class acts to help lift tardy tahs...agement will resume in a fortnight. power football chief peter...

TUESDAY OCTOBER 28 2014 SPORT 37

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Star’s stay a Gray areaPORT Adelaide and star mid-fielder Robbie Gray haveagreed on the value of the All-Australian’s signature on anew contract.

All that needs to be resolvedis the term of his new deal.

The Power and Gray’s man-agement are in agreement onhow much to pay the 26-year-old Victorian midfielder-for-ward, who this year won theJohn Cahill Medal as clubchampion. Port would prefer a

three-year contract extensionthat would take Gray out ofnext year’s free agency field.Gray is currently on contractto the end of next season – andis prepared to consider alonger term.

The long-running talks be-tween Port and Gray’s man-agement will resume in afortnight. Power football chiefPeter Rohde said last night:“We are hopeful we will final-ise a deal in the off-season.”

Class acts to help lift tardy TahsWARATAHS’ faltering NTFLseason will get a big injectionof class on Sunday when dualHawthorn premiership playerBrent Guerra and former StKilda defender Stephen Bakermake their Top End debuts.

Guerra’s 255 games withPort Adelaide, St Kilda andHawthorn included 21 finals.Baker played 203 games for StKilda, including the losing2009 and ’10 grand finals.

Tags coach Tim Weather-ald confirmed both players willwear the red and white jump-ers against Southern Districtsat Gardens Oval on Sundayand a TIO blockbuster againstreigning premier St Marys onFriday week.

“They’ll be here for the nextcouple of games where we’llprobably start Brent acrosshalfback and Stephen up for-ward and on the ball,’’ Weath-erald said.

“There’ll be a couple ofother good ones up this weekas well. Ex-Adelaide Crow Mi-chael Handby and Mitch San-dery, who played at Norwoodand South Adelaide.’’

Weatherald knows the2014-15 NTFL season is gettingaway from his side after three

close losses to Nightcliff, theTiwi Bombers and Wanderers.

Those losses have seenWaratahs plummet from firstto sixth despite a healthy per-centage that is better than thefourth and fifth placed sides.

“We had a long chatstraight after the Wanderersgame where I pretty much laidit on the line to the boys thatthey need to lift and quickly,’’he said. “Good sides win thoseclose games and we’ve lostthree winnable games nowwhich isn’t good enough.

“I stressed my disappoint-ment and the fact we have tofind a bit more fire in the bellyand a bit more spirit within thegroup, especially with probablytwo of our biggest games of theyear in the next two weeksagainst Southern Districts andSt Marys.’’

Weatherald said that hisplayers’ cruising attitude wasone he wanted to get out oftheir system.

“We’ll be working prettyhard on the track this week torectify that and obviously theaddition of some quality play-ers will help,’’ he said.

“But we still have to rely onthe local boys, they are theplayers who need to lift andstart playing some more con-sistent footy.’’

By GREY MORRISNTFL

Wanderers player Maddison Smith wraps up Waratahs’ Brittany Abel in a tackle Picture: HELEN ORR

Wanderers had little reply in goal spree

WARATAHS stretched theirwinning run in NTFL women’sfootball to four games with an87-point win over Wanderersat Marrara’s TIO Stadium.

The red and whites sealedthe game in the third quarterwhen they kicked 11 goalswithout reply to extend theirthree-goal lead at half-time toa massive 14 at the last change.

Abbey Holmes kicked fivegoals and Breanna Martin andSue Nalder four each as Tahsburst away to win 18.6 (114) to4.3 (27).

The Darwin Buffettescaused an upset by disposing ofSt Marys by 24 points in a low-scoring affair at Marrara onSaturday night.

Shay Warburton’s threegoals for the Buffettes comple-mented the good play of Ma-chealia Roberts and KeishaTinley around the ground,while an inaccurate Saints sidecould only kick one goal from10 shots at goal.

Palmerston got back on thewinner’s track with a tough4.10 (34) to 1.3 (9) win overSouthern Districts.

Magpies Jessica Stassi andRumelda O’Donnell playedkey roles in holding the Croco-diles scoreless after half-time.

Tracy Village beat Night-cliff by a goal in Sunday’s clashbetween the third and fourth-placed sides at TIO Stadium.

Bonnie McDougall andLauren Douglas were the bestfor the Villagers.

By GREY MORRISWOMEN’S FOOTBALL

Tigers flirting with signing RobinsonAXED Carlton hard-nut MitchRobinson will meet with Rich-mond this week in the hope ofreviving his 100-game career asa delisted free agent.

The Tigers have expressedinterest in throwing thedumped Blues utility, who wasset to play for NTFL side Dar-win Buffaloes this season, anAFL lifeline and will interviewhim at Punt Rd this morning.

Brisbane is also consideringrecruiting Robinson, cut by the

Blues last month after the clubfailed to find a suitor at thetrade table. Richmond arekeen to bolster their midfieldstocks and made a play forMelbourne’s Jack Trengoveand St Kilda’s David Armitageduring the trade period.

The Tigers will use five draftpicks on young talent in nextmonth’s national draft butcould secure Robinson, 25, forfree as a delisted free agent andplace him on the rookie list.

The delisted free agency win-dow opens on Saturday withTaylor Hunt (Geelong), JaredPetrenko (Adelaide), SamBlease (Melbourne) and ShaunMcKernan (Adelaide) in themix for a second chance.

Robinson would be seen asa risk given his repeatedbehavioural breaches at theBlues but is a proven contestedball-winner. He finished sev-enth in Carlton’s 2011 best-and-fairest and ninth in 2012.

Demon landingFORMER Western Bulldogscoach Brendan McCartney hasjoined Melbourne.

McCartney, who earlier thismonth resigned his position atWhitten Oval following playerdisharmony at the Bulldogs,will take up the position of de-velopment and strategy coach.

He will be part of the De-mons coaching panel and as-sist Paul Roos.

He will help develop theDemons’ young players.

Be a part of the spring carnival action with your Melbourne Cup Sweep in paper this Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

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