By Matt McLennan (Armidale Express, 02/06/2008)
The New England Nomads were no match for the Inverell Saints in round eight of the Tamworth Australian Football League (TAFL) competition on Saturday, despite scoring more goals in two of the four quarters.

Inverell took the game 17-9-111 to 10-6-66 to record their third win on the trot, and inflict the Nomads’ third loss in as many games.

Inverell’s win means they continue to sit atop the TAFL ladder on 24 points, while the Nomads are in third position with 12.

The game slipped away from New England in the third quarter of the match, when they scored one goal to Inverell’s nine.

Inverell continued to dominate in the fourth quarter, scoring five goals to the Nomads’ three.

Richard Malone was the pick of the New England players, booting three goals. Matthew Maxwell, Weston Whitby and Peter Welton scored two while Anthony Reid bagged one.

Nomads coach Brendan Meehan said he was happy with his team’s performance for most of the match.

“The third quarter was really the only part of the match they beat us in,” Meehan said.

“We had a three goal lead at half time, and they just came out with a better attitude in that fourth quarter and caught us on the back foot a bit. Credit to the boys for battling it out in the last quarter, there was only about a one goal difference to them in the last quarter.”

The conditions were good for the match, with a light breeze coming across the ground.

“There was a bit of a breeze, we thought the conditions were going to be a lot worse than they were,” Meehan said.

Meehan named Whitby, Malone and Clinton Ballagh as standout players in the match.

“Our backline also did a great job, with Glen Northway playing back there.

“It was a really good, hard-fought match,” he said.

Most of the team are now looking forward to a weekend off, with no play this weekend to due a representative match in Wagga Wagga.

Each team in the competition nominates five players to take part in the match.

“That splits it up fairly evenly between the teams, they don’t just pick the best players from each team in the competition,” Meehan said.

The other players in the Nomads side are turning their attentions to their next match against the fourth-placed Tamworth Swans at Bellevue Oval.

“We’re meant to be playing them in Tamworth, but our home ground has been booked later in the year so they have agreed to swap for us, which is good of them,” Meehan said.

The side has no major injury concerns ahead of that match.

“Hopefully we can get them into the mood to play a full game of football, rather than just two or three quarters,” Meehan said.

Meehan was confident of a good showing from his team for the remainder of the season.

“Hopefully the game has shown them they can really put it to the top teams, and they can look forward to a good end to the season and have a good go in the finals,” he said.

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