That third quarter last night was possibly our best quarter for the year so far.
I was worried at half time after the Hurley goalsquare blunder that it may have caused them to come out and play conservatively and just try and save the game than rather take it on like has happened on so many other occasions with this team. My fears were gone straight from the outset thankfully.
Zerrett and Shiel stated to win the centre clearances consistently and were also clean with their delivery into the F50 with them. We basically swamped Hawthorn that whole quarter.
I thought that the forward line functioned quite well too and was particularly impressed with McKernanâs efforts in constantly fisting the ball to ground when he was caught behind a pack and giving our crumbers chances to score. Laverde did this too on a few occasions.
I thought that Laverdeâs attack on the ball was excellent all night along with a few crunchi g tackles. Apart from his jitters in front of goal that was one of his best all round games for the club imo. He is improving every week which is pleasing to see.
Saad and McKenna were outstanding last night and I thought that both guys were at the freewheeling and creative bests last night. Saadâs defensive work was sensational last night with a lot of his well timed spoils and that goal capped off an excellent night for him.
Another thing that impressed me was the way Darcy Parish worked his way into the game after a reasonably quiet first half and when wveryone around him were missing their set shots he cooly slotted his from a gettable but difficult angle. In fact I thought both his and McKernanâs set shot goals were vital to us gaining momentum and taking the game away from the Hawks.
Langfordâs game was a little underrated too I thought. His two goals were outstandind but his work around the ground was quite good too. He took a couple of clutch marks out on the wings when we were coming out of defense which were important and did some hard inside work to lock the ball in when required. Last night was also the first time that Iâve noticed that he has gained some serious size and thickness in his body and now looks strong.
That was one of our better four quarter efforts this season and the most pleasing aspect of our last two wins has been that both wins were driven mainly by our younger guys on the list.
Canât help but feel that things are slowly starting to click and that the consistency that we all crave for from this team is slowly about to begin.
I do remember that in the pre-season that Woosha did mention that he was all about priming the side for an assault on the comp in the back end of the year after the bye, hopefully his prediction is beginning to bear fruit now.
Donât get me wrong, I am enjoying it and will watch the game again but the result was expected.
Back it up with a quality win against a top side and I will start getting excited.
Pretty happy with names now regularly coming up now when talking about our best.
Reflects a very even team.
And with Hepp rating us still a 6, I think that is a good thing. SĂł much upsideâŚ
We need it to click and play much better footy, but when a few new names start doing the heavy lifting its reason I think to be excited to be an Essendon supporter.
When we are winning without a single midfielder needing to put in a massive game, or a key forward kick a bag or find it hard to pick our best defender. The future starts to look pretty bright.
Of course when one does, its glorious. And that I think will happen when we are good enough to hand some team a floggin.
I hope youâre right. Certainly winning last night was a good start. Six and six is much better than five and seven! Still it means weâve got to win at least six of our last ten, a fairly tall order. Weâll need to play much more like we did in the third quarter last night on a regular basis.
Go Bombers!
Saad will be our best and fairest. Dunno if he was this good at gc or not, but heâs got to be up there with one of the most underrated players in the league.
âFootys meant to be funâ⌠how about the players? Is being bruised all up and down your arm for no reason other than to be annoyed your definition of fun?
Can we not post Tom brownies stuff on blitz anymore? Itâs obvious he is a troll.
I want it so that that â â â â face Tom Browne isnât even allowed into the doors of a club and woosha just refused his stupid questions post match
Can someone explain the difference between the blocking free kick Hurley was pinged for late in the Freo game where he took his eyes off the ball briefly and touched the freo player and the one with Sicily and Guelfi on the half time siren where Sicilyâs not looking at the ball and just pushes Guelfi out the way.
