North played their best footy of the season. Large periods of control that we couldn’t pressure because they slowed the game down.
We won’t have it all our own way.
Today, the proof of change was rather than us getting nervous, frustrated and letting them hang around, we found a way to kill the game and cruise.
Happily take a similar result next weekend. And extend to 7 weeks unbeaten. That builds culture and momentum.
We only had to beat one team today, not a lot of them. We managed to beat the one we played…by 40 points.
Massive round for us again next week…
I felt it was a game taken as an opportunity to give some players bigger roles in the midfield/stoppage and rest others.
We got beaten in there but won convincingly and have made the side a little more battle ready.
Take it and move on to next challenge.
If you’re disappointed now regarding percentage then turn your attention to win/loss for a moment
Have watched til half time. Umps really did have a mare. Two times Goldstein was blocked out of the ruck contest, play on that led to goal
Hopefully we have gotten our scratchy win out of the way and can reset and prime ourselves for dreamtime, I hope Scott drills them on the need to be ruthless Vs the minnow and struggling clubs
Watching the game live today, there were many parallels with both recent games and the game against Port.
The common factor is Goldstein being taken apart in the centre ball ups by combative opposition ruckman. It stems from Goldstein wanting to wrestle them first before going for the tap out. His opponent doesn’t engage him in a wrestle but just shoves him away and taps it to whom he wants or takes it out of the ruck and kicks it forward. That’s why we were down 0-5 centre clearances in Q1 and -11 for all clearances at half time.
After half time, Goldstein wither got told - or finally realise to jump and tap/punch the ball. The game changed in Q3 partly because of this. And we went +2 in centre clearances after half time. We halved clearances overall after HT.
The other major factor was our poor contested ball work - both in the stoppage and general ground ball gets. We were -5 in contested possession (cp) at half time. Our 3rd quarter was epic and went +24 in cp in Q3 with the result evident on the score board. We would win cp by a further +5 in Q4 but used it horribly going forward too often. Also, not having Jones was an issue because he was giving contests and we lost that - Shiel, as a sub, was very poor and barely touched the ball in Q4 despite the game being over.
Just think, against the winless, bottom side we got spanked in clearances and cp in the first half time. That is utterly pathetic but Goldstein is a major contributor to the problem as it starts with him in the ruck and he is being taken to the cleaners by younger, more energetic and more combative ruckmen who then lift their midfielders around them.
As we know and saw, the umpiring after half time was a disgrace and probably cost us at least 3 goals. In the end, Martin and Stringer we pleading/seriously questioning the umpires on decisions in front of our goal.
During Q2 Tsatas, who started the game well, went right out of the game. Given how much Durham was struggling, I would have swapped them - Tsatas is a natural inside mid and Durham started his career as a wingman. It was disappointing not see that switch. Tsatas played well after half time and ran the second most km’s on the ground (19.9 km, just behind Martin who ran 15.0). Tsatas clearly has the tank for AFL and his ground ball gets - especially one Q4 on on half forward line - is excellent. His disposal wasn’t too bad at all today. No better to worse than anyone else.
One switch that was made at half time was Martin to half forward (just like Anzac Day when that move was made at 3QT). That moved too played immediate dividends with a great crumb and pass to Guelfi for the opening Q3 goal.
Listening to Scott’s post match presser, it was clear that a virus had been through the club. Jones had had it and that was behind subbing him. Durham off was precautionary (could have come back on). Parish - unclear about next week (personally, I think he was rested to give Tsatas a run).
When you step and take some perspective, it was not as bad a 40 point win as we all thought when the siren sounded to end Q4:
We are outright second for a reason - we have played consistent, reasonable football all year except for about 2.5 quarters against Port Adelaide. Did we really look like a Top 4 team playing the bottom side today? No, we didn’t. But Port can thank some unbelievable umpiring (non dropping/throwing the ball decisions against) for just getting over the line against the Hawks today. Over in the west, as I type, the Eagles have led Melbourne all game and currently lead 48-37 late in Q2.
It’s a strange, even year with shocks a plenty. We are as much a chance as anyone to finish Top 4. We don’t have to be great, just consistently better than our opponents week in, week out like we have been for nearly the whole season thus far.
It was 
terrible spelling sure but our ability to allow I50 turn into scoring shots continues to be pretty shyte, and they bottled some easy chances in the way you would expect a bottom team to, and at 40% today is probs at the better end of our efforts
A 40 point win that takes us to 2nd on the ladder and people are still not happy.
We need to realise that we aren’t the team of 2000. Our wins aren’t going to be perfect. Enjoy the ones that do come our way, and yes, hopefully we are still improving.
Nick Bryan in the magoos: 40 hit-outs, 15 clearances, 2 goals, 25 disposals, 3 tackles.
i’m happy
Im not!
This was actually the most disappointing thing about the day for mine. A missed opportunity to just let him play parish’s midfield minutes, especially considering we were getting smashed out of the middle. 100% Should have been swung on ball
The only thing I think you’re summary fails to really highly is just how well we defended the ground, trapped them in our half, covered off switches, minimized out the back opportunities. More than any where else that’s where we won the game imo
I know people are in a hurry to get rids back and he should come in but I don’t think we should rushing to drop lav just yet. He’s brave in the air and rigorous in the contest and I think our backline needs a bit of that.
I think we could out hind (who was good today), play hepp and cox on the wing
Run with this back 6(1)
McGrath lav rids
Redman McKay Martin
(Kelly)
Pressure went up and we flogged them. Early on, pressure was putrid and wee looked like a bottom 5 rabble.
I agree with you about the refs, they were comical. But they were the difference between a 100 point win and a 70 point win. We were the balance.
Did you ask him if he had far to go?
Or if it was a Long walk?
We did defend the ground well generally but they had patches when the took the ball from deep in our forward to the other end and scored. Their first 3 score in Q4 happened this way.
North do like to possess the ball by foot and quickly short pass it around. Whilst our general around the ground defence was good (a lot of our sprints were devoted to shutting down space), North were their own worse enemy at times and turned the ball over needlessly. They possess the ball way too much for a team that is young and not so well skilled.
The non called throw when Curtis (?) Scooped it in their forward pocket in the 2nd qtr was jump the fence levels of anger inducing
