Narrow defeat is hard to Bear

The result has Echuca 7-3 after 10 games, but with all three losses coming against top sides in the competition.

And Pearson thinks the top sides won’t change much from here.

‘‘I think what we have in the top six is pretty much how it’s going to remain until the end of the year,’’ she said.

‘‘All the sides at the top of the ladder are going to be around come the end of the season, it’s going to be a question of who has the best run home and is in the best form come the end of the year.

‘‘We are sitting at 7-3, we have a few tough games for the remainder of the year, so it’s up to us to have the best possible back half of the year we can and set ourselves up for the end of the season.’’

Echuca started the match strongly, but struggled to keep up with the Bears after rain set in on Deakin Reserve.

‘‘We played really well in the early stages of the match,’’ she said.

‘‘We were playing the game in the exact way we want to play. We were able to force errors and shoot really well in the early stages, but unfortunately we weren’t able to maintain the same way of playing after the rain set in.

‘‘Shepparton were able to get back on top of us as the game went on, and we weren’t able to break out of the pattern of going goal for goal through a lot of the match. They were able to get out to a six-goal lead during the final quarter, and we weren’t able to pull them back from there.’’

Echuca’s next contest will be against Mansfield on the road, with the second-from-bottom Eagles unlikely to prove too much trouble.