ARARAT Rats coach Matt Walder believes his side\u2019s lack of Grand Final experience will serve as a greater motivator than hindrance ahead of Saturday\u2019s decider.<\/p>\n
The Rats will play off in their first Grand Final since 2002, when they meet Minyip-Murtoa for the Wimmera Premiership in Horsham on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Despite Grand Final experience at the Rats currently limited to those who have enjoyed previous success at other clubs, it is not something which worries Walder heading into the club\u2019s biggest match in 20 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe players will provide a freshness to it because, for a lot of them, this is their first Grand Final and they don\u2019t know what\u2019s in front of them,\u201d Walder said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ll be really enthusiastic and won\u2019t be blinded or scarred by any previous experiences they\u2019ve had, so from that perspective it is exciting for the group.\u00a0 In saying that, we\u2019re surrounded here by a good core of level-headed guys to assist anyone through this.\u201d<\/p>\n
One player who will be heading into their first senior Grand Final is captain Riley Taylor.<\/p>\n
While the prospect of becoming one of the club\u2019s youngest-ever premiership captains has crept into the midfielder\u2019s mind, he has been quick to \u201cput the lid back on\u201d in anticipation for a fierce battle.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d be lying if I said it hasn\u2019t crossed my mind at this point, but I\u2019ve been quick to shift the focus away because it\u2019s going to be one hell of a game on the weekend and will be a big challenge for us,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cExcited is an understatement considering there are only two or three that have played in a senior Grand Final. There was a great excitement and buzz after the prelim, I couldn\u2019t really describe how it felt.\u201d<\/p>\n
There will also be plenty of sentimental motivation for the Rats with the premiership drought, as well as the club celebrating its 150th<\/sup> anniversary in 2022.<\/p>\n After a shaky start to the finals series against this week\u2019s opponent in the semi-final, Ararat rediscovered its brand in last week\u2019s preliminary final against Stawell to qualify for Saturday\u2019s Grand Final.<\/p>\n Saturday\u2019s meeting with Minyip-Murtoa will be the fourth between the two sides this year. \u00a0The Magpies lead 2-1 in the head-to-head, with their most recent win over the Rats coming in the Semi-Final.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re a good side and have been the benchmark side for the last few years. They\u2019re consistent and showed that level of consistency in that final two weeks ago that you need. It was probably that consistency which beat us because we probably weren\u2019t consistent for long enough,\u201d Walder said.<\/p>\n The Wimmera Grand Final will be played in Horsham this Saturday from 2:20pm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ARARAT Rats coach Matt Walder believes his side\u2019s lack of Grand Final experience will serve as a greater motivator than hindrance ahead of Saturday\u2019s decider.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1555,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"ARARAT Rats coach Matt Walder believes his side\u2019s lack of Grand Final experience will serve as a greater motivator than hindrance ahead of Saturday\u2019s decider.","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"coauthors":[38],"class_list":["post-1554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/rats-training-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1707&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pdqUu4-p4","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1554"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1554\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1554"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}