Hungry Tigers set sights on 2022 flag hunt

TORQUAY Tigers footballers have unfinished business that will motivate the club for premiership tilts after COVID cruelled its 2021 campaign.

Both the Tigers’ men’s and women’s senior sides had built strong platforms to challenge for premierships before August lockdowns hammered a final nail in the coffin of football seasons.

The Tigers men had cemented themselves as the team to beat entering last year’s Bellarine Football League finals, sitting undefeated and three games clear on top of the ladder after an abbreviated 12-game home-and-away season.

The club’s women’s side had also won through to a grand final in the AFL Barwon Division Three competition with an emphatic win over minor premier St Joseph’s in the first week of finals before the season was cut short.

Men’s coach Dom Gleeson said the frustration of missing out on a finals campaign meant his team was starving for the ultimate success this year.

“Of course there was disappointment that we didn’t get to finish it all off,” he said.

“What it has done is it’s made us hungry, and it’s allowed us to retain a lot of our list.

“That driving force to go a couple of steps further this year is certainly there, and we will use it at times for sure.”

The Tigers have kept the bulk of their powerful squad together for this season, though young guns Kane Loftus (St Mary’s) and Baxter Mensch (Geelong West) are among the departures and test themselves in the Geelong Football League.

Experienced key defender James Saker will also juggle playing commitments with a new assistant coaching role in the VFL with Werribee.

Torquay begins its 2022 season with a challenging trip to Ocean Grove on Saturday, with the Grubbers coming off an impressive elimination final win in what became the final game of 2021.

In other round one fixtures, 2019 reigning premier Barwon Heads hosts Drysdale, Geelong Amateur kicks off its season at home to Portarlington, Queenscliff face Newcomb and Modewarre goes head-to-head with Anglesea.

Meanwhile, senior women’s coach Josie Smith said her side was similarly motivated ahead of its first game this weekend.

Smith estimated the Tigers had brought back about three-quarters of its 2021 squad, with both new and returning players eager to repeat its success and go one better this year.

“It was obviously really exciting to win our way through to a grand final, but it was bitterly disappointing to never actually get (the chance) to play off in a grand final and hopefully win that cup and hold it up,” she said.

“It definitely has spurred the players on, and myself as well, to go hard again this year.

“We hope we get an uninterrupted season and a really good run at it. There’s definitely a sense of unfinished business for sure.”

The women’s side will spend the opening weeks of the season in grading matches to determine divisions for the 2022 season. Torquay kicks off its season at Barwon Heads on Sunday.