PAKENHAM had to fight hard at the Perc Allison Oval before overpowering neighbours Beaconsfield in the second half and cruising to an easy 70-point victory to retain the Highway Cup on Saturday.

The Lions booted with a four-goal wind in the opening term and made the most of it in the first 10 minutes, booting four goals before the Eagles steadied to reply with three of their own.

The game opened up and both sides traded goals with the visitors leading by 12 points at the first change.

It was more of the same in the second term and Beaconsfield coach Robbie Taylor led from the front in his last game at the helm, along with champion ruckman Chris Kelf and rugged midfielder Lachlan Oakley.

Their efforts were mirrored by Lions Clint Walker, Nathan Brown, Cory Lenders and Jake Matthews and at half-time the match was evenly poised with the visitors leading by nine points.

The momentum changed dramatically after the long break however, and Pakenham showed the Eagles why it is one of the top premiership fancies by producing two dominant quarters of football.

The Lions attack looked dangerous and with Matthews, Sean Gramc, Daniel Fry and goalsneak Dom Paynter all on target, the Eagle defenders did not know which avenue of attack would be next.

Pakenham booted nine goals with the wind in the third term and then finished the match off strongly to snare another six against it in the final stanza.

From limited opportunities youngster Cley Bertoncello was the Eagles best forward with four majors and significantly a proppy-looking Andrew Williams was kept goalless on the day.

While it was not the ideal send-off for Taylor, he was still among the best on the day and opposing coach Michael Holland paid tribute to him afterwards.

“Robbie’s been an out and out champion on and off field and you wouldn’t find a better bloke in football either. He’s got a lot of respect at Pakenham,” he said.

“Beaconsfield probably should have been in front at half-time. We opened them up a little bit after that and it was good that so many players had an impact on the game.

“I was pretty happy with the way we finished off. Having a good spread of goalkickers was also a big plus.”

Taylor said he would look back on his stellar career over summer, but had only been focussed on Saturday’s game.

“Look, it hasn’t really sunk in yet and all my focus was on us playing as well as we could against Pakenham,” he said.

“It’s been a disappointing season as far as results go on field, but we probably weren’t ready to make finals in hindsight and that’s the way it ended up.”

He added that he would likely remain involved with the club in some capacity next season, but it was still very unlikely that he would play, despite speculation suggesting he would.