Temora head into a bye next weekend high on confidence after almost certainly locking down a top three finish with a 38-point win against The Rock-Yerong Creek on Saturday.
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The Roos recaptured some of their best form to produce a 17.10 (112) to 11.8 (74) victory at Nixon Park.
It was just what the coach ordered, opening up a two-game break on the Magpies, who sit just below them on the ladder.
“It was really pleasing,” Wooden said, after their best performance since beating Marrar late last month.
“It was time to show it, and we did… we’d been winning ugly but today we played to the game plan, played to our structures and did everything we talked about.
“We took the game on and it was almost a four-quarter effort.”
They took the risk out of the game with a flying start against the Pies, kicking six goals in the first quarter to lead by 24 points.
TRYC came back early in the second but another six-goal effort in the third quarter almost trebled Temora’s lead from 18 points to 49.
“The midfield stood up,” Wooden said.
“We addressed that at half-time, I put it on the midfielders to be a bit tighter and bring a bit more pressure. As a group they all did that together, and Aker (Anthony Atkin) battled away all day in the ruck for us again.”
But the league’s leading goalkicker, Matt Harpley, was a standout performer, kicking half-a-dozen goals for the fourth time this year – and twice against the Pies.
“He could’ve had a real good day out,” Wooden said. “He gave off a lot of hand-passes over the top. Sometimes you’d like to see your big forward go back and have the shot but he brought a lot of players into the game and he ended up with six himself.”
With four points guaranteed next week, Temora are assured at least an eight-point advantage over TRYC heading into their final three games before finals.
Wooden said they’re looking forward to the break after eight straight games and have at least six players in the mix to come back against Barellan or East Wagga-Kooringal early next month.
One of those is forward Matt Wallis who kicked four goals in reserve grade on Saturday in his second game back from a serious knee injury.
“It’s a week-to-week thing with him, he’s doing his own thing, we’re not putting any pressure on him,” Wooden said.
“He got his hands on it a bit and seemed to move a lot better this week so hopefully that’s good signs that his knee’s freeing up a bit and also that he’s getting his confidence back.”
TRYC kept coming, kicking four goals in the last quarter to limit the damage. But the result closes out a tough month of one win and three losses against the other four top sides.
They were well served by midfielder Matt Murray and backman Sam Durnan while the return of Josh Meiselbach was a welcome sight.