ALL I KNOW by the Oracle

"I bruise you, you bruise me

We both bruise too easily ..."

[Art Garfunkel - All I Know]

We all bruise easily at certain moments in our lives. The dreadful and insulting controversy of last week about the way that a heavily undermanned Melbourne allegedly played "bruise fee" football started by some of Carlton's lesser lights and fueled by a sensationist media was more about perception than reality and had very little to do with the way Melbourne responded to the week's off field events.

Certainly, Melbourne did respond to its poor showing against Carlton by handing out a psychological bruising to the Bombers but it was more about the way in which the club approached the game, first in the selection and then in how it adopted and carried out its tactics and strategies than anything else. This game was about taking risks more than about the individual's fear of physical bruising.

Melbourne put the difficulties of the past weeks behind it with some boldness at the selection table. Players were omitted from the previous week because their form did not warrant selection. The start was the non selection of Lynden Dunn on return from suspension a fortnight earlier in the game against North Melbourne when he played poorly. It would have been easy to slip him back into the team but the selectors deemed there was a price to pay if players lack the necessary application.

The selectors also opted to send Matthew Bate, Addam Maric, Ricky Petterd and Matthew Warnock back to Casey as well.

With Aaron Davey out through injury and an ailing and homesick Austin Wonaeamirri back home on compassionate leave in the Tiwi Islands, the football department went for youth to lift the team by the bootstraps - two debutants and three others who first played in Round 1, 2010 came in making it the least experienced of all teams in the competition including the newly formed Gold Coast Suns.

With a team composed of so many players with less than 50 games experience and five with no more than two matches, the scene was set for a big win for an Essendon fighting for top four honours at the MCG.

And when you consider that the club was forced to remove Colin Sylvia from the game with a corked thigh and replace him with second game substitute Dan Nicholson midway through the second quarter, a Demon victory became even more unlikely.

The Demons certainly played a hard brand of football as was attested by them winning the contested possession count by 148 to 133 and by effecting far more tackles (77-51) on the night but it was a case of brain not brawn and skilful efficiency that tipped the scales in their favour.

The Demons were more attacking and it showed from the start when they opened up with the first two goals to Brad Green and and Sylvia. Soon after Jack Watts emphasised his growing stature in the game with a strong mark and a goal at the top of the goal square to give his team three of the first four goals of the match setting off alarm bells in the Essendon camp.

The Bombers responded taking the lead before the first break and extending it in the opening seconds of the next term but the Demons were persistent. They continually used handball to get themselves out of trouble (sometimes with the reverse effect) but the plugged away. A couple of magnificent Patrick Ryder goals was all that stood between Melbourne and the lead at half time.

The third quarter was a classic for the Demons. Slowly but surely the midfield took the ascendency and goals flowed as their use of the ball became more positive and the confidence of the group visibly grew. The dividend was six goals and change to a single point for the quarter. The Bombers had been mentally bruised.

There was always going to be a counterattack aided by some poor kicking for goal by Melbourne but this young side was not going to say die.

Despite the fact that the Bombers had 15 more inside 50s, the Demons emerged victors by 33 points, a testament to the strength of a defence led brilliantly by Jared Rivers, James Frawley and Joel Macdonald, the goalkicking of Brad Green and Liam Jurrah with four and three goals respectively, a winning ruck led by Stef Martin ably backed up by newcomer Max Gawn and a young/old midfield bolstered by the return of brilliant duo Tom Scully (whose 24 possessions were sublime after so many weeks out) and Jack Trengove (28 touches), the continuing rise of Jordan Gysberts (30 disposals and eight marks) and the hard tackling of Jordie McKenzie (28 possessions and countless tackles) in his third game back after missing the early part of the season.

Not to be forgotten was the role of Brent Moloney (28 disposals) who capped the game off with a ripping goal to the thunderous applause of the Demon faithful. Nathan Jones was also tough in the clinches and Neville Jetta and Jamie Bennell contributed to the run of the team. Jeremy Howe was promising on debut with some strong marking adding something around the ground that has been missing in recent weeks. His goal in the third quarter was a gem.

The Demons' week from hell restored some balance to the club's season and, while the team played a hard brand of football it handed out no more bruises to the opposition than were expected.

The matter of the "bruise free" allegations could play itself out later in the season but, for the moment, it has been laid to rest as yet another furphy on which the football media uses to peddle its wares for one given week of the season before it moves on to the next confected headline.

Meanwhile, the Demons are back on track thanks to an injection of youth. The journey continues and, in the short term, there will still be ups and downs.

That's all I know.

Melbourne 3.0.18 5.4.34 11.6.72 15.11.101

Essendon 3.2.20 6.5.41 6.6.42 10.8. 68

Goals

Melbourne

Green 4 Jurrah 3 Jetta Moloney 2 Howe Scully Sylvia Watts

Essendon

Ryder 2 Crameri Hardingham Hille Howlett Melksham Monfries Stanton Zaharakis

Best

Melbourne Gysberts Macdonald McKenzie Moloney Trengove Rivers Green

Essendon

Melksham Heppell Lonergan Howlett Stanton Hibberd

Injuries

Melbourne Sylvia (corked thigh)

Essendon Nil

Changes

Melbourne Nil

Essendon Nil

Reports

Melbourne Nil

Essendon Nil

Umpires Donlon Rosebury Mollison

Crowd 53,077 at the MCG

I've just watched the replay of this match.

In just over a year of football Melbourne will/no longer have:

Jurrah, Green, Moloney, Scully,

Questions/rumours over whether the following will be at the club:

Morton, Gysberts, Bennell, Martin, Evans, Jetta, Strauss

That's 11 players out of 22 that are gone or have question marks over their heads.

Just shows how far off the mark we were IMO.