A BATTLE of the reigning premiers saw Casterton Sandford take first blood over Kybybolite in round one of the 2023 Limestone Coast Women’s Football League season.

B Division winners in 2022, the Cats recruited well in the off-season while maintaining a large chunk of their grand final list and stepped out with confidence to take on last year’s A Division premier.

Despite the low-scoring affair – the Cats taking the match 1.7.13 to Kyby’s 1.2.8 – coach Pete Hutchins said his side showed outstanding potential for the coming season.

“Our forward line didn’t quite click, which can happen when you’ve got 10 or 11 new players rotating through the side,” he said.

“They got sucked up the ground in the contest and left us with few options up forward, but as the girls are getting to know their teammates, putting their trust in their teammates to get the job done up the ground, then things will just fall into place.

“Apart from that, our contested football is ridiculously good and the growth in the skills, the skills development our players are showing is outstanding.

“We’ve got a team of girls who want the hard ball, they want possession of the ball and if someone’s in their way, they’re gonna take it and do their best to do something with it.”

Adding to the ranks this year and after training and watching from the sidelines for several seasons, youngster Kirby Vise finally got to don the blue, white and red for a senior match on Sunday.

The 14-year-old first took to the ground as a five-year-old Auskicker, making her way up through the ranks with the Cats in Under 12 and Under 14 competitions, where girls are permitted to play in the competition with the boys.

While several years ago, that would have been the end of her football career, Hutchins said the opportunity afforded by the Limestone Coast competition was one Vice had grabbed with both hands.

“She’s turned up to every training for a couple of seasons, she sits on the bench, she listens to everything that’s going on around her and this year she gets to play,” Hutchins said.

“I’ve watched Kirby play a fair bit of junior football; I just told her to go out and play it exactly how she’d played any other game and when she got the opportunity, as soon as she got on the ground, she got two or three kicks straight up out of the backline and really held her own for the whole game.”

While losing star Sophie Arkun to the Norwood club and Chloe Finnigan to an overseas trip this year, the Cats have retained Zhane Crawford, who stunned everyone with her footy prowess in just her first season in 2022, as well as club stalwarts Scarlett Jarrad, Emma Lynch, Gaby Sullivan, Carli Smith and Madi Zuijdveld.

“We’ve got Scarlett as joint coach this year, which is really a great thing for the club … we mostly think along the same lines, but have different ways of talking to the girls, different methods for getting the best out of them and that worksreally well,” Hutchins said.

“And Carli Smith is just a machine, she cracks in all day and she’s getting smarter as she gets older with her football.

“She puts her little frame in the right spot and manages to dish it out to anyone who gets in her way … and when she hasn’t got the ball, you can hear her talking; she’s just great to have on the ground.”

In yet another history-making event for the club, Sunday’s win was the first time the Cats had beaten Kybybolite, since joining the competition and Hutchins said he was looking forward to plenty more ‘firsts’ for the team, this season.

“We’ll be playing under lights at home in round eight, which will be brilliant,” he said.

“Island Park’s always been a great place to play footy, the atmosphere there is brilliant and it will be a great night to have everyone around us.”

The Cats head to Vansittart Park again this Friday night, taking on the Kalangadoo Magpies.