The Queen Elizabeth Oval and Golden Square’s Country Vet Oval will both host semi-finals on Saturday.

The semi-finals were meant to be played at the QEO last weekend, but the league was forced to postpone the games because of the torrential rain that fell across Bendigo overnight on Friday.

The change in scheduling means the senior second semi-final between Golden Square and Eaglehawk will now be played at the QEO this Saturday night, while the South Bendigo versus Maryborough first semi-final will be played at Golden Square on Saturday afternoon.

“The QEO is looking fantastic, and it’s the same at Golden Square, which was verti-drained yesterday,’’ BFNL chief executive officer Steven Oliver said yesterday.

“Obviously, we’re expecting a little bit of rain tomorrow, but we expect the grounds to be in superb condition for this weekend.’’

Oliver said the BFNL had looked at a number of options for an alternate finals venue to the QEO, before deciding on Golden Square to host the first semi-final.

“We’d been looking at alternatives for probably a week and a half, and we had taken a look at a number of other grounds,’’ Oliver said.

“Eaglehawk was no good, it was too chopped up, Kangaroo Flat was the same, Strathfieldsaye doesn’t have the infrastructure to cater for a final yet, Maryborough was no good if we were going to hold an alternate night game, and Castlemaine on Saturday probably had two feet of water on the creek side of the ground.

“Also, by holding the two games this Saturday we’ve split some clubs up, so it’s not like a Saturday-Sunday finals structure where your off-field staff can go to both games.

“So what we looked at was to play at a venue that could obviously give us some shelter in case the weather isn’t great, which Golden Square can.

“Also, we didn’t want some of these clubs that have to split their personnel having to travel 30 minutes to Castlemaine or 45 minutes to Marybororough.