Can’t believe I have to start the review thread, but such is the year we had.
It was a strange game but we managed to be good for 3 quarters, not just one.
Q1 was bizarre - we made all the early play just to not take our chances or simple turnovers and Swans made us pay, big time with ballistic ball movement that simply exposes Reid and Langford time and again as Solomon continued to pointedly not play a spare behind the ball which I thought we needed from the start. It didn’t help after Vigo’s great start against Grundy that Bryan cam on and was, I thought deplorable in Q1. thankfully, he improved significantly after quarter time.
Vigo stayed good and was, at times exceptional - against Grundy who he troubled with his lead, especially in the centre bounce. Vigo’s game was that good live it was no surprise to him with a higher player rating than Grundy - that how good he was. If not rucking well, he was linking up, then he was nailing Warner and Papley in crunching tackles, then he was literally picking up half volleys off the ground cleanly and dishing off handballs or then he was playing a deep forward role and hauling a superb mark in between multiple Swan players and coolly kicking his first goal. It was very noticeable how limited a player Bryan is compared to Vigo. I would expect both to play next week as Bryan did get better as the game wore on.
The big change in Q2 was that, finally, Solomon put a spare behind the ball and the Swans hesitated sweeping the ball forward which is invited pressure further up the ground. Jones played mainly half back (spelling Reid/Langford occasionally on a tall) and typically lined up on Jake Lloyd after quarter time. When Lloyd pushed up the ground for stoppages, Jones stayed back and typically took either Langford or Redman’s man allowing either of those to play spare, about 15m behind the last pair of players. This totally changed the complexion of the game. It became an arm-wrestle but Sydney dug in and ground out 2 goals later in Q3 after we got to within 11 points, which was an incredible come back. They would ease away but with nothing like ease they had in Q1 kicking 9 goals. Again, we had chances to score but didn’t take them from mid Q3 onwards which is why we didn’t closer than 11 points - I am talking about Clarke, Kako and Caddy in particular.
Setterfield was superb in the midfield as was Prior on the wing who easily played the best game I have seen him play. Sharp was again as McGrath (mainly on Papley) as Redman and Langford. It was good to see our senior players play reasonably well (Merrett started well but faded). Special mention to Reid who looked demoralised in Q1 to starting to look solid in Q2 to totally owning Curnow in Q3 and looking the Top 10 pick he is.
We outran them (more kms and sprints and out-tackled them (+15). We just didn’t have their skill level and that was the biggest difference between the two sides all night. They really punished our turnovers but we weren’t able to punish theirs.
Roberts went back to kicking rubbish tonight - from the start of the game to the very end. And often under zero pressure until he hesitated so much he had to kick it. He was very frustrating to watch.