AFL Central West: Eagles show fight against Sapphire Coast after slow opening quarter

Saturday's match at Nowra, which the hosts won 6-7-43 to 3-2-20, was just the second time a senior Eagles women's outfit had played even though AFL Central West has included a women's premiership since back in 2015.

It was a game which highlighted the talent in another region and had the Eagles eager to be exposed to that sort of competition more often.

"I reckon if we got to play them up home in Orange or in Bathurst, so we play one down there and then they come up here it would be really good just to have another opportunity," Orange Tiger Elizabeth Gibson said.

"I think the more participants you have in the rep side the more skills you can bring back to our club and develop from there."

Gibson has been a regular face in the junior Eagles side, but this was her first hit out in the senior squad.

"It was pretty exciting. It was a bit of a step up and a bit different because you only have one game to showcase your skills, but it was a really good experience," she said.

"The Sapphire Coast just came out better at the start, but our second half was definitely stronger, so if we played our second half in the first half I reckon we would've had it."

Eagles manager Liz Kennedy added that she would love to see the carnival extended so they could play more than one game.

"It was a good weekend, but we'd like a bit more emphasis on it now, we'd like to move forward with it now," she said.

"It's something that we are going to pursue for sure. It would be nice to play other teams and see how we do stand up."

It was the first term which set up victory for Sapphire Coast, the well-prepared outfit starting much stronger than the Eagles.

But from that point onwards the Eagles improved and they even won the final quarter.

"The opening quarter they were a little bit shell-shocked I think, the speed of the game was just totally not what our girls are used to," Kennedy, who worked alongside coach Mick Sloan, said.

"But at quarter-time we spoke about it and they redeemed themselves, the last quarter was where they really clicked.

"You could see them lift, you could see them go 'Okay we've got to lift our work rate here' and they did, every single one of them lifted.

"Even though there was a lot of Giants players in there, we still had people from other clubs in the mix, so getting used to how all the girls played and trusting them like you do your own team members took a bit of time."

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