layzie

A guy in one of my messenger chats said "The only thing worse than the umpiring today has been Melbourne's effort" People need to get a grip sometimes and stop looking for the perfectly umpired game, control the controllables.

That's right, it's made an already fundamentally flawed fixture ever more flawed. I was also shocked that they didn't Glenelg as a venue, that's a great footy ground. If doing it for the community and boosting the economy was really the true motive for Gather Round then they missed a big opportunity.

Did Sestan play? Must have gone missing if he did?

I did the same, really wanted to let it sit for a bit and get some clarity. You have not only hit the nail on the head but built a house with the remaining nails. That Brisbane game was the definition of a one-off as we will never be monstered like that in contested ball. This game however took things to a new level. I’m a realistic football fan, I don’t yell ‘pick the ball up’ at games and then get really annoyed at players when they don’t. It’s a two team sport after all but what I can’t cop is having our fortress attacked and destroyed at our most strongest points. To be 35 – 7 in the possession count 5 mins in was very telling, to be smashed in centre clearances early was also telling, but the icing on the cake was to concede 15 marks inside defensive 50 mostly directly in front. That is the point you throw your hands up and say “well, they got us”. Lever out definitely hurt of course as he’s so often the guy coming over the top and killing the contest but come on, we should have had enough to deal with their talls. We really missed Gawn’s ability to drop back and influence as well and this is where I look squarely at Brodie Grundy and say “Mate, you may be getting beat in the ruck right now but you can still influence the game in other ways." Get on your bike and push back hard to try and get a spoil, a physical body on a Bombers forward, something, anything! It was so obvious we were getting outmarked 1 v 1 in that backline, we really needed some help. To be fair no Hibbo and a wounded Petty didn’t help either as they can cut across and do this but we just needed the big man getting back more. I said this earlier but when the ball was in the air and the pack formed, we seemed to setup with someone front and square and a couple on either side ready to takeway and move the ball quickly forward. Rarely we had someone to the back of the contest and the number of times Essendon got a long kick out of the 50 up to the wing or centre it would come off hands to the back and perfectly placed for a Bomber to take it then scrap kick it into 50 where we got outmarked all the time. I found this happened in the Brisbane game for nearly every first quarter goal. I don’t know if it’s just coincidence but I’ve said before there are things about our defensive approach and what got us here that I don’t want to lose completely. Which kind of leads me into the next point. The Bombers played with such speed and dare in the first half, the game was not really played in close at all and there were very few stoppages. It’s time like this where I’d like to slow the game down a bit, force stoppages and let our contested bulls get to work. The rain could have really helped us get back into it, as the 2nd half started I thought that maybe Essendon could struggle because they won’t be able to get as much speed on it and it will be harder to bomb in long to their tall timber. If we could just get that first goal of the second half we may well be able to scrap back into it and get it on our terms. No, we simply weren’t up for the challenge. EFC came out and went bang, bang, bang with 3 straight and the game was dead. Forget what happened previously, this was the most disappointing moment of the game for me. After this there was this feeling of cue in the rack with 15 mins left in the 3rd quarter? I was seeing JVR down back, Fritsch up the ground, the kind of moves you see when we’re 50 points down. We turned our heels up. It’s such a cliché in AFL footy to say another team wanted it more but this is exactly what happened. We started off looking a bit cruisey and casual, trying some fancy stuff and not always thinking team first while Essendon player were cracking in 110% efforts, tackling to hurt and always providing an option for a handball. In a lot of ways we were beaten at our own game and anyone still saying Essendon will do nothing this year you may be right but don’t be surprised if this is a platform for them to build on this year. For Melbourne this sets us back a little, while nothing fatal we had some weaknesses laid bare and there to be exploited. We were outcoached and their selections paid off big time. It’s extremely unsettling to see this lack of effort in Round 5, we saw the response after Brisbane but the one thing you want each week is effort and I hope this isn’t going to be a team that thinks they can flick the switch and get the job done as opposed to consistent intensity. Long way to go but it’s a more level playing field than we think sometimes. We don’t have a divine right to beat a team on a given day and if you’re 5% off you likely get done. Bit nervy for the ANZAC eve game now as we run into a Richmond side with two losses on the bounce and something to prove. Would have been much nicer to go into it off a win but that’s the way it is.

Brilliant question. As a coach, how do you get your team wanting it more than the opposition every single week? It has to be one of the toughest parts of the gig to consistently say all the right things and hope your players don't get ahead of themselves. It's easy to say that players should be giving 110% every single week but we're all human and have blips here and there. How do you coach for this?

We did, even paper clips annoyed us.

Doesn't get much worse.

It's like when people have bad memory retension. Demonstone out!

How many Vics were there again?

I knew this question would tick people off!

Could this be a Grand Final preview?

GG

Grandstand finish

What a win for the GWS Suns!

GG

What the

I thought the idea of Gather round was not to have games at the same time and stand on their own.

This game stinks

Enrichment

Would have liked to see WA get a go as well

Wow, what the hell is the AFL doing? Pretty obviously nothing. Growing the game in other states? AFL says meh

Never a dull moment

It's over

Yeah right an elephant ran through your front yard.