Why were the Hawks able to keep the feet all night and we were slipping over as if we were playing on an ice rink?
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Ok for what???
We wore moulded soles (short stops)ā¦ā¦ā¦they didnāt!
Hawks 17.9
Essendon 12.13
Recon the game was similar to last years rnd 1 Hawks were effcient and kicked accurately and we didnt
Threw everything but the kitchen sink
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If the players choose to wear moulded soles in those conditions, the coach needs to step in and tell them to change to the long stops. We are so dumb in aspects of the game which should be a no brainer.
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I think this is partly because their positioning was vastly superior to begin with.
Watching live I can barely remember a single instance where they didnāt have the ground setup extremely quickly whether attacking or defending.
We are not good enough to bit off ambitious 45 Deg kicks into the corridor repeatedly. I feel like we need to be more methodical and patient otherwise we just give the ball up and get rebounded on badly.
A few random thoughts on specific players:
Durham: was needed to lock down on Day and did that terrifically well. Missed a bit of his attacking intent as a result but heās a fantastic footballer
Caldwell: Beast. Hopefully he is our clear number 1 mid by seasonās end
BSD: Connection with mids not quite there (yet) but thought he destroyed Meek and can be useful up forward
Perkins: was filthy at his lack of impact at half time but he turned around well. Id starts to give him more mid minutes. Need to establish if heās more than a part-time contributor. Admittedly the half forward role is unforgiving in that respect
Reid: A step behind most of the night, but we must persist and get him to 30 off games so he can feel like he belongs
Redman: confused at the mid role. Play of HB and use it by foot. As per Perkins, Hobbs needs those mid minutes as a means of finding out if we have a player or not
Caddy: maybe it got lost on TV but for the supposed endurance beast he is he seemed to be anchored to the same spot alot. So impressive when heās on the move though. Needs to watch Nick Reiwoldt highlights on repeat for months
Overall I canāt say Iām too down about last night. Quite a bit to build on
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I like Caddy but fark me its going to take 3-4 years before he starts to clunk and kick goals on a regular basis
Iam not going to put myself through watching that again just to prove a point.
There was an incident on the wing where he just walked along as hawks players streamed past no body or effort at all.
I think GWS will get the Hawks they are not going to give them space where they can slice and dice like they did to us in the first qrt.
A lot of our behinds were rushed/crappy shots at goal anyway. Expected score still had us lose by 20. While we were competitive hawks were still the better side and had much better looks at goal than we did.
Do they even make them anymore or is it just a player uses what the sponsors give
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I need to watch the replay but someone posted that he played on Day and beat him. So thatd be the reason.
Someone else posted about our defenders being moose on roller skates. Redman is a moose on scates on a dry day and not suited to any of their 3 small forwards. Maybe Ginnivan but i think Ginnivan has kicked multiple on Redman before
Serious question:
Has any other Club been penalised for deliberately conceding a behind in the last 12 months (last night & the Geelong game last year), or is that just saved for Essendon?
I dont warch many other games to comment but Iām sure we copped a similar decision last year too.
Iād almost forgotten how histrionic blitz can be, I donāt know how some of you are functioning humans
Long stops vs short stops?
Itās the MCG in the middle of March coming off cricket season, not some suburban ā ā ā ā heap.
Iād be shocked if players ever changed their boots unless the conditions were extraordinary
I donāt think the pressure was there. Sure, in contested situation we were good but open up in general play and we let our players sneak off. Thatās not really pressure but discipline
Listen you pelicans, Mitchell has been at the club since 2019 working as an assistant for 3 years, coaching the VFL team in ā21, all the while conditioning players in how he wants them to play. It took his 6th year! (3 as senior coach) to improve the win/loss.
Hawthorn are flag favourites. Essendon fielded the youngest team of the round. They are a team in transition and the result was expected.
The most disappointing aspect of the game was the lack of leadership from some of the senior blokes, one of the main offenders being McGrath. And yes, McKay had a poor game but heās had NO preseason and heāll continue to be off the pace for a while yet.
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Good effort against a hot team but kicking and marking were pretty bad. The number of kicks overshooting the target was astounding. Shiel and McGrath just butchered the ball all night.
And again it looks like weāre relying on a pack mark out of the backline, then canāt decide where to kick next so bomb it to half forward. The few times we moved it quickly we looked quick and capable of scoring. Unfortunately the last kick going in was often overcooked or turned over.
Umpires were terrible and the injuries to key players is going to set us back a bit.