Why is it so?

[gsmith12 491]

Thx Smthy I was kind of referring to the smashing teams bit rather than the skinny win.

The Swans win was one of the few I remember like that.

Fair call jnrmac.

[gsmith12 491]

Then you missed my point. I was trying to say that we wouldn't match the overall tone of the round so far as we rarely seem to do it. You brought up a game from 2 months ago. I don't know where else to go with it.

Fair enough, now that it's over, did we match the tone of the round ?

[old dee 23,788]

Fair enough, now that it's over, did we match the tone of the round ?

Yes we lost as usual

[Wiseblood 24,637]

Fair enough, now that it's over, did we match the tone of the round ?

Yes we did Cpt. Obvious.

[hulkhogan666 142]

We still had Jones, Vince, Cross, Dunn, Frawley, Grimes, Watts, McDonald, Trengrove, Howe, and Pedersen

Billings, Delaney, Dunstan and Templeton had never played an AFL game before and it was their first year in the system (compared to Tyson's 3 years and Michie's 4, injuries noted but they are still 3-4 years older)

I get what you mean, and to be fair we also had Garland and Hogan out, but I think people need to have some perspective when talking about St Kilda's list; they still beat us when seriously undermanned with very little experience.

Nah fully agreed, they deserved it. TMac went down with injury that's when Riewoldt turned it up, and it hurts when we kick 6 goals 15 behinds. It was ours for the taking but with due respect they took it.

[gsmith12 491]

Yes we did Cpt. Obvious.

Nice of you to recognise the fact Cpt. Negative.

[Wiseblood 24,637]

Nice of you to recognise the fact Cpt. Negative.

I think you'll find I've been far from negative about the game. I just don't have time for childish posters who pull the "I told you so" stuff.

[gsmith12 491]

I think you'll find I've been far from negative about the game. I just don't have time for childish posters who pull the "I told you so" stuff.

Get over it petal.

[Wiseblood 24,637]

Get over it petal.

I'm not the one who brought it up.

[gsmith12 491]

I'm not the one who brought it up.

You are the one who made it personal.

[Pirlo 813]

Believe we beat Freo by 96 in 2011.

[gsmith12 491]

Carlton by 105 in 2004.

[picket fence 17,151]

For some reason I still remember the "From out of left field" win against the odds against Freo I think in Perth when Peter Vardy ( a most underrated player) had a HUGE GAME.

Pouring rain in the last 4 or 5 goals down at 3/4 time and got up to win SENSATIONAL game!

I think Neil Daniher was coach!??

[gsmith12 491]

For some reason I still remember the "From out of left field" win against the odds against Freo I think in Perth when Peter Vardy ( a most underrated player) had a HUGE GAME.

Pouring rain in the last 4 or 5 goals down at 3/4 time and got up to win SENSATIONAL game!

I think Neil Daniher was coach!??

Round 11, 2004 fence.

Scores at 3/4 qtr time Freo 9.8.62 Dees 7.8.50

After an inspired last quarter in the rain scores ended up Dees 13.15.93 Freo 9.8.62

Freo scoreless, Vardy kicked 4.

Wonderful comeback win.

[titan_uranus 25,016]

We still had Jones, Vince, Cross, Dunn, Frawley, Grimes, Watts, McDonald, Trengrove, Howe, and Pedersen

Billings, Delaney, Dunstan and Templeton had never played an AFL game before and it was their first year in the system (compared to Tyson's 3 years and Michie's 4, injuries noted but they are still 3-4 years older)

I get what you mean, and to be fair we also had Garland and Hogan out, but I think people need to have some perspective when talking about St Kilda's list; they still beat us when seriously undermanned with very little experience.

Agreed.

For mine, the close losses to the Dogs, Port and Gold Coast have all been tough, but the hardest game for me to stomach is the St Kilda game. They were missing so many key players, coming off an abysmal pre-season (vs ours which actually for once involved a win) and we had more experience.

McDonald gets injured (meaning no one can stop Riewoldt), Fitzpatrick gets concussed (ruining our sub), Howe is forced to play on a corked leg, so we're decimated in one of the years few truly winnable games. Despite all that, we generate 9 more inside 50s and 3 more scoring shots (from our 60 more disposals), yet we blow it in front of goal to kick 6.15 and lose. To a side that then wins again the next week in very similar circumstances, and proceeds to lose 13 of its next 14 games and run up a percentage under 60% (with its better players back).

Next year I want to beat St Kilda more than anyone.

[La Dee-vina Comedia 16,754]

Personally, I've found that every win in the last 2.5 seasons has been unexpected.

[robbiefrom13 887]

Yesterday's result [st Kilda winning] certainly came out of nowhere. We smashed a couple of sides in 2010 when we were semi decent. But as for all the other years when we have been terrible, I can't remember us coming out and unexpectedly pummelling anyone.

Over the past few years we have not been particularly uneven (think Kangaroos this year for "uneven"), but rather, just no good. Poor recruiting, development, coaching, training facilities, toxic club politics, an awful run of major health disasters - it has all added up to us not being much good. So, our lack of huge wins is not evidence of any lack of character, or killer instinct, or whatever - we just aren't likely to get on top because we aren't yet good enough.

At the moment, it takes a team having a bad day for us to get on top. Like the Dockers just had against St Kilda - the Dockers' players went on holidays a day too soon, and it wasn't that much about St Kilda, whose experienced players simply carried out their roles and cashed in on the windfall.

Now we are getting closer to competence, and some non-destructive experience is going to be accumulating, we will probably win more of the achievable games next year. We already have some great signs, and individuals doing great things, and stronger defensive skills all over the ground (allowing for errors that are still part of our pattern, at this stage of skills development); but it's not enough all over the ground yet. But it is building. As positive experience builds, we will be able to do what St Kilda's experienced players did on Saturday. As we get better, we will have more to draw on - better skills and more confidence in those skills and in our team-mates, and a bigger number of players all over the field with more confidence and experience in doing it well and confidence in and knowledge of their team-mates - and we will be better able to exploit it when our opposition is not switched on; and eventually be better able to rattle the other team into falling apart.

As the team as a whole gets better, we will have more big runaway wins. Good teams have them. Other than that, such big wins are anomalies arising out of what the other team did wrong, or they are evidence of unevenness the result of some unaddressed weakness in the team (think us in 2010, or the Kangaroos this year).

It's exhausting listening to people endlessly bagging out our players for character defects, while ignoring the obvious reasons for poor outcomes. Ockham's razor! We don't crush teams, because we aren't good enough at the moment. But we are getting better.

Edited July 20, 2014 by robbiefrom13

[old dee 23,788]

Personally, I've found that every win in the last 2.5 seasons has been unexpected.

Love it LDC

Best comment for the day so far

[PJ_12345 1,098]

Agreed.

For mine, the close losses to the Dogs, Port and Gold Coast have all been tough, but the hardest game for me to stomach is the St Kilda game. They were missing so many key players, coming off an abysmal pre-season (vs ours which actually for once involved a win) and we had more experience.

McDonald gets injured (meaning no one can stop Riewoldt), Fitzpatrick gets concussed (ruining our sub), Howe is forced to play on a corked leg, so we're decimated in one of the years few truly winnable games. Despite all that, we generate 9 more inside 50s and 3 more scoring shots (from our 60 more disposals), yet we blow it in front of goal to kick 6.15 and lose. To a side that then wins again the next week in very similar circumstances, and proceeds to lose 13 of its next 14 games and run up a percentage under 60% (with its better players back).

Next year I want to beat St Kilda more than anyone.

Haha I couldn't agree anymore!

10 straight points... 10!

Watching Daniher kill it at Essendon made it even worse... would have loved to see Hogan in that game