Temora coach Jake Wooden has revealed shutting down Coleambally midfielder Curtis Steele will be a prime focus for the Kangaroos in Sunday's elimination final at Maher Oval.
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Steele has enjoyed a sensational debut season in the Farrer League and has been a standout for the Blues in their rise from the bottom of the ladder to finals.
The Blues defeated Temora by 22 points at Coleambally the last time they met so Wooden is well aware of what the opposition is capable of.
"Absolutely, they've got some good outside players and Curtis Steele is one of their big targets in the middle there," Wooden said.
"So we're going to have to play tight on him and a few of their other players to not allow them to get on the outside. We'll look to tighten up on a few of their players because in the middle is going to be where it's won and lost.
"If we can get on top early and get the ball into our forward line nice and quick then hopefully it will work from there."
Temora will play in the elimination final for the first time under Wooden's tenure as coach.
They went down to Marrar by four points in the grand final in his first season in charge and then lost to North Wagga in last year's preliminary final.
"It's not ideal but we got ourselves in that position so now we've got to get ourselves out," Wooden said.
"It was a little bit disappointing the way we let it slip but hopefully we can rectify that. Coly are up and about obviously coming in off a win while we're coming in off some losses."
Temora had the chance to finish third but went down to East Wagga-Kooringal by 20 points in a final round play-off for the double chance.
Temora led by 15 points at half-time and five points at three-quarter-time before the Hawks ran over the top.
"It was obviously disappointing that we didn't get the job done," Wooden said.
"I felt as though we were all over them in the first half, and even at three-quarter-time, we probably missed four or five shots. We didn't take the chance to put some scoreboard pressure on and they went up the other end and scored and it slowly slipped away on us."
Kieran Shea strained his hamstring in the loss but has recovered well and is expected to be right to face Coleambally.
If he gets up, Temora are expected to take in an unchanged line-up to the sudden-death final.
Wooden has watched the video of their last two losses and is confident that his team will be able to bounce back.
"When you look through the games, it's just been a 10 minute period that has cost us the game," he said.
"Obviously we can't do that against the top teams but we've got a senior squad so there shouldn't be any excuses as to why we can't turn it around in a week."
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