ANOTHER AFL Central West senior men's grand final, another Bathurst Bushrangers appearance.
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Bushrangers booked their ticket to the last day of the season for the 19th straight time following Saturday's preliminary final victory at home over the Orange Tigers.
The Bushies were relentless over a strong opening three quarters of the game and were able to ease off towards the end to claim a 15-15-105 to 8-4-52 win.
The victory sets up a third straight Bushrangers-Bathurst Giants grand final this Saturday.
Bushrangers' Alex Sparks - one of nine different goal scorers for the team - said it's great to see the grand final streak live on for another year.
"We're lucky to have had a lot of success over a long numbers of years, and hopefully that's something we can keep going," he said.
"It's a pretty great achievement, that's for sure."
Bushrangers made their intentions clear early by not allowing a single point for the Tigers in the opening quarter while putting on 28 of their own.
After a relatively even second quarter Bushrangers emerged from the sidelines determined to put the game away.
They kicked six goals to one in the term to put the result beyond doubt.
Tigers made sure they ended their year on an encouraging note by continuing to show fight and picking gaps in a sometimes complacent Bushrangers defence, scoring four goals to add more respectability to the scoreline.
Sparks said that'll be an area the team will be sure to address in the lead up to the big day.
"Orange had a late fightback and that's something we spoke about after the game. That was probably the only disappointing thing from the game - letting them have a bit more of a go in the last quarter," he said.
"But I think that we had done such a good job over those previous three quarters that it didn't matter that much. We're really happy with the momentum we've got going into the granny.
"It's a good foundation. We think we're building up momentum at the right time of the year. We know what areas we need to work on to take it to the Giants, who have been the top side all year.
"We're really looking forward to the challenge."
BATHURST BUSHRANGERS 15-15-105 (Kolby McMahon 3, Matt Archer 2, Andrew James 2, James Smith 2, Alex Sparks 2, Peter Grundy, Ben Horn, Tim Hunter, Hugh Templeton) to ORANGE TIGERS 8-4-52 (Andrew O'Brien 3, Nathan Bellina, Peter Byrne, Shihan Naushad, Andrew Nelson, Jacob Tyack)
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