MAITLAND Magpies coach Mick Bolch didn’t mince words: “It was as bad a performance as we’ve put in during my time here.” He was reacting to the Magpies’ surprising 4-0 loss to Hamilton Olympic on Saturday. There is no doubt this hot and cold Hamilton side was having one of their hot days, but it was difficult to see this result coming.
The Magpies, after losing their first game of the season, had strung together five impressive performances that included a win over Edgeworth and creditable draws against the highly fancied Broadmeadow Magic and Lambton Jaffas. “I’m not sure four-nil is a fair indication of the game, but there’s do doubt that the better side won,” Bolch said. “After half time they definitely wanted it more than we did.” Maitland suffered a body blow right on the half-time bell when they conceded a late goal to give Olympic a two-nil lead which was perhaps a touch flattering as Maitland had a number of scoring opportunities that they failed to grab. It capped a disappointing first half during which attacking midfielder Sean Pratt suffered concussion early on, and then experienced Matt Thompson suffered a strained calf and didn’t return for the second half. But after the break it was all Hamilton.
Coach Bolch shuffled his team before the match and believes this may also have hindered their cohesion. “I’ve said we have about 16 players who can all do the job, so I was keen to rotate players to give them game time,” he said. “It’s tricky. If I don’t rotate, then the players on the bench are underdone when you need them, because they haven’t had a lot of game time.” Still, Bolch said it will be business as usual this week in readiness for Sunday’s home clash with Adamstown. “We’ll have a 15-minute debrief about what went wrong, but it’s our first bad game for a while, so let’s not overreact.”
MAITLAND MERCURY – Rick Allan (Monday May 13th, 2019)
