Laura Hall and Adriana Konjarski will hope to help lead their sides to victory when Newcastle Olympic face Warners Bay FC in the inaugural NPL Women’s NNSW grand final on Sunday.
Northern NSW Football’s top tier women’s competition transitioned to National Premier Leagues status this season, with the first decider to be played as a double header alongside the NPL Men’s NNSW grand final at No.2 Sportsground.
After a thrilling come from behind win against Charlestown Azzurri in the minor semi-final, Olympic went on to defeat Broadmeadow Magic 3-1 in the preliminary final.
In a season built on desire, heart and determination, a slew of injuries and absences could do nothing to deflate the Olympic squad’s spirit when they booked their place in the grand-final.
Olympic captain Hall led her team to victory in the preliminary final despite suffering a dislocated thumb early in the second half against Magic. After a brief period on the sideline following the incident, Hall was back on the field to help her side get the win.
Despite the dislocation and obvious pain, Hall insisted there was nothing that would keep her from the field on Sunday.
“I’ll definitely be playing,” Hall said.
“Nothing could keep me from taking the field this week.”
As soon as Hall went down, Olympic coach Paul Devitis knew nothing would keep her from getting back up and playing on and credited Hall’s passion for the game and her team for inspiring the rest of the squad.
“It’s amazing to have a player like Laura on the team,” Devitis said.
“She really personifies what we want here. She’s all heart. She’s had an MRI and an X-ray this week and we’ll get the result shortly but I just know that she’ll be there and she’ll play.
“She’ll give it everything that she can and I think the girls really lift from seeing that. I know that as a player, especially when you have a captain who leads like that, you just want to try harder. She’s so important to this team and she’ll be there for the game and she can help us get the job done.”
With Warners Bay heading into the grand final as favourites, Hall insisted that Olympic do not mind the status of underdogs, claiming the title made them more determined to get to this point.
“We don’t mind being the underdogs,” Hall said.
“We’ve struggles a lot this year with injuries and player unavailability but when we’ve needed to win we have and we’ve got a lot of experience in the squad when it comes to big games.
“We’ve got momentum coming into the weekend from winning our past two games that we probably weren’t expected to win so we’ll just be doing the same thing this weekend.”
After working on and perfecting their style of play all season, the grand final will be more of a mental game for Hall and the Olympic squad.
“I think we’re there mentally,” Hall said.
“We’ve done it already. We had to do it against Charlestown and we had to do it against Magic. Everyone’s prepared and excited and we’ve got a huge amount of momentum going into this weekend, so we just have to take care of ourselves, look after our bodies and we’ll be ready.”
Being part of the most dominant team all season is no mean feat but add to that being the league’s leading goal scorer and Konjarski is well prepared to help lead her team to victory on Sunday.
Konjarski has scored a whopping 39 goals from 22 appearances and will be looking to add to this tally on the biggest day of the season.
“I don’t want to get too cocky and too confident and then go in with the wrong mindset on the day but I think if we can just keep level-headed and know that we have goals in us then I think that’s all we need to do,” Konjarski said.
Despite losing to Olympic midseason, Konjarski attributed the shake-up following that loss as the start of their competition domination.
“[Olympic] beat us midseason there and it kind of shook us a little bit,” Konjarski said.
“I feel like if we go into [the grand final] and play how we’ve been playing since that game with the momentum that we’ve had we should be fine.
“In saying that I think it’s going to be a good game and it’s going to be a good game for the supporters to watch because I don’t think it’s going to be a blowout. I think it’s going to be pretty close.”
Following their win over Broadmeadow Magic in the major semi-final, Warners Bay were afforded a week off, something Konjarski said was a positive for her side.
“I think [the break] was good for us mentally,” Konjarski said.
“We had a training session on the Sunday anyway so it’s not like we didn’t do anything over the weekend. I think it will be an advantage for us in the way that we can reset and we didn’t have to drag ourselves through another match because we had that guaranteed spot. I think it will be a good thing going into [the game] refreshed.”
With the likes of Cass Davis, Lauren Allan and Tara Andrews on their side, Warners Bay have proved a threat all season.
“It’s good having that quality around you and all the other girls can bring out how well they’re playing with such quality players around us,” Konjarski said.
“It really goes to show with how well we’ve been playing this year and that we can all bounce off each other. Even though we’ve got these big names, we’ve got other girls who can do an equally good job.”