The Box Hill Hawks surged past Frankston yesterday to win by 12 points away at Frankston Oval, 15.13.(103) to the Dolphins 14.7.(91).

The Hawks grabbed the lead and then the match with four last quarter goals after being well-held all day.

Frankston applied all sorts of pressure restricting the Hawks' usual game style and were unlucky to be rewarded after leading by the eventual winning margin at three-quarter time.

Box Hill Coach Brendon Bolton was full of praise for Frankston who proved a tough opponent for the Hawks to control.

“Full credit to Frankston, they played with a lot of spirit and passion.

“I know they’ve pushed some sides of late.

“They had a fairly close contest against North Ballarat and just haven’t come away with some results, not to dissimilar to us in the first half of the year.

“Their ability to win the contested footy and the stoppages particularly in the first half was a real positive for them and put us under a real amount of pressure.” Bolton said.

Cellar-dwelling at the bottom of the ladder with only a single win, Frankston were on paper a class below in a similar season re-write of their form from the previous year under then coach Shannon Grant.

However ladder positions were irrelevant with the Dolphins serving it up to Hawks in spades, even with a young, inexperienced team mainly of local talent from the peninsula.

Frankston took the lead at every change, with Box Hill having their work cut out in the final term. Jayden Hoegel provided the spark of extra energy for the Hawks digging deep with two important final quarter goals to blast the Hawks away from a determined Frankston outfit.

The past caught up with Frankston as the bottom ranked fourth quarter side in terms quarters won gave up a considerable lead and then were unable to hit the scoreboard with precision, having scored only a solitary goal when it mattered most.

Bolton was pleased with the Hawks intensity late in the game.

“I was really happy with our last quarter the way we fought out the win.” Bolton said.

“We were a little bit inconsistent throughout the game, we had surges, but our last quarter was really exciting.”

Mixing positioning around the ground, Bolton used players in all different areas with rookie Luke Breust in particular trying his hand on the ball, rather than directly up forward.

“We went with the opportunity today to really give some exposure to different players through the middle.

“I thought if we could rotate heavily, that gives these guys not only some exposure but keeps our intensity around the contest. That really helped us in the last quarter.

“In the end we played Tuck, Stokes, Savage, Muston, Moss, Kiel, Breust, Andrews and Kayler-Thomson.

“We have a lot of rotations now in the VFL, not too dissimilar to the AFL and it allows you to keep intensity in the game, so it was good in the last quarter that Breust helped with that.” Bolton said.

Getting so close, the Dolphins always seem to tear up the turf against the Hawks after the last time they played in 2009 at the same ground, they only lost by nine points.

For the Hawks, Shane Savage’s work rate was first class through the middle with a full four quarter effort to rack up 30 disposals.

Power forward, Ben Fagan won some really strong contests up forward using his solid body to advantage to kick three goals.

Cameron Pedersen (12) and Jarryd Morton (22) worked well down back against the strength of Frankston’s big forward to prevent the Dolphins from making a late charge to the line.

Pedersen not only marked but killed off some dangerous balls in the opposition forward fifty, with Morton whose rebounding was effective.

Jayden Hoegel with his winning last quarter efforts had a polished performance with 26 disposals and three goals, likewise Travis Tuck who compiled 23 touches.

Garry Moss, Ben Smithwick and Jordan Lisle also all chipped in with two goals in the Hawks eighth win for the season.

Box Hill remains in seventh position on the VFL ladder, equal on points to the Northern Bullants in sixth and one game away from Port Melbourne and Collingwood in fourth and fifth respectively.

Next, Box Hill returns home to play the Casey Scorpions this Sunday 1 August.

Frankston: 4.3 / 6.6 / 13.7 / 14.7.91   
Box Hill Hawks: 3.2 / 5.3 / 11.7 / 15.13.103 

Goals: B. Fagan 3, J. Hoegel 3, B. Smithwick 2, G. Moss 2, J. Lisle 2, L. Breust, B. Dowler, S. Savage

Best: S. Savage, B. Fagan, T. Tuck, G. Moss, C. Pedersen, J. Morton