Round 19 Preview v East Fremantle

THE final Fremantle derby of the season is set to be another cracking contest this Saturday at Fremantle Oval with the Bulldogs looking to continue their best form of the season and the Sharks needing to win in order to stay alive in the finals race.

South Fremantle and East Fremantle have already met in two Fremantle derbies this season with the Sharks winning at Fremantle Oval in the ANZAC Day clash by 29 points before the Bulldogs turned that around in the Foundation Derby with a thumping 67-point victory.

This third clash of the season is again for the Uittenbroek-Ciccotosto Cup with the now annual contest taking place for the first time last season when South Fremantle scored an upset win over the eventual grand finalist East Fremantle.

South Fremantle might again be out of finals contention in 2013 but got off the bottom of the ladder last week with a terrific 39-point win over West Perth at Arena Joondalup.

Prior to that, the Bulldogs had played well in narrow losses to top-four teams Claremont and Perth as well and now return to Fremantle Oval this Saturday looking to maintain their best run of form so far in 2013.

East Fremantle, on the other hand, remains a chance to still play finals football in 2013 coming off making last year's grand final but the Sharks will have to win all of their remaining games to get there.

The Sharks have bounced back from a run of losing six of seven games to have now won their last two against Subiaco to improve to a 7-8 record on the season but they remain two games out of the four and won't be able to have a slip up in the run home.

South Fremantle's leading ball winner and goal kicker this season has been Port Adelaide recruit Mitch Banner and even though he's in his first season with the Bulldogs, he's picked up the Fremantle rivalry quickly and is looking forward to taking on the Sharks again.

"Coming from the Maggies we had a rivalry with Norwood and this Freo rivalry is pretty similarly because that goes back years and years, but the ferociousness of this derby over here takes it even to another level," Banner said.

"We beat them last time and it would be good to repeat that. They are going to come out firing no doubt and wouldn’t be happy we knocked them off last time, and we were probably in it against them the first game as well but just one quarter cost us.

"Hopefully we can put another four quarters together and come away with a win."

South Fremantle's only out at this stage is West Coast's Ashton Hams after being picked by the Eagles to take on the Western Bulldogs.

Hams was outstanding in the midfield last week in the win over West Perth with 35 possessions and also had 34 disposals and three goals back in the Foundation Derby win over the Sharks.

Reece Adams, Warrick Andreoli, Tyler Hall and Alex Grima are the South Fremantle players who have been showing form in the reserves that are putting their names up for a recall into the league side this week to take on the Sharks.

East Fremantle loses West Coast's Daniel Kerr to continued soreness in his knee following last week's convincing win over Subiaco with Jayden Schofield also out of the Sharks line-up to face the Bulldogs.

Another Eagle Brad Sheppard is set to return from injury for East Fremantle as are important defenders Steven Dodd and Brad Cooper.

Former Perth player Michael Edwards is a chance to make his East Fremantle debut after some good form in the reserves with Kurt Tropiano a possibility to come in and provide the Sharks some more height around the ground or up forward.

By Chris Pike