their own.
In the final term the Gulls outscored the Seagulls as the battle of the birds became a shoot out, Paynesville kicking five goals to four with both sides having plays for the
highlight reel.
In a positive for Paynesville it finished with its highest score for the season, 7.4-46.
Paynesville coach David Westland was happy to run with the positives.
“We were certainly better this week, its
been a challenge with so many new players,” Westland said.
Ben McKinnon and Henry Wirken both kicked two goals each for the Gulls.
The best players for Lakes were Carroll, George Ioakim, McKenzie, Gillam, Banner and Brazzale.
Jordan Farquhar was again outstanding for the Gulls. He’s been a shining light this season in the ruck given the scorelines.
Other solid contributors were Harry
Gibbs, McKinnon, Judah May, Mitchell and Lachie Willmott.
All clubs in the EGFNL will enjoy a much appreciated week off with the Seagulls’ next match against Stratford at Boyd Reserve.
