Green Gully player/coach Jeffrey Fleming was disappointed and hurt by his side’s loss to South Melbourne in the Elimination Final, but has declared the season a success nonetheless.
Having failed to punish profligate South Melbourne side by not taking some gilt edge chances of their own, the match looked destined for extra time before Tyson Holmes struck a dagger through Gully hearts.
“It’s really disappointing. I was confident getting towards extra time, I thought we probably had the legs, had a couple of pretty dangerous boys on the bench to bring on, and then to cop a goal just before full time, it hurts a lot,” Fleming said.
“Sometimes those things go your way and today they didn’t so it was disappointing.”
Green Gully were missing key defender Roddy Vargas with a knee injury, but his replacement Mitchell Bissinger was more than capable of filling in according to his coach.
“You always miss his experience and the quality of player that he is, and I thought Mitch Bissinger had a really good game today and did really well and stepped in,” he said.
“I don’t think we lacked anything really in regards to quality no certainly not something that was a difference between winning and losing.”
The difference may have been the need for a bit more cutting edge when the game was cagey in the second half.
Though Green Gully were able to show promising signs going forward, most notably through Jason Hayne, there was an option to bring on the exciting Nigerian winger Osagie Ederaro.
However, Fleming thought it best to leave the side which he felt was doing well to see out normal time, believing their best chance of winning came in extra time.
“There was [a temptation to bring on Ederaro]. We just felt it was really tight in that second half and we felt that we were sort of getting on top, we just didn’t want to rock the boat too much,” he said.
“We thought extra time was coming up, he was a good option for us to bring on, and really get him running at them and then you have these thoughts and then you cop a goal and it changes everything.
“So you look back and you go yeah, maybe you could’ve brought him on earlier but that’s the way we did it and it didn’t work for us today so we’ll cop that.”
Rather than focus on what could have been, Fleming was happy to look back on his side’s turn of form and finish to the season, including the State Knockout Cup win.
“Overall I’d say the season is a success. Particularly winning the cup was obviously a highlight, and getting into the finals from where we were when I took over was a success, and it’s just disappointing that you were so close in a game and to lose it hurts,” he said.
“I thought the players, from the position we were in when I took over with four points, there wasn’t much confidence, I thought the boys really performed well and really dug in when they had to and worked hard and got results, got some confidence and then we started playing some really good football.
“But I think we’ll look back at the season in a couple weeks time and go you know what? From where we were and what we’ve achieved, that’s probably been a success for us. ”
Fleming did however feel Green Gully would have had a good chance of progressing deep into Finals had they progressed passed South Melbourne.
“I think South feels a similar way, but I think the teams ahead of us in the finals were probably afraid of playing us because we had good results against them apart from Bentleigh so we were confident that if we could get through this week, we knew this week would be a challenge, that we had the goods to give it a real good shake,” he said.
With the season now over, he can now turn his attentions to next season, though with all that is going on behind the scenes at FFV Headquarters, nobody knows just exactly what they’ll be preparing for at the minute.
“It’s a real conundrum at the moment isn’t it? No one really knows what league they’re playing in, who they’re playing for, what’s happening so as a coach and a player, you just have to wait and see,” Fleming said.
“You’d love to know that whether the season starts in March or February and you can start planning but no one can really do much at the moment.”
“I would love to keep the majority of these boys together if possible, maybe freshen it up a little bit, but it’s an unknown. It’s an unfortunate situation as a player/coach to be in.”