BAD AND UGLY by KC from Casey

[Demonland 73,281]

It was a day for the bad and the ugly and very little good for the Casey Scorpions on a day when they had a season high 16 Melbourne listed players, started favourites over Collingwood VFL at Victoria Park in miserable conditions and finished with a 23 point loss that could so easily have been much more.

The signs were bad early when the Scorpions kicked with the advantage of a stiff breeze but broke down in front of goal to score only three points in the first 15 minutes before a long goal off the boot of rookie Mitch White gave them a lift. However, when Magpie AFL premiership defender Ben Reid goaled well into time on, Casey's domination around the ground had been wasted. An after the siren goal by Ben Newton was much needed and then Max King booted another early in the second term to give them a 15 point buffer but from there, the Pies took over.

Although Mark Jamar and Jake Spencer dominated the hit outs as usual, there was no spring in their step and the Collingwood on ball brigade sharked much of their work, outrunning and outrunning the visitors who were lucky to be just one goal in arrears at the break.

The Scorps had the wind but put in an absolute shocker in the third quarter, allowing the Magpies to kick five goals straight outscore them for the term. They trailed by three goals but the game was virtually all over and even though the bitingly cold conditions moderated, the home team dominated but kicked poorly in the end. The final scoreboard did them little justice.

For Casey, Jordie McKenzie was easily the team's best and his disposal looks to have improved. The Demons' forgotten man would be looking at a comeback to AFL ranks on that performance. Alex Neal-Bullen with 40 touches was a prolific ball magnet and definitely has a future in the Melbourne midfield. Rohan Bail was busy and there were flashes of good play from others but generally it was not good enough. Despite some good flashes of play from Jayden Hunt, Max King and Mitch White, all are still a way off.

Casey was also hampered by injuries to Jack Fitzpatrick, Jimmy Toumpas and Ed Morris, all of who had opened brightly and the limited ground time of Christian Salem coming back from hamstring problems.

The Scorpions find themselves in seventh place and with a tough final month return to Casey Fields next Sunday in a must win match up against eighth placed Werribee.

2015 Peter Jackson VFL

Casey Scorpions 2.4.16 3.4.22 6.5.41 9.6.60

Collingwood 1.1.7 4.4.28 9.4.58 12.11.83

Goals

Casey Scorpions Hunt King White 2 McDonald McKenzie Newton

Collingwood Reid 3 Matheson Young 2 Cox Gault Hellier McKeown Williams

Best

Casey Scorpions McKenzie White Neal-Bullen Hunt Panozza Terlich

Collingwood Dwyer Marsh Seedsman Borthwick Hellier Young

Statistics

Rohan Bail 1 behind 30 disposals 10 kicks 20 handballs 5 marks 9 tackles 120 dream team points

Jack Fitzpatrick 7 disposals 3 kicks 4 handballs 3 marks 1 tackle 31 dream team points

Mark Jamar 16 disposals 11 kicks 5 handballs 3 marks 4 tackles 48 hit outs 119 dream team points

Jayden Hunt 2 goals 1 behind 11 disposals 8 kicks 3 handballs 1 mark 1 tackle 49 dream team points

Jay Kennedy-Harris 14 disposals 4 kicks 10 handballs 1 marks 7 tackles 63 dream team points

Max King 2 goals 13 disposals 9 kicks 4 handballs 7 marks 1 tackle 1 hit out 73 dream team points Alex Neal-Bullen 40 disposals 18 kicks 22 handballs 5 marks 8 tackles 140 dream team points

Oscar McDonald 1 goal disposals kicks handballs marks tackles dream team points

Jordie McKenzie 1 goal 1 behind 30 disposals 17 kicks 13 handballs 6 marks 2 tackles 111 dream team points

Ben Newton 1 goal disposals kicks handballs marks tackles

Aidan Riley 21 disposals 8 kicks 13 handballs 1 marks 6 tackles 68 dream team points

Christian Salem 8 disposals 4 kicks 4 handballs 4 marks 2 tackles 37 dream team points

Jake Spencer 1 behind disposals 2 kicks 7 handballs 1 mark 4 tackles 20 hit outs 60 dream team points

Dean Terlich 25 disposals 11 kicks 14 handballs 3 tackles 70 dream team points

Jimmy Toumpas 12 disposals 6 kicks 6 handballs 1 tackle 31 dream team points

Mitch White 2 goals 17 disposals 9 kicks 8 handballs 5 marks 4 tackles 83 dream team points