East Fremantle vs West Adelaide- Foxtel Cup Grand Final tonight!

The mighty Sharks take on the best of the SANFL in tonight's Foxtel Cup Grand Final. Having already disposed of SANFL 2012 Premiers Norwood in the first round, the Sharks will now battle SANFL runners up West Adelaide for the Foxtel Cup and $100,000 prize money. Coincidentally, both the Sharks and The Bloods are sitting 3rd on their respective ladders, both were runners up in 2012, and both defeated the other's premiers in earlier rounds.

The Sharks are close to full strength, with AFL players Daniel Kerr & Brad Dick the only players missing from the side that beat Perth Demons at the weekend. Godfrey Curley, Cameron Symonds and Scott Jansen come into the side, with Adrian Ricciardello, Tom Hooker and Kieran King as the emergencies. The Sharks are without Richard Hadley and Ryan Lester-Smith; both sustained injuries in the South Fremantle game the week before. 

The Sharks flew down to Adelaide yesterday and held a light training session near AAMI Stadium yesterday, where they caught up with a former Shark; Port Adelaide's midfield coach Josh Carr (pictured).

Both of East Fremantle's qualifiying games were played in incredibly wet conditions, with torrential rain falling in both Adelaide and Perth when they played Norwood and Werribee respectively.

West Adelaide met Port Melbourne in the first round, and put on a dominant display to win by 53 points at the MCG.  Their semi-final victory came against current WAFL Premiers Claremont at Paterson's Stadium, The Bloods made the best of the slippery conditions to win in a low scoring match by 17 points.

It looks set to be a great contest in the midfield, Mark McGough and Rory O'Brien have been the standout players for East Fremantle (along with the injured Richard Hadley) in both their Foxtel Cup games, and Travis Tuck and Ben Macreadie the same for West Adelaide.

The Bloods will be significantly boosted by the inclusion of key defenders Ryan Ferguson and Joel Tippett, who were both sidelined for the semi-final victory. The Bloods also held four players- Adam Hartlett, Scott Bricknell, Nick Homburg and Aaron Anderson- out of their SANFL game on the weekend to keep them fresh for this game. No such choice for the Sharks, with almost every WAFL game a must win to make the finals.

The game will commence at 8.05pm local time (6:35pm Perth) and will be made up of four quarters of eighteen (18) minutes set time, plus time-on from the last 3 minutes only (20 minutes approximately total per quarter).

This will be the third season for the knockout competition that saw Williamstown (VFL) take home the prize in the inaugural competition in 2011 and Claremont (WAFL) claiming victory last year.

ROAD TO THE FOXTEL CUP FINAL

West Adelaide

Tuesday June 11 – West Adelaide 17.9 (111) d Port Melbourne 9.4 (58) at the MCG
Tuesday July 16 – West Adelaide 6.7 (43) d Claremont 3.8 (26) at AAMI Stadium

East Fremantle

Tuesday May 21 – East Fremantle 6.6 (42) d Norwood 4.11 (35) at AAMI Stadium
Tuesday July 9 – East Fremantle 6.4 (40) d Werribee 2.4 (16) at Patersons Stadium

FOXTEL CUP GRAND FINAL TEAMS

WEST ADELAIDE

F: Jon Beech (14), Michael Still (17), Shane Birss (3)

HF: Matthew Rankine (21), Ryan Ferguson (27), Chris Bonney (29)

C: Nick Homburg (30), Chris Schmidt (5), Taite Silverlock (4)

HB: Brad Mangan (43), Adam Hartlett (7), Aaron Anderson (42)

B: Kurt Thompson (31), Joel Tippett (12), Daniel Caire (13)

R: Peter Nelson (33), Ben Macreadie (10), Travis Tuck (18)

INT: Josh Schiller (34), Tom Keough (20), Daniel Webb (26), Aaron Fielke (9)

EMG: Tom Schott (39), Dean Poynton (25), Brad Kirk (35)

EAST FREMANTLE

F: James Depane (30), Rob Young (23), Louis Cronan (20)

HF: Godfrey Curley (26), Jack Perham (6), Sean Henson (5)

C: Brett Peake (7), Mark McGough (1), Mitchell Boyle (14)

HB: Jayden Schofield (13), Steven Dodd (8), Andrew Stephen (12)

B: James Bayliss (35), Tom Howlett (29), Samuel Read (9)

R: Fraser MacDougall (28), Aidan Tropiano (3), Rory O’Brien (4)

INT: Brad Cooper (32), Cameron Symonds (15), Scott Hancock (16), Scott Jansen (10)

EMG: Adrian Ricciardello (33), Tom Hooker (11), Kieran King (25)