BMD Premiership semi-finals preview
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Four teams are just one game away from potential grand final glory, with the stage set for this weekend's BMD Premiership semi-finals.
The undefeated Souths Logan Magpies will take on the fourth-placed Wynnum Manly Seagulls in the opening semi-final on Sunday at Davies Park, before the Burleigh Bears and Mackay Cutters meet in the second grand final qualifier, in what are sure to be two blockbuster clashes.
Here are the coach's thoughts ahead of the semi-final showdowns.
BMD Premiership semi-finals
Souths Logan Magpies v Wynnum Manly Seagulls
Souths Logan Magpies coach Maia Tua-Davidson: To be where we are now - top of the ladder and undefeated for the regular season - it means everything in terms of how hard the team have worked to get to this point. But it also all means nothing when we have this game in front of us. To be honest, I think Round 7 was actually our worst performance, even if we got the win over Mackay. But it’s become probably best the preparation we could have for this week because it was ugly and we didn’t play to the best of our ability but we still got the result. We’ve talked about being prepared for ugly in the finals. We have to be comfortable with that. If we’re uncomfortable, we’re going to psych ourselves out of the game. Wynnum Manly in particular is the team I consider to be the most like us. They have talent across the park and a mix of really talented young girls, really experienced older players but no single threat. We know it’s going to be a grind and that they’re going to compete in every moment just like we’re going to compete in every moment.
Semi-final match-up: Kiria-Ratu v Lofipo
Wynnum Manly Seagulls coach Ron Troutman: We’ve been building throughout the season and it’s been good. We’re working on getting our completions right up. That’s been our goal for the week coming up against Souths Logan. They’ll be very strong, obviously. They’ll be a lot better footy side than what they were earlier on in the year against us. They have a good forward pack so it’s something we have to stand up and prepare for. We just need everyone to be ready across the board for us. Hopefully we can be clean with the ball.
Match: Magpies v WM Seagulls
Semi Final -
home Team
Magpies
1st Position
away Team
WM Seagulls
4th Position
Venue: Davies Park, Brisbane
Burleigh Bears v Mackay Cutters
Burleigh Bears coach Scott Cooke: Even with a final round win against the Brisbane Tigers, we know we need to improve defensively. One of the big things we will focus on this week is starting the game stronger. We really need to get out there and try to set the tone for the game straight away instead of waiting to get into it. We’ve been guilty of that lately so that’s something we’ve focused on and has been part of our talks post-game. I’m expecting a good game on Sunday. Mackay are going to be hard, they’re going to play tough. I saw their game against Souths and they played pretty good footy. We beat them up there last time, in Round 3, so they’re going to look for a bit of revenge and to come out hard.
Semi-final match-up: Manzelmann and Temara
Mackay Cutters coach Marco Peters: The big takeaway from last week's loss to Souths Logan is that we understand that when we hold the ball, we do really well. If we turn it over, we have to chase our tail. We need to improve our completions. We know we can match it with any team, we just need to hold the ball. Within the team we have confidence and we can compete with all the other teams. From our point-of-view, we always just focus on our team and what we can do better. We believe we can be better than last weekend. Coming up against Burleigh, this is our third semi-final in a row against them, if we include our North Queensland Gold Stars days. We always book a game with them at this time of year. They’re a very prestigious club in that they’ve had a lot of success. They got us at the start of the year but it’s a different side now. We believe we can compete with all the teams if we stick to what we know.
Match: Cutters v Bears
Semi Final -
home Team
Cutters
3rd Position
away Team
Bears
2nd Position
Venue: Davies Park, Brisbane
Catch all the BMD Premiership finals action live and free at Qplus.tv.
