WESTERN NSW's quest to contest a Football NSW finals series will have to wait another season after a penultimate round draw on Saturday ended their hopes.
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Western went into the match against Nepean sitting in sixth on the ladder and given only the top four in the shortened season will play finals, they knew it was a must-win.
The Mark Rooke coached side pushed hard, but in the end the game finished in a 2-all deadlock. It lifted Western into fifth, but even a final round victory will not be enough for them to climb further.
"It was another one which got away in reality," Rooke said.
"Like I said to the boys at the end of the game, in years gone past we'd be saying '2-all draw, great result guys, well done', but you could see on the guys' faces they were disappointed, we knew we needed to win that game to be any chance of playing semis.
"So to come away with just a point, on a normal day that's fine, but for this game it was disappointing.
"The guys gave it absolutely everything, we just didn't take advantage of the few moments we had - we got two but geeze we could have had a couple more."
It was Western who struck first in the match at St Mary's Cook Park when a shot from Matt Hobby deflected into the net.
The visitors had an ideal chance to extend that advantage before half-time following an infringement from a Nepean defender, but they could not convert from the penalty spot.
"That would have made it 2-0 and we thoroughly deserved to be 2-0 up, at that point we were right in the ascendancy in the match, we were well ahead, we had nullified what they had put out for the day," Rooke said.
"So it was disappointing not to be 2-0 then it would have seriously been 10 seconds before half-time they scored, which was a real nail in the coffin."
Nepean struck again early in the second half after Western turned over possession near halfway to make it 2-1.
Western was able to get back on level terms when a Jesse Boness strike from the top of the area off a corner kick looped into the top corner. After that both teams pressed in attack, but it remained locked at 2-all.
"Nepean knew if that if they won the match they could still get a finals berth, but if we won we could catch them," Rooke said. "We had our chances towards the end, we just couldn't get that killer goal."
