Tara Murray
The incredible turnaround of Keilor Park has continued with the club winning through to two Essendon District Football League grand finals.
After not fielding a side in 2018 the Devils’ seniors and reserves sides will be at Windy Hill on the final day of the year in division 2.
Devils coach Paul Guicas was a very relieved and happy man after the 12.10 (82)-8.8 (56) win.
“A lot of hard work has been done by good people around the footy club to make this happen,” he said.
“They threw everything at us to their credit as we were able to get over the line. In the rooms old KP people were in the rooms afterwards and crying.
“It was great to see and we’ll try to keep a lid on it.”
The Devils had to to it the hard way against Oak Park in their senior semi final on Sunday,
The Kangaroos made the most of the breeze in the first quarter to open up a three goal lead at quarter time.
The Devils slowly made inroads in the second quarter with the margin back to six points. The Devils were able to shut the Kangaroos down in the third quarter.
“We changed a few things at half time and that worked in our favour,” Guicas said.
“We stopped them in the third quarter. It was stoppage after stoppage and we worked hard. We were a goal down at three quarter time.
“We know we can run out games and we were still running on the ground at the end. We kicked the first goal of that last quarter and it went from there.”
The Devils kicked the only five goals of the last quarter to run away with the results.
Damien Cavka kicked four goals for the Devils after a slow start.
Skipper Daylan Kempster continued his good form and did a lot of the hard work.
Guicas was full of praise for his backline.
“Our backline has been great this year,” he said.
“We got Bryce Whelan from East Sunbury and he has been outstanding. Vincent Schiavello is another.
“We have a potent forward line, but our backline has done a lot of the work for us.”
The Devils are looking to win their first senior grand final since 2001. With all but one player available for selection, there’s plenty of depth heading into the grand final.
Guicas said they needed to just stick to what they’ve done all year and resulted them finished with the minor premiership;
“We’ll look to enjoy the grand final and the lead up,” he said.
“We’ll train Tuesday, Thursday, Tuesday and Thursday. We’ll try and keep the week as normal as possible.”
Oak Park will play Coburg Districts in the preliminary final after the Lions beat Burnside Heights, 12.11 (83)-10.8 (68) in the other semi final.
