Carracher can see Winchelsea’s light

Carracher can see Winchelsea’s light

Winchelsea veteran Joshua Carracher was once accustomed to playing in September.

While playing for Lake Wendouree, after stints with North Ballarat’s TAC Cup and VFL teams, his Lakers’ side would finish sixth or higher from 2003 to their famous 2010 premiership year.

The following winter he would then head to Torquay, playing finals from 2011-14, though he would be absent from the Tigers’ 2012 grand final side after breaking his arm a week earlier.

Then came Winchelsea.

_MG_0394

Unfortunately, the experienced midfielder has been deprived of GDFL finals since crossing to the Eastern Reserve where he collected a club best and fairest in 2015.

Winchelsea could only showcase a gradual amount of improvement from the club’s exodus of players around this time before climbing from the bottom-two to eighth under Brendan Forssman last year.

However tomorrow the Blues will travel to Bannockburn in what looms as a thrilling ANZAC Day match-up if Winchelsea’s recent form is anything to go by.

“All we want is to put the game up to Bannockburn, that’s what we wanted against Thomson and no one was expecting that result to happen,” Carracher said after Winchelsea’s 80-point win.

The Blues have the best defensive record so far this year after keeping finals contenders Anakie to 2.6 (18) and Thomson to 4.7 (31) in the past fortnight.

“This has been great getting so many young blokes on board, Foss hasn’t brought too many old blokes like myself,” he laughed.

“They just bring a bit more to the club and it’s a really good place to be at the moment, a total different feel from the last three years.”

Jackson Smith

He continued, “I’m getting a bit old now, turning 36 in June, but I don’t want to give it up now because after tonight I can see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel,” he added.

Critics voiced their frustration on the GDFL’s social media platforms after reigning finalists Inverleigh and Bannockburn made for the ANZAC Day match up in recent years.

This negativity was heightened after Winchelsea surrendered a 13-point lead to suffer a narrow defeat to Geelong West in the opening round.

Interestingly, there’s been a decrease  coinciding with Winchelsea’s dominating form while Blues fans cheered on Carracher who displayed a bone crunching tackle on Thomson youngster Jeremy Stacey.

Winch

“There was a lot of disappointment after the Geelong West game which I haven’t seen in the last few years; I guess we sort of had the expectation of losing before this year so it hurt,” he added.

“ANZAC Day will be a great opportunity personally, since I left Wendouree, the finals were big at Torquay but for where we (Winchelsea) are at right now this will be pretty big as well.”

Carracher looms as a contender for the ANZAC Day medal however Bannockburn’s Matt Tyquin remains as the overwhelming favourite.

By Alex Tigani
GDFL Media (24/04/2018)

No Comments

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.