5 GOALS by Whispering Jack

April 14Apr 14

What were they thinking?

I mean by “they” the coaching panel and team selectors who chose the team to play against an opponent who, like Melbourne, had made a poor start to the season and who they appeared perfectly capable of beating in what was possibly the last chance to turn the season around.

It’s no secret that the Demons’ forward line is totally dysfunctional, having opened the season barely able to average sixty points per game which means there has been no semblance of any system from the team going forward into attack.

Nevertheless, on Saturday night at the Adelaide Oval in one of the Gather Round showcase games, Melbourne, with Max Gawn dominating the hit outs against a depleted Essendon ruck resulting from Nick Bryan’s early exit, finished just ahead in clearances won and found itself inside the 50 metre arc 51 times to 43. The end result was a final score that had the Bombers winning 15.6 (96) to 8.9 (57).

On balance, one could expect this to result in a two or three goal win, but in this case, it translated into a six and a half goal defeat because they only managed to convert eight times or 11.68% of their entries. The Bombers more than doubled that. On Thursday night at the same ground, the losing team Adelaide managed to score 100 points from almost the same number of times inside 50.

The message there is clear. The ball wasn’t delivered to the forwards in a manner that made it easy for them to score, they went into attack in a predictable manner and the forward line make up was totally unsuited for the task. It has become the dream of every AFL defensive line coach to play against the Demons because you can beat them the same way each week and this brings us to the point about team selection of forwards who managed to take only 8 marks inside the forward 50 arc (against 15 from their counterparts up forward).

When their season opened a month ago, Melbourne went into the first game on a wet day with four tall forwards - van Rooyen, Turner, Jefferson and Johnson. Only the former remained in the Round 5 selection and he has been completely out of form since those back spasms put him out in the first minute of the Fremantle practice match. Turner, who kicked five in a master class for Casey a fortnight ago, was given short shrift after one further try and 200cm Tom Fullarton, recruited as a ruckman/forward at the end of 2023, was overlooked after a bag of five in the curtain raiser against the Cats last week.

The message for me is that “they” have little time for tall players who can take a contested mark and have the ability to kick five goals in a match, albeit at a lesser level. At least the two of them were kicking goals - something which the team is struggling to do!

The game started with the plodding Demons giving an inaccurate Essendon a clear run to a two goal lead at the first break. The Demon mids were slow off the mark but starting to get their hands on the ball but the Bombers with captain Zach Merrett dominating on the ball (he finished with 38 disposals) found their mark and kicked four straight goals to take a 29 point lead into the Adelaide Oval rooms at the half. This was extended with Essendon kicking the first goal of the second half before a Melbourne revival that saw it turn the tide with four consecutive goals in a 15-minute burst when Bayley Fritsch scored twice and Kozzy Pickett added his second. Suddenly, they were within 11 points and it could so easily have been even closer had one or two chances been taken and one or two poor errors not been committed.

There’s no use labouring the point. There are a lot of things happening at the club, the coach is not doing well, the team is not switched on, it lacks direction from top to bottom and is bereft of confidence. In that way, the opportunity to comeback is lost and the opposition swoops on your mistakes.

This was in complete contrast to what was occurring across town at Norwood Oval where the Lions had earlier completed their comeback from 39 points to beat the Bulldogs by 21 points with their 200cm forward, Eric Hipwood instrumental in that comeback kicking five goals for the match.

MELBOURNE 1.4.10 2.5.17 7.7.49 8.9.57

ESSENDON 3.4.22 7.4.46 10.5.65 15.6.96

GOALS

MELBOURNE Fritsch Pickett 2 Langdon Petty Sharp Sparrow

ESSENDON Menzie 4 Caddy Hobbs 2 Duursma Gresham Jones Martin Perkins Redman Shiel

BEST

MELBOURNE Langdon Gawn Pickett Petracca Oliver Bowey

ESSENDON Merrett Martin Menzie Ridley Durham Shiel

INJURIES

MELBOURNE Nil

ESSENDON Nick Bryan (knee)

REPORTS