LOVE STORY

LOVE STORY by Whispering Jack

I have this application on my iPhone which supplies up-to-date scores of every AFL game being played at any particular time. When the game is over, the result is recorded for posterity so that the final score from the match played at Skilled Stadium on the last Saturday in the month of July 2011 will stand forever as the most shameful result in the 153 year history of the Melbourne Football Club*.

There is little more that needs to be written or said about the game. There might well be reasons behind the train wreck to explain or excuse the performance of particular individuals within the group. For example, Brent Moloney was ill and should not have played. There may well have been others but it matters little because, apart from the lone effort of Jordie McKenzie (25 disposals including 16 contested possessions and 8 tackles) the team was hopelessly shamed. And if it was a player protest against Cameron Schwab as is being suggested in some quarters then it is a matter of complete and utter disgrace.

What's more, this was not a single, isolated instance of ineptitude on the part of the team but rather, it forms part of a pattern that has been evident since as early as February when Melbourne was unceremoniously bundled out of the NAB Cup by Essendon. This team is capable of winning against the weak but it also meekly capitulates at the slightest sign of pressure from the strong. What does this tell you about their character and about the ability of those appointed to prepare them for the hard slog of an elite sporting competition?

Coach Dean Bailey has quite rightly accepted responsibility for the day's debacle. At the after match press conference, he described it as "an embarrassing day" with the potential ''to create a division or a fracture'' at the club.

''I stand here absolutely taking the whole responsibility for today, no question about that. The rest of the year it'll either be the making of us, or … we'll slowly disintegrate for the rest of the year. I'd like to think there's enough resolve within the group that this is as big a kick in the arse as you can get. We got kicked in the arse often today, we were embarrassing. We were embarrassing for the whole game. There probably aren't strong enough words to suggest how poor we were today.''

Bailey also conceded that ''a loss like today doesn't [bode] well for anyone who's in the last year of their contract'' and that while he wanted to continue as coach, the decision on that matter is with the club board.

''The board will make a decision that's in the best interests of the Melbourne Football Club, the decision will be what it is. There is no greyness in it, it's black and white.''

Earlier in the day, the morning papers told how the board was contemplating extending Bailey's contract by a year or even two. The Herald Sun carried a double page spread with the pros and cons of Bailey's three and three quarter years at the coaching helm at Melbourne.

I have heard it said by some that the players all "love the coach".

Really?

My experience tells me that if there's one thing that's true about professional team sports these days, it's that they only constitute a love story for supporters of and for their club.

Sportsmen get paid for their labour so it's more about professionalism and respect in the first instance rather than about "love". Love is often a factor in the equation but never what it's all about for the players. They have a job to do first.

On this day, the entire playing group assembled at Skilled Stadium (OK with one or two exceptions) showed no love over a period of six hours from the commencement of the VFL game at 10.40 am to the end of the AFL game at 4.40 pm. Nor did they show any respect for their club, their coach or their supporters, particularly those who went to the game and paid admission to the ground to suffer not "embarrassment" as Bailey called it, but "humiliation" which more properly describes the events of this dark day for all those who truly love the club.

However, there is no emotion involved in dual North Melbourne premiership player David King's telling analysis of why Bailey's game plan has been an abject failure against the competition's leading lights. This is what he said in the Herald Sun spread which appeared on the morning of the game.

"There are two answers to why their game plan doesn't work against good sides. Either the coaches haven't been able to implement what they want or it simply doesn't work.

"When I watch them, their set-up reminds me of an era gone by, similar to Geelong between 2007-2010, and a system that doesn't work against a properly implemented press.

"When the ball is in Melbourne's defensive end, their forwards roll right up the ground, which makes it very hard to score. I do believe the talent is there.

"So either that talent develops and allows them to play the way Dean wants them to, or the game plan is outdated. I think it might be the latter.''

If the game plan was outdated before the game, it is likely to soon become a part of history and, along with it, I fear will be the coach.

I do care for Dean Bailey but I care more for the Demons and, since I agree with him that the decision on his future now rests with the board, I trust that they will do the right thing and move quickly and decisively to stave off what will otherwise inevitably be a very ugly week for the Melbourne Football Club.

Melbourne 0.3.3 1.4.10 5.4.34 7.5.47

Geelong 8.3.51 20.4.124 28.8.176 37.11.233

Goals

Melbourne Dunn 2 Bate Howe Trengove Watts

Geelong Johnson 7 Hawkins Mooney 5 Hawkins 5 Duncan Stokes Varcoe 3, Bartel Corey West 2 Christensen Ling Mackie Ottens Selwood

Best

Melbourne McKenzie

Geelong Johnson Selwood Corey Enright Mooney Bartel Varcoe

Injuries

Melbourne Moloney (ill)

Geelong Taylor (hip)

Changes

Melbourne Nil

Geelong Nil

Reports

Melbourne Nil

Geelong Nil

Umpires H Ryan S Ryan Jeffery

Crowd 22,716 at Skilled Stadium

*History says there has only been one instance of a greater losing margin than that which was witnessed in this game - back in 1979 when Fitzroy disposed of an injury-depleted Melbourne side that was sitting close to the bottom of the ladder by 190 points but that was in a time where there was no such thing as today's sophisticated defensive strategies, zoning and presses.

One of our posters, Redleg, who was team manager at Melbourne under Carl Ditterich that year, will tell the story of how and why the Demons suffered that defeat, what it meant to the club at that time and how it rebounded the following week to beat the Bombers.