By ADEM SARICAOGLU
TAYLORS Lakes’ progress in the wide open Division One premiership race in the Essendon District Football League was cut short by Tullamarine on Sunday.
The Lions failed in their bid to progress to a preliminary final berth after falling just five points short of victory at Glenroy’s Sewell Reserve, leaving coach Steve Burns “very disappointed” after the game.
“Tulla wanted it a bit more than us today, which is really hard for me to say because our boys pride themselves on the fact they’re normally pretty fierce,” Burns said.
“They just wanted it a little bit more and the ball bounced their way a little bit more than ours and some decisions went their way that hurt us goal-wise.“But they thoroughly deserved to win. They were good considering how many players they’ve got out.”
After trailing by five straight kicks at quarter-time, Taylors Lakes responded with six unanswered goals at the scoring end to lead by five points at half-time.
But by the final change Tullamarine managed to get ahead by a kick, and despite the confidence the Lions had kicking to the scoring end in the final term, Tullamarine held on to keep a fast-finishing Taylors Lakes outfit at bay.
“We thought we were going to run away and have a good win but it didn’t happen,” Burns said.“They kicked the first two for the (final) quarter but we were coming home when the siren went.
“The quarter went for 27 minutes, which I couldn’t believe because every other quarter went for 30, so that blew us away a little bit as well but no sour grapes – they deserved to win.”
The loss marked the finale for local football legend Daniel McFerran, while Burns confirmed, contrary to speculation, that he will coach Taylors Lakes again in 2014.
