Lambton Jaffas get fresh legs for cup clash at Kotara South

Jaffas, the 2022 NPL grand final winners, travel to Nesbitt Park for the round five match in the knockout's Northern NSW preliminary stage. The winners play the survivors of next week's Charlestown v Edgeworth game.

Tuesday night's match is a David v Goliath battle given Kotara South are playing in the third tier of NNSW football - Zone Premier League, where they are third.

Coach Mark Mansfield said Kotara South have played Edgeworth, Broadmeadow and Jaffas before in the cup but they have never hosted a top-division side.

"It is just an opportunity for a few of the young boys to see what it's like, to test themselves and see what the gap is, but also it's a great opportunity for the club," Mansfield said.

"That's what's a bit special about it - a community club hosting one of the top dogs and we're just hoping a lot of our juniors get around it, have a look and see what local football is all about."

Mansfield said his squad consisted of several local juniors, experienced players Tom Tredinnick and Jim Bennis - the brother of Broadmeadow coach John - as well as former Jets academy defender Tao Grieves.

He said they would not be sitting back against Jaffas.

"I assume they will rest a few players, but they are still going to want to move on to the next round - they won't want to be the guys who have this sort of blip," he said.

"We've got nothing to lose. We'll play how we usually like to. We're not going to change or set up just to sit in, and we certainly won't park the bus. We'll do our thing and hopefully give it a good shake.

"We've got a good mix with some older heads who had some state league experience. There's Tao, who was at Edgeworth at the start of last year and came through the Jets. He'd be our most recent one from that league, but there's also some who could make the step up if they committed to the training."

Jaffas will be out to bounce back from a 3-2 loss to Olympic in the NPL on Saturday.

Midfielder Cox, who played at Adamstown last year, will provide fresh legs. He has trained the past two weeks with Jaffas after returning from Brisbane.

Riley McNaughton and Pat Bond are back from suspension, but Josh Piddington is in doubt again with illness after missing Saturday's loss.

Jaffas coach David Tanchevski believed it was a good performance against Olympic, given the players Jaffas had out.

With one eye on the clash with Maitland on Saturday in the NPL, he said a mix of first and reserve grade players would face the Tigers.

"They've done really well to get here and they are near the top of their division, and from what I hear, they have been playing quite well," Tanchevski said.

"It will be a grand final for them. It always is when you player a higher team, so we'll have to match their energy in the first half, then hopefully we can close the game out."

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