Bulls into preliminary final

The Harvey Bulls kicked eight of the last 10 goals to over-run a lacklustre Collie Eagles by 10 points at the Collie Recreation Ground on Sunday, putting them in their third-straight preliminary final.

The teams traded the momentum early, but the Eagles seemingly ran out of legs in the second half to lose 14.11 (95) to 12.13 (85).

A frenetic first term had the Bulls dominate the opening minutes, before Eagles midfielder Michael Florio took control of the game, capitalising on a lack of opponent to run the ball up the wings and kick two goals for the term.

This gave the Eagles all the momentum heading into quarter time and they looked as if they were going to dominate for the rest of the game, with newly-crowned Hayward Medallist Travis Cleggett, Teke Vernon and Kyle Shanahan taking control in the midfield.

This set up Joel Houghton (four goals) and Jayce Fontana (three goals) who took a number of good marks.

But after the main break a different Harvey Bulls team emerged and found their run.

Former captain Josh Krispyn was working hard in the contest and partnered with Rodney Shemeld to dominate the midfield contest.

Elimination final star Jaxon Egan was brought up the ground and he used his run and carry to stun the Eagles’ defence, who soon had five goals kicked on them in the third term.

Brendon Jones and Dean Miller were outstanding across half-back for the Bulls, cutting off any of the Eagles’ attempts to attack and controlling the play with their precise disposals.

The Eagles had no answers and soon found themselves on the back foot and trailing at the three-quarter time break.

Things got worse when David Faulkner booted his second goal to extend the Bulls’ lead.

A clever crumbing goal from Fontana soon gave the home fans something to cheer about, but in the next 10 minutes neither team was able to score.

The contests became more intense and clean disposal was hard to find.

Fittingly it was Shemeld who broke the deadlock, finding space inside his forward 50m zone to kick what would be the sealing goal.

Thomas Smith booted his second shortly after and it seemed the Bulls were on their way. Houghton booted a late goal to reduce the margin, but the damage had been done.