Rd 3 vs Carlton : 2.3 to 0.2
Rd 7 vs Freo : 6.4 to 0.1
Rd 10 vs Rich : 2.3 to 0.3
3 goal less last quarters in games that were in the balance at 3/4 time.
Even in the Cats game, a 40 point 3/4 time lead whittled down to about 10 points before we got away with a 17 point win.
I know there has been short weeks and travel in amongst it all, and the returning players might still be finding their legs, but it is frustrating that we can’t run these games out in what I think are very winnable games.
I think it’s a concern that’s being addressed. We have a young team and a team with players that haven’t played for a year. You can’t expect the win condition of our team to run it out as most are <5 year players and the rest are barely match fit.
Never mind that. In most of our games that we’ve lost it’s because we’ve butchered the footy and end up chasing tail. If you’re charging out of your back 50 only to have turn on your heels and chase your/any opponent back into defense you’re gonna blow up a lot more/quicker than your opponent who’s been pumping it back inside 50 all game. It should come as no surprise that the games we’ve won we’ve ran out the contest much better. Add to that short breaks and the heavy workload after Anzac Day.
I remember someone here in the preseason saying that it was not a good sign that we kept fading and losing matches. I responded saying that it’s irrelevant as it’s just preseason.
Clearly I was wrong.
So they’re were fatigued halfway through the 1st quarter on Saturday night? It’s definitely a vicious cycle, the more fatigued you are the more likely you are execute simple skill errors, but we’re pretty adept at doing under no pressure or fatigue at times.
We’ve thrown away 3 very winnable games purely with the main reason being our skill error, or inability to adapt when the game wasn’t on our terms.
V Carlton - it took a whole half before we stopped letting them kick short all the way up the ground, while we insisted on trying fancy handballs and turning the ball over
V MEL - we kicked ourselves out of the game, and paid the price in the 3rd qtr
V Rich - we let the game be played on their terms we turned the ball over over and over, and the coach himself said we overused the ball. We were in the game all the way until the last 10mins.
Its disappointing. The over use of the ball is the most frustrating, especially when you have guys clear forward of centre and they look for a sideways handpass iso of a quicker entry into 50.
It contradicts the team selection of having 3 talls and 3 pressure forwards, when u refuse to get the ball into them.
They were “winnable” but it wasn’t like we were playing well in the first 3 quarters, we were lucky to be that close (Carlton and Richmond games). The geelong game was a worry but that’s was probably due to fatigue.