THE battle for the last spot in the Loddon Valley Football League finals series will come down to this Saturday’s clash between Mitiamo and Bears Lagoon-Serpentine.With the Superoos losing to Calivil United on Saturday and the Bears defeating Newbridge in a thriller, the two sides are locked on 28 points apiece ahead of their round 18 meeting at Mitiamo.The scenario is simple. The winner will play finals, while the season will be over for the loser.The Bears – who haven’t played finals since 2006 – clung on to defeat Newbridge by four points in their game at Serpentine.The Bears were again plagued by poor kicking as they won 14.22 (106) to 16.6 (102).That’s now 11 times in 15 games this season the Bears have kicked more behinds than goals.The game was tight all day, with the biggest margin at each of the breaks the 15 points the Bears led by at half-time.The Bears had 14 more scoring shots than Newbridge, but their inaccuracy kept the Maroons in the game.“Poor kicking allows the opposition to stay in the hunt,” Bears coach Damien Featherby said.“It’s like cricket, where catches win matches. In footy, goals win matches, and if you don’t kick them then you make it hard for yourself.“All we wanted to do at the start of the game was just win it to still give us that chance at the finals.“We got the win we were after and we’ll work on tidying up a few things during the week before this game against Mitiamo, which is a great challenge for us.”Better players for the Bears in their win were midifelders Rohan Nolan (two goals), rover Thomas Cartledge (two goals) and centre half-back Andrew Gladman.Saturday was the second thriller in a row the Bears have played in, after they lost to Pyramid Hill by two points the previous week.Those to play well for the Maroons – who have now lost five in a row – were Tyson Holt, Chris Belz and David Ryan.“With the injuries we’ve got at the moment, we’ve got 13 blokes who played in the seniors today who have qualified for finals in the reserves,” Newbridge coach Phil Birchmore said.“The boys played really well today, and something we’ve been focusing on is to finish the year off really well and represent the jumper.“We couldn’t have played any better, but we just made mistakes at the crucial times.”? Inglewood broke through for its first win of the season when it came from behind at three quarter-time to defeat Marong by 11 points.The Blues won 13.8 (86) to 11.9 (75) at Inglewood to win their first game since defeating Bears Lagoon-Serpentine by 127 points in round 17 last year.“It was a great result for the club,” Inglewood coach Stuart Balnaves said.“We’ve had our fair share of injuries and we’ve often needed to have guys double up in the reserves and seniors to get us through.“Today, we had no players who doubled up, so that certainly helped us.”In what was their last game of the season, the Panthers raced to a 25-point lead at the first change, and by three quarter-time were still 14 points in front.Going into Saturday’s game the Blues had won just two of their 14 last quarters.But they steamrolled the Panthers in the last term, piling on 6.3 to 2.2 to end their 15-game losing streak.“Each week we seem to be consistent for a half or three quarters and then get blown out of the water,” Balnaves said.“So for the boys to dig deep and work really hard in that last quarter was a credit to them, because they could have easily chucked the towel in.“We got level with Marong in that last quarter, and they then kicked a couple of goals and looked like they may have broken our spirit.“But we hung in there and came back at them, so it was a really good effort.”The standouts in the Blues’ victory were Jason Connally, who played a mix of half-forward and half-back, hard-at-it midfielder Kris Doran and mid-season recruit Tom Prime in his return from injury.Josh Houlden and Frank Towers kicked three goals each.The best for the Panthers, who end another disappointing season with eight-straight losses and just three wins, were Mark Gretgrix, Brett Rogers and captain Lee Franklin.The classy Bryan Vance kicked five of Marong’s 11 goals.Saturday wasn’t the first time Inglewood has ended a lengthy losing streak by beating Marong.Back in round four of the 2007 season, Inglewood famously defeated Marong by 32 points to end a 51-game losing streak.? In a preview of the qualifying final in two weeks, Pyramid Hill defeated YCW by 11 points at Backhaus Oval.In a low-scoring contest, the Bulldogs won 8.12 (60) to 7.7 (49).Pyramid Hill’s total of 60 was the lowest winning score in the LVFL this season.“We got into a position where we could have really buried them, but YCW is a good side and they stuck at it,” Pyramid Hill coach Leigh Davies said.“It was a very physical game with a lot of pressure put on by both sides.”Adam Pollock, Michael Bateman and Anthony Holdstock dominated for the Bulldogs, who had led by 24 points at the last change before they were outscored 3.3 to 1.2 in the final quarter.Devin Brown, Steve Turner and Ben Greene played well for the Eagles.YCW’s Kieran Atkin was the game’s leading goalscorer with three.? Calivil United defeated Mitiamo by 44 points, 19.15 (129) to 13.7 (85), at Calivil.The Demons had control of the game when they led by 28 points at half-time, before they added 10 goals to eight after the main break to improve their record to 9-6.Henry Miller, Evan Ritchie and veteran Lloyd Maxted were dominant for the Demons, while Glen Scholtes booted five goals.Forwards Alex Chapman (five) and Ryan Haythorpe (four) combined for nine goals for the Superoos to be their two best players.? LVFL finals venues: Qualifying final, August 20 – Serpentine.Elimination final, August 21 – Backhaus Oval.Second semi-final, August 27 – Mitiamo.First semi-final, August 28 – Bridgewater.Preliminary final, September 3 – Marong.Grand final, September 10 – Calivil.