WHEN Bathurst City walk onto the turf at Orange on Saturday afternoon it will be with a very clear mission in mind – they want second place on the women’s Premier League Hockey ladder back.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Last week as Bathurst City suffered a 3-0 loss to fierce rivals Lithgow Panthers, Ex-Services were busy beating Confederates 1-0.
Those results saw Exies move into second and City slip to third.
“They overtook us after last weekend’s loss, so it’s on,” City’s Casey Bayliss said.
“I looked at the point score and saw they [Exies] had snuck up on us. Every year we focus on Panthers, they are our match, we have played them in the last two grand finals, so to be honest, we don’t give anyone else much thought.
“But we are happy to be playing Exies this weekend, we can slip into second again. We are not shy about it, we want second spot back – it’s that simple.”
The first time City and Exies did battle this season was on April 9, the match ending in a 1-all draw.
But neither Australian Country representative Bayliss nor City coach Lisa Quinn took part in that match. This Saturday the Bathurst outfit should have a stronger line up.
“In not one game this season have we had a full strength outfit,” Bayliss said.
“Last weekend against Panthers we were missing Tirah Jarvis and Brielle Lovekin from the midfield and Grace Schumacher up front, so that’s a pretty solid core to miss. But hopefully we get them back this weekend and we are at full strength.
“We had a 1-all draw with them the first time, but that was early on in the season when we had a lot of new juniors and with Lisa and I missing, there was not a lot of senior guidance.”
While Bayliss has every confidence City – who have played one game less than Exies - can post their seventh win of the season on Saturday, she still has respect for the Orange outfit.
Exies have scored 15 goals more than City thus far and were they not stripped of points for fielding an unregistered player, could be in an even stronger position.
“Playing them in Orange, that’s going to make them tougher. We still respect them, but we are going to have to be smarter than them,” Bayliss said. “We need to give them credit for where they are positional wise on the ladder, but I am confident we can take them.”
Saturday’s game will start at 1.10pm.