It wasn’t pretty, but Brunswick brought home the four points and some extra percentage with a comprehensive win over cellar-dwellers St Mary’s Salesian at Ferndale Park on Saturday.

At this stage of the season, any game against a team fighting to avoid relegation is marked as D for danger, and the Saints certainly had a dip early, but ultimately the NOBs owned the ball in this contest, although struggled to make the most of their dominance in front of goals.

To be fair, the conditions were not easy on the day, with a swirling wind making it difficult to hit targets by foot, and Brunswick never really adapted their game to the ground’s postage-stamp dimensions and to the extra Saints’ numbers behind the ball.

The home side began the best, with two of the first three goals of the game, but by quarter-time Brunswick had wrested back the momentum and, despite missing some easy set shots, had established a 10-point lead, with crumbing goals to Paul Scamporlino and Ben Wilson the highlight.

The less said about the second term the better. It was as much a defensive triumph, conceding only the solitary point, as an offensive nightmare, with 2.8, including seven straight behinds after Hayden Parker had an early goal assisted by a 50, before Gus Coverdale used his pace to snag one from the safety of a metre out.

Things got a bit better after halftime and Brunswick improved their accuracy in the third quarter, with majors to Jonny Haddad, Harris Mittar and a couple more to Scamporlino, but it was still a modest return for the totally dominant inside-50 count. In the final term, Tom Wilson and Haddad both added to their tallies, while Scamporlino topped off a very nice game with his fourth on the siren.

The defenders were the heroes on the day, restricting the home side to just the four goals and providing good run and carry. The midfield had bucket-loads of possessions, but struggled to connect with a forward line that was out-of-sorts in the conditions.

Best were Jackson Browne, whose form has continued to improve week-on-week, and the Lewises, McKenzie and White (and you could also include their defensive colleagues Jake Ralston and Taj Haddock). Archie Fulton-Grigg was tremendous in the ruck, while Josh Hedley and Liam Whelan were hard-at-it as usual. Scamporlino is loving life back in the ones, with seven goals in two weeks.

After a week’s rest, Brunswick are back at Gillon to face Bulleen Templestowe as they seek to consolidate a top-two spot in the run home.