In a 65-point turnaround from last year’s grand final, the Mean Machine set up their 13.8 (86) to 8.7 (55) victory with a dominant first half in which they held the Demons to just one goal.

The Mean Machine, coming off the bye last week, led the Demons by 36 points at the main break, 7.5 to 1.5.

“Calivil brought a lot of pressure and the game felt a lot closer than what the scoreboard showed in the first half,” Bridgewater coach Dale Cameron said.

“Overall, it was a really good team effort. We just wanted to play our good standard of footy today and get the win.

“It was a very physical game that was scrappy, but the boys really grinded it out.”

Having been best known throughout his career at Bridgewater as a top-line backman, the Mean Machine’s Darren Clutton again proved how damaging he can be in attack.

Clutton followed up his seven goals in the Mean Machine’s previous game against Inglewood with a haul of six, and after four rounds is the competition’s leading goalkicker.

Down the other end veteran defender Daniel Nalder played a fine game, as did Joseph Mayes in the ruck and Jack Symons.

The better players for the Demons featured Jake Lawry, Sam Brinsmead and captain Chris Down, who was his usual tireless self in the ruck.

The Demons now have an extended opportunity to regroup from their sluggish start, with their next game not until May 26 against Maiden Gully YCW.

The Demons have their bye next week, followed by the inter-league bye on May 19 when Loddon Valley plays Golden Rivers at the QEO.

Maiden Gully YCW’s resurgence continued with its biggest win for four years.

Following the high of the previous week’s headline-grabbing win over Calivil United, it was back to earth with a thud for Inglewood as it copped an 88-point hiding from the Eagles, who won 21.21 (147) to 9.5 (59) at Maiden Gully.

The Eagles retained their position at the top of the ladder, and with their record now 4-0 – already one more win than last year – it’s their best start to a season since 1995.

The Blues picked up from where they left off last week with a positive opening term in which they led by 13 points at quarter-time, 4.2 to 1.7, against the wayward Eagles.

However, the final three quarters were dominated by the Eagles, who added 20 goals to five to notch their biggest win since 2014.

A spread of 11 Eagles’ goalkickers included Cohen Kekich and Luke Gray kicking four apiece.

Gray featured among the Eagles’ best, which also included Nick Waterson (two goals), who has been superb in his return to the club, Natnael McLaren and Matthew Higgs.

The Blues were best served by Bailey Evans and Jesse Coe. Sam Barnes kicked four of Inglewood’s nine goals.

Inglewood was two rotations down by half-time, with defender Levi De Pyle (knee) and Ben Smith (corkie) both off the ground.

“With a young group we’re going to be a little bit up-and-down in our performances, but we let them get some cheap goals, which I’m disappointed in,” Inglewood coach Ryan McNish said.

“We’ll work on that during the week to make sure that our effort and intensity is there for the full game because we were just very patchy today.

“I wouldn’t say we got ahead of ourselves… we started the game well, but in the second and third quarters we let ourselves down.

“Full credit to YCW, they were very sharp today and clearly outplayed us.”

Like Maiden Gully YCW, another of the teams that didn’t play finals last year – Pyramid Hill – also maintained an unblemished record.

The Bulldogs kept Mitiamo goalless in the final quarter to defeat the Superoos by 18 points, 11.7 (73) to 8.7 (55) at home.

Mitiamo had the momentum at the final change after the Superoos had turned a 17-point deficit at half-time into a six-point lead at three quarter-time.

But the Bulldogs regained the ascendancy in the final term with 4.2 to 0.2 to claim victory.

“Mitiamo got on top in the third quarter around the clearances and were running and carrying the footy well and put our back six under pressure,” Bulldogs co-coach Brad Fawcett said.

“We put it on the midfield at three quarter-time that we needed them to lift and they responded really well to change the momentum of the game.”

Pyramid Hill’s 16-year-old Edmund Caburnay had a senior debut to remember, slotting a goal with his first kick and finishing with four.

Another of the Bulldogs’ youngsters in Ben Dalton also played well, while tenacious onballer Billy Micevski and Andrew Dobby off half-back were both influential.

After a 2-0 start Mitiamo has now lost two games in a row – both after having been in front at three quarter-time.

The best players for the Superoos featured James Rozynski, Kyle Patten and ruckman Michael I’Anson.

Newbridge kicked away from Marong after half-time to win by 25 points.

The Maroons playing at home kept the Panthers winless with their 17.7 (109) to 13.6 (84) victory, having earlier been just five points up at half-time.

“The boys played some good footy in the second half,” Newbridge coach Brad Comer said.

“We lost our ruckman (Jayden Prior) to a head clash before half-time, so it was a really good character-building win for the boys after Marong threw a lot at us.

“Our midfield got on top after half-time… Tommy Horne did some super contested work and Will Daly did a good job on Jarrod Fitzpatrick.”

Newbridge’s Jordan Gilboy proved a handful inside forward 50 for the Panthers with a bag of seven goals to be the Maroons’ best player as they improved to 2-1.

Key on-ball recruit Tommy Horne was the standout player for the Maroons, while Comer was also pleased with the role of Chris McLean when moved onto Lachlan Frankel (two goals) and Sam Kennedy chipped in with four goals.

Jarrod Fitzpatrick slotted four goals for Marong and was named the best for the Panthers, who were also well served by Sam Harvey and Josh Griffin.