Russells Creek on a winning run after tough start to Warrnambool and District season

Creek has rocketed back into contention after winning three on the trot. Its latest triumph over Old Collegians resulted in a jump from ninth to sixth on the ladder, with Creek sitting sit two games outside the top five behind Dennington. A grade mentor Stacy Dunkley said while finals "wasn't even in our eyesight" at the beginning of the season, the team is aiming to "make some noise" in the remaining six home and away games.

"Morale is really up, it's nice to have the girls feel what they can achieve," she said. "To see (the jump to six) after the game, everyone was really ecstatic."

With her squad cursed with multiple injuries in early rounds, Dunkley said improvement had come once the line up had its chance to settle.

"Having injuries return helped as well," she said. "Everything we've worked on is just finally coming together. And the growth in the girls, it's starting to come to life."

Bonnie Winter and teen Carla Van Zyl's partnership in goals is beginning to pay off, the former in her first season in both A grade and goals while Van Zyl's elevation sees Brooke Herbertson take a posting in defence.

"Bonnie's come a long way from her first game to now," Dunkley said. "She's normally either in a defensive or centre position and at the start of the season, we didn't have much step up for goals. She actually was one to put her hand up.

"Once I put her in a practice match I thought, yeah I reckon we can work with this. And Carla, who is a junior, is doing a beautiful job in A grade. She's got nice body strength and really holds her own in there."

Bridging its margins is Creek's main objective in coming rounds. It has already turned a 14-goal deficit against South Rovers into a seven-goal sweep before flipping two-goal losses to Timboon and Old Collegians into four-goal wins.

Dunkley said she "wasn't expecting miracles" in rematches against Panmure, Nirranda and Merrivale, though battles against Allansford and Dennington will put her team's finals credentials to the test.

"The goal every week is to close that margin as much as we can," Dunkley said. "We're coming together as a team and growing so lets just keep going and see what we can do."

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