Picola United handed heavy defeat by Waaia

It wouldn’t end there, however, as a relentless Bombers side continued the onslaught in the second half, with a six-goal-to-one behind final term rounding out a disappointing day for Picola United.

Blues coach Darby Walsh was optimistic about the result, however, with passages of play encouraging for the side, while the scoreboard perhaps exaggerates the contest.

"We knew obviously, Waaia, we've got a lot of respect for them, we know what they can bring and what they did bring obviously,” Walsh said.

“We knew we were going to have to play our best to sort of be with a shot and probably just didn't do it for long enough to be honest, a little bit similar to last week in that sense.

“We tried to get our match-ups right and they've obviously got a lot of good players, and some of the ones that we probably didn't expect, you know, (Dylan) Moncur kicked seven goals, which was really good by him, but we were sort of yeah, trying to get our match-ups right and it probably took us a little bit of time to adjust to that I think.

“Once we did adjust to it, it was probably a little bit more even on the ground, probably not so much reflected on the scoreboard, but yeah performance-wise, I thought it was much better in that sense probably after half-time."

The improved performance came without the full amount of rotations on the bench, which again perhaps skewed the final result, according to Walsh.

"We were down on rotations after half-time, so sort of really asking a lot out of a few blokes and I thought yeah, I thought for the most part we got what we needed to,” he said.

“Obviously the result is not great, a 99-point loss isn't what we wanted, but yeah, I thought it wasn't probably as bad as what the scoreboard might look like."

A number of stand-out performers elevated themselves while the team was struggling, with a couple of Blues leading by example.

"Cody Haub was again really good, (as was) Blake Jorgensen; Cody and Blake are both our co-captains, they were both really, really strong,” Walsh said.

“Brandon Byrne across centre-half-back was really good as well. We had a lot of blokes who just battled really hard all day, but they were probably that the main ones I'd say.”

Mitchell Dickason joined Haub and Jorgensen as the only goal kickers, while Tanner Smith, Clinton Barnes and Taylor Beard rounded out the best players.

Looking ahead to next week, where Picola United will play a top-four Rennie side, Walsh is clear on the improvements that need to be made from the weekend’s game.

"Just our execution I thought let us down a bit,” he said.

“There were probably passages where we just missed a handball or we just missed a kick or just fumbled the ball or whatever, and we could have been really out and potentially having shots on goal, so just tidying up on a few things in that sense would be really important for us."

The Blues fall to a 2-2 record following the round-four loss and enter their clash with Rennie without a win since round two, when they narrowly defeated a Mathoura side that featured former Collingwood superstar Dane Swan.