The contrasting finish to the last 2 seasons are remarkable in that 2017 left a bitter taste with the EFC a long way off footy credibility even though the year was so much fun, fall of highlights. It seemed they lacked an identity. What did the team stand for? Fast forward 12 months and supporters have their answer …
They’re tough in the clinches.
They’re resilient. Even if they’re not playing well and the opposition seem to have control, Essendon find a way to get back into the contest (they failed to win the close ones - Pies, Hawks, Tiges - but they were close and with a bit of luck … !)
They’re fast, both in leg speed and more importantly, reaction times. Those multiple bullet hand passes in tight are brilliant.
They have a good system of play that will hold up in the big games/finals.
What’s most pleasing - the players have genuine belief in what they’re doing. As opposed to last year, the team has an identity (something of substance they can hang their hat on) and they’ve brought into what the coach wants them to do. 10 of the last 14 with some big scalps says they’re doing something right. Yes, there’s been progress this year. Lots to look forward to … providing of course they don’t rest on their laurels and think they’ll start where they left off. Lots more work needed to get that consistency they desperately need.
Yeh nice 12 weeks or so once the season was shot, but seriously if we don’t hit JLT 1 next year with the same energy, and effort then good help Worsfold. There is absolutely no excuse in the world for this team not to hit the ground running next season and make a legitimate challenge. If you ask me the pressure on club, player, and coach in 2019 is going to be huge, put in another season like this things will get very very ugly.
One of the great coaching positives over the second half of the season was managing to kick winning scores with who they had at their disposal.
Started the year centred around JD, lost him and then structured around Smack and lost him and then had on occasion Brown and String to kick to. The absolute class in Fanta was in an out and showed when he played how much better we were. I reckon they did as well as could be expected.
The Cantong loss was a burn everything down and start again debacle. Especially after the preceding rubbish football and the Daniher mismanagement.
Year is 100% a fail. But we did manage to salvage a few positives from the last 3 months, so not the catastrophic failure it looked to be earlier on. Still a fail.
If Daniher isn’t fully fit we won’t do much next year. The only quality, genuine chf on the list.
Stringer is not kpf size.
Stewart lol.
Mitch Brown tries hard but plays like a tall lead up flanker.
All our kicks into the F50 that are swallowed by the loose man in defence go to Daniher instead.
Not having him and losing to Carlton made us improve as a team significantly I believe. I think the pain of that loss and our poor start causing us to miss the finals will steel us fo next year.
I think our depth will be better than most teams in 2019 and our group will become scary to play as it matures.
I think our consistency of effort across the whole team has really improved and if we can play good dynamic team football with the added x factor of JD, Raz, Walla, Stringer, Zerrett, Francis, Smith, Saad, McKenna, McGrath and Co…
I think the irony is that the more clapper you are about 2019 the more gloomer (see realist) you have to be about 2018. By any measure this year cannot be seen as a success, we didn’t achieve our stated aims & we stagnated in terms of outcomes. Now that doesn’t mean the entire season is a negative - there have been very definable positives to come from the season but that doesn’t erase the negatives that ultimately were equally responsible for where we ended up. You can’t bank on what you hope will happen next year when reviewing this year.
There’s very good reason to believe we can be better next year but there are also just as many possibilities that see us regress. Most believed StKilda were poised for a better 2018 after 11 wins in 2017 including smashing Richmond. Nobody outside the Holden Ctr gave Collingwood a hope of top 4 in 2018 yet look at where they are. I personally believe our list is capable of finals at a minimum next year but all the factors that cost us this year are still capable of derailing another season. Will losing Goddard hurt more than we know, will Hooker & Hurley start to show signs of decline, will JD get back to where he was or will we have more injuries to key players?
The biggest positive this year I believe has been finding better overall depth in the side. We didn’t really have the few standout stars like in the past but we had lots of cameo games, glimpses of what might be & some real development from guys like Parish, Langford plus glimpses of Ridley, Francis late & the cherry on top was Laverde last night. Smith set a new standard at the club for workrate & I believe he is the type of leader who can spread that culture through the group. McGrath was really up & down & I don’t see him playing wing long term but still enough talent there to work with.
The biggest negative for mine has been the coaching. Obviously whatever was happened in the box earlier in the year was toxic & should have been identified earlier before it cost us the season. Having said that, even though the motivation & cohesion of the group improved dramatically after Neeld left there were still signs that we were lacking direction & tactical nous on matchdays. I believe our midfield structure & coaching was the best its been for a long time & I’ve assumed thats Skippy’s work. Our forward line has suffered the most from injuries but I still believe its overall worked well. Our backline is where I believe our biggest weaknesses have been in terms of structure & style. I really wanted to see some positive signs of a tighter defensive structure where we don’t continually concede 1 on 1’s to their best forwards or even worse the trend of resting mids waltzing forward for easy goals. The kickouts continue to show no sign of meaningful planning or variety. The appointment of Rutten indicates that we are addressing the area so that is a reason for optimism.
The Hurley regression is real (as you mentioned).
I have doubts he is capable of returning to AA form again.
As a team, that’s OK.
He can just be 1 of 6/7 contributors in our defensive team.
What concerns me, is that he has 3 years remaining at quite big coin (800k-ish).
Ultimately, our hands are tied as we really owe these guys for the obvious reasons, and us instigating a trade is not a stance that good clubs with strong cultures would explore.
My fear is that in the coming years, we are paying a 400-450k player 800k.
I think it might cost us a player like McKernan or Laverde at some point.
A year that promised so much, delivered the proverbial mixed bag. There’s no doubt in my mind we should be playing finals, but we couldn’t get our shitt together early enough. I went to a sportsman’s night in February where sheeds was one of the speakers, he said back then that we weren’t a top 8 side yet. He cited the loss of experience around the club of Stanton, Jobe, Kelly, Hocking, Howlett etc (approx 1200 matches) and the recruitment of SSS as all having played around 100 matches but zero together & with our existing group. He also said that we’d be better in the back half of the year than the first half. How prophetic in hindsight.
I see the positives from the year being:
12 wins despite missing Daniher, Fantasia, Gleeson for large chunks of the season.
tightening of the defensive side of our game. We conceded almost 200 less points than 2017 and increased our pressure around the ball.
Improvement of Parish, Langford, Francis, McKernan, Merrett, McGrath, Saad, Stringer & Redman to name a few. They’ll all be better again next year.
Winning 5 of 6 interstate trips for the season.
Finding our identity as a team and setting a standard of play that will compete with the best on any given day.
Negatives:
Our ability to beat the teams we should. The losses to Freo, Dogs, Melbourne (who were going badly at the time) and Carlton. This must improve if we’re to take the next step.
Our inability to hammer home an advantage when we have a team by the throat. The second Freo game stands out. The first Port game, we were 40pts up in third yet only won by 22.
Point kick ins. Say no more.
Our inability to cope with a spare man in defence.
We really need to clean these things up next year to take the next step. Add in a fit Daniher, McKernan, Fantasia & Gleeson as well as possibly another traded in mid and we’re on our way if we can clean up those other areas. I think we have the makings of a strong team. We have more internal growth to come yet too IMO, the aforementioned in addition to Stringer (who’s just beginning to scratch the surface of what he’s capable of) and an injury free run at things from Laverde (yes, I still have hope for him). I’m more positive than negative about next year, we’re definitely trending upwards.
Hopefully Rutten adds something to the coaches box which seemed out of ideas at times this year.
Judging by the mood of the players last night, not a lot of gusto in the song, no real celebration afterwards, they realise how much work is ahead to get where they want to get to. I’m confident we can get there. Soon.
Media mantra at start of season- “Essendon will be a top 4 team this year”
Media mantra at the end of season- "Its been a failure for Essendon this year "
There are 17 teams that will fail this year.
I understand that the club had the goal to improve from last year and win a final. We didnt achieve that, but what we did acheive was immensly more important to sustainable future success. This year our improvement was fantastic and I dont care that we didnt make finals.
The next 10+ years are going to be amazing so sit back and enjoy
I’m happy to do that, to an extent.
Seems an odd request when some can’t separate 2018 from what they think will happen in 2019, though.
Maybe start a new thread?
Rate the last two thirds of the season?
Yes: approach every game with the same intensity as the second half of 2018; beat each of these sides - Richmond, Collingwood and Hawthorn in 2019 ; make sure we have a good percentage; finish top four; and, go deep into the finals.
No: playing unfit players; losing to bottom four teams;; and, no more Essington!
Let’s hope we can recruit a big name - Shiel perhaps - and get our best players on the park more often. Go Bombers in 2019!
I’m worried about that Anzac Day period of the year where if we lose the game before the Pies, then to the Pies, then to Melbourne we seem to limp into the bye week - no excuses though as the Pies seemingly deal with this with no fuss…
They were discussing Essendon’s season on Triple M just now. Barrett obviously dug the knife in and said we were a massive failure and in the same boat as Port and Adelaide.
Carey said we were are disappointment only because we aren’t playing finals. And in his opinion, we are a very good team and very good teams should be playing finals. Also thinks that if we managed to make the 8, we would have made it through to a couple of stages in the finals at least.
They asked them about what we need to improve for 2019. And Carey and BT said that midfield depth would be great (such as getting Shiel) but that we were pretty much already there. Both were salivating over Francis as well.
