If last week was the equivalent of some really long and pointless Swedish movie that you can't quite understand, then this week had the potential to be a Cannibal Holocaust style violent slasher snuff film. In case you were hit on the head by a rogue Brent Grgic slice at Baytec Stadium and have just woken up from the resultant coma - Geelong are quite a good team these days, Grgic doesn't play for them anymore and nobody is quite sure what Kardinia Park is called this week. I'm not sure if the first two are connected.
We, however, are struggling. The green shoots of recovery are there somewhere but we're still a long way from seeing any real returns on our investments. Last week against Adelaide we were arguably half decent but let down by the complete absence of a forward structure for most of the game. The long awaited return of Russell Robertson addressed that issue somewhat, but the fact of the matter still remained that the worst team of the past two years was lining up against the best and a world class porking was on the cards.
Somehow despite the Cats racking up an all-time record for the most disposals in one game with two players on more than 40 possesions, and having 36 scoring shots it didn't happen this way. Whisper it quietly we were even winning at one point. Sure, it was for about two minutes at the end of the first quarter and it stirred the Cats into switching gear and putting us away but it was nice while it lasted. The freak who had a casual $500,000 on Geelong to win $25k surely wouldn't have been too concerned (after all you would have to have grapefruits the size of Peru to put a bet like that on in the first place) but he must have been wondering if Geelong could possibly find a way to throw the match. They couldn't.
Speaking of world records I'm not sure I've ever seen a quicker goal from the first - or indeed any - bounce that didn't involve a downfield free kick or a 50. For some reason Ablett, coming off about 4000 possesions in a month was allowed to stand all on his own in the centre. I'm sure everyone in the world could see what was going to happen next and lo and behold fate didn't disappoint. Straight into his hands, wandered to just outside 50 and slotted it in 9 seconds.
On the strength of that moment alone things looked like they were going to get really, really ugly but in reality after that we spent the next 25 minutes being better than we had any right to be while the Cats seemed to be suffering a major lack of interest. I can understand where they're coming from, having won 48 of the last 51 games including a couple of grand finals it must be difficult to get yourself motivated to be dragged into a slopfest against the worst team in the land. If we'd been able to kick straight we'd have made it even more interesting. The much welcome return of Robertson delivered a couple of nervous looking points but more importantly put somebody into our forward line who could go on a long lead and mark without tripping over and killing themselves.
Down the other end the Cats were going inside 50 without trouble, but a combination of excellent defensive work and poor kicking kept us from being totally destroyed. I'm going to say this every week but Frawley, Warnock, Martin and Rivers are starting to develop into a formidable unit. If we can keep them together in the future that's the springboard to build a decent team from. Even Rivers' luck must have swung around somewhat, the knock he got to the knee in Q3 would probably have ended up with him in hospital over the last few years but this time he was back within minutes taking grabs and filling gaps inside 50. The only blemish on his record was a sloppy shanked kick straight down Johnson's throat in the second.
Not surprisingly, as often happens a good team held to a points draw by a poor team in the first quarter realises what's going on during the quarter time break and come out to rectify the situation before half time. Suddenly they had free players everywhere and were putting more pressure on our players leading to turnovers left, right and centre and textbook rebound football on their behalf. Only Paul Johnson's late goal - and he was at least better than he has been recently - kept us within six goals at the long break and it seemed as if any remaining resistance was going to collapse in a screaming heap.
5 Geelong behinds and a goal to start the third quarter made it look like we were going to get bitchslapped, but Robbo's 2nd and 3rd goals - celebrated wildly despite the scoreboard - dragged it back to 30 points before they got a couple of late ones. We pulled off a couple of pieces of sublime linking football but time and time again we'd do the hard work and turn it over. At least they tried something different in the forward line by sending the Stefan Martin Experience up there for the first time. He gave off a couple of clever assists and looked lively but I'm hardly declaring him to be the future of goalscoring. Similarly Petterd was lively again without ever dominating.
The key fourth quarter highlight was Davey's flying smother in the centre. How good was that? I'm still convinced that we're lacking crumb, but I have to admit that he is dominating in his new role. Hawkins - aka the Geelong Newton - finally flounced his way to a goal to open the quarter but with Ablett off, Scarlett rested and most of their other players struggling to maintain interest we won the last. Incidentally Juice could make a fortune if he franchised his style of gameplay - Hawkins in Geelong, Gill in Adelaide. Could be big bucks in it for him.
Ironically we've now gone into games against Geelong twice in two years expecting to get massacred and come away with a creditable performance both times. Then when we were in relatively decent form last year and played them on the Friday night they cut us to shreds. The moral of the story? Throw ourselves on the mercy of the footballing world every week before we play them.
Nobody seriously expected us to win so what did we really lose today? The pro-tank bin scab faction were probably sitting there in Geelong scarves punting it home, and the rest of us saw a team that is a couple of years away from being truly competitive no matter who ends up joining us via the draft. I said I'd take anyth
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
5 - Aaron Davey
4 - James Frawley
3 - Russell Robertson
2 - Brent Moloney
1 - Stefan Martin
Varying degrees of apologies to Miller, Rivers, Jones, Warnock, McLean, McDonald, Petterd, Meesen, Sylvia and Morton
On the other side of the coin we have to work out what's wrong with Bate. Ever since he was one of a handful of contributors in Adelaide a few weeks back he has had three consecutive games of complete pox. You would have thought that the return of Robbo would free him up to play further up the ground, and while he got a little bit of it late on it was still well under his best.
Maric had an absolute nightmare. After showing a lot of promise last season and sneaking into the bests for Casey in most of their early games he turned up today and played undoubtedly the worst game since either of Weetra's spectacular performances at the start of last season. I suppose you give everyone a second chance but good god he'd want to improve significantly on the Keystone Kops trash he served up today.
Leaderboard
For the first couple of weeks it was how far Green, now it's Davey who is streaking to the title. Cheney still leads the Hilton on the strength of Round 1 alone but the voting system could prove controversial if he's still in that position come R22. In reality Bennell is really the moral leader at this point.
17 - Aaron Davey
11 - Brent Moloney
8 - Brad Green, James Frawley (LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean, Stefan Martin
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brad Miller
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce, Russell Robertson
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
Two things that should be outlawed - forcibly if required.
1) Grown men waving flags
It's bad enough as it is, but unlike kids who just swing the thing around without concern and nearly take your eye out the grown man flag waver goes about his craft with an intensity bordering on psychotic. They wave the thing around in intricate patterns as if not following the same sick ritual will cause the world to end.
Judgement - Nobody over 13 years old shall henceforth be permitted to wave a flag unless they are in a cheer squad.
Sure cheer squads should be shot as well but that's for another day.
2) Teenybopper female fans displaying homemade signs.
No person, male or female, older than 13 to bring a handwritten homemade sign declaring their undying love for a player. We're all for women in football here but ask yourself how many times you see a 16-year-old with an "I HEART PLAYER X" handwritten sign when your team is losing. The "ILUVROBBO24" faction dropped off the twig a couple of years ago, but they were out there in numbers and are waiting for us to fire up again so they can come back. There were two girls sitting in front of me today who must have been in their mid-20's and were waving signs about telling us how much they loved Joel Selwood. One day Geelong are going to turn rancid and these people will disappear.
Judgement: Handwritten signs to be banned. Sew a banner with a terrible pun a'la the cheersquad or at least spraypaint it on a
bedsheet and display the thing at the top of the Southern Stand.
Female fans of a legal age shall henceforth follow historical tradition and only declare their love for individual players on the internet or in the back seat of cars outside seedy nightclubs.
Kasey Korner
Caught the last three quarters of the game against Coburg. Newton kicked five and no doubt will get a recall sometime before the end of the season but I was most impressive by Danny Hughes. Would love to see him get a game before the end of the year. Whelan was impressive as well, but to be entirely honest I'm not sure where he fits into our plans at the moment. Bennell has been too good to drop, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to switch the two around at some point. The really interesting one is Wheatley - where does he come back? To be honest I don't see any point to him at the moment.
Oh and there was some kid called Watts who was quite good as well. Makes Morton look like Hulk Hogan at the moment though so I still can't support playing him before the halfway mark of the year. Could be an absolute stud in the future though if his senior debut was anything to go by.
The Tombstone Report
It's the year of players mysteriously getting injured. First Garland, then McDonald and now Sam Blease - leg snapped in two during a schoolyard kickaround. My god.
For this reason if Watts is going to play school football then I volunteer to go to each game and throw myself in front of him at every contest.
Radio Watch
Triple M is my preferred listening at a game, but overall it is an absolutely gash radio station. Don't you just want to stab Pete and Myf in the face? And the claim in their jingle that it's "the breakfast show that Melbourne wakes up to" should be investigated by the Advertising Standards Tribunal if the ratings are anything to go by.
Next Week
West Coast in Perth in the 4.40pm Sunday game. They're hardly setting the world on fire at the moment but there's more chance of peace in the Middle East than there is of us winning anywhere west of Melbourne at the moment.
Wednesday, 13 May 2009
Sunday, 10 May 2009
Go West. Lose. Come Back. Lose Again.
In the interests of tackling global warming and decreasing the AFL's carbon footprint I hereby propose that the league don't even bother flying us to Perth or Adelaide for the forseeable future. For the love of christ I've lived in 5 different places since we last won in either city. We'll never forget Brock and Peter Vardy going nuts in the wet against Freo, mainly because at this rate we'll never see the next win.
At least today we can say we went as close as we have since that day. The difference between the two sides today was clearly that one is a fallen giant fall of premiership winners, and the other is rapidly scraping it's way off up from the bottom. Experience and cool heads in the balance was what it was all about today, and we're just not good enough to deal with that yet.
Meanwhile in a convenient twist of events when I couldn't be bothered going outside this afternoon - somehow Fox Sports just appeared on my computer screen. I can't explain it. It's a round 7 miracle. Choppy as fuck but well better than the alternative of having to watch the game with... people. Did make it bloody hard to work out what was going on at any given time though.
Glad I wasn't paying for it to be honest. The pre-game 'entertainment' consisted of footage of Spud Frawley and Jason Dunstall doing gymnastics in front of small children in ill-fitting footy jumpers. Completely meaningless television. Just before that Gerard Healy called Cale Morton a "forward target of the future". So many low moments in the history of TV in such a short time. Then they threw to an ad break and those CGU ads that make me wish for nuclear holocaust came on.
So, in a rapidly evolving tradition we copped a goal straight from the first bounce. Surely no team has ever gone two weeks in a row conceding goals within the first 15 seconds. It could only happen to us. Not surprisingly Johnson was demolished in the bounce by Dean Cox and off they went. We were lucky not cop a second from the next bounce when precisely the same thing happened. Indeed it looked like some of the most comical MFC rucking at Subiaco since Nick Smith in the finals against Freo.
First quarter also notable for boundary umpire fiascos. Cam Bruce shanks one that lands closer to Rio De Janerio than Brad Miller but half a metre inside the line and the umpires almost give away a free, then on the other side one rolls out right under the boundary umpire's nose, the players stop and the field umpire had to tell them to play on. Shambolic. Five minutes later there's a questionable Bate kick that lands on the goal line and takes the zaniest bounce in history. Was it over? Who knows/cares, but it certainly wasn't a great day to be one of the minor umpires. Not a great day to be any umpire really - one of them botched the bounce and was caught on the microphone asking "is there something wrong with this" about the ball. No, you're just shit at your job.
Much like last week the first quarter consisted of getting slaughtered at the first bounce, almost repeating the dose on the second and then breaking even thereafter. Only difference was that we weren't kicking goals. As per usual we were pumping balls inside 50 at will but with little reward. Eventually after getting nothing from ten minutes of domination Rivers stuck a kick-in right down LeCras' throat for the Eagles second. BT claimed it was a Mother's Day present - does that mean he's a mother? Don't answer that.
For a quarter where nothing of any interest happened for about 15 minutes, the second term was certainly action packed. Before the whole thing slowed down to a crawl Bruce got a cheap 50 for falling over like a housewife and then the Eagles dominated for a couple of goals. Johnson continued to frustrate Cox in the ruck to such a degree that they eventually moved Deano into the forward line. Sadly it didn't last long so we were only treated to one centre bounce featuring the Stefan Martin Experience. He still looked more likely than Spencer.
Suddenly Jones exploded into life and was responsible for two goals in a minute. First he ran down an Eagle for holding the ball in what would have been a certain goal, leading to a Miller set shot at the other end and then won it out of the centre bounce and set up Miller for a second.
At the other end Jared Rivers, the unluckiest man ever born, courageously got in the way of an almost certain goal and injured his ankle in the process. It went down the other end and Miller got his third in a row on the back of Rivers' courage, but more importantly Mr. Black Cloud was being carried off at the other end looking shithouse. Eventually turned out that he hasn't completely destroyed it, which is something, but he still ended up on crutches so he's gone for the next few weeks.
The Eagles got a couple late to undo all our good work, but it was no surprise that gaps started to open in the backline when not only Rivers was off but Frawley gone with an injury as well. Bate got a late one to close the gap, but with two players down, only one ruckman and the fact that we're generally shit hardly filled me with confidence.
As with every other week this year there were signs but a lack of quality. Some of our run - particuarly from Jones - was sublime, but when we try to hit up short targets and deliver to around the 50m line it all goes horribly wrong. No surprises that when we bombed it in a bit more we had some success. Miller was doing a good job getting it at half forward but we just couldn't get it to a target inside. Bate was ordinary in the first half but he fired up for a great performance in the second and played an important role. Grimes and Maric were also much improved on their first half performance in the third quarter.
Eventually we hit the lead. That wasn't in the script. Surely not supposed to happen. Indeed it wasn't, and justifiably didn't last. Cheap free kick out of a ruck contest to the Eagles and all of a sudden they go nuts and kick four in a row to redress the balance. The fourth was a farce - the West Coast bloke (whoever he was - I couldn't tell) tried to take half the world on, got tackled, hit the ground and THEN handballed for Hunter to soccer through. Just what we needed to really stitch us up. We got a late one back but still went into the last quarter two players down. They lost Kerr, but still had the numbers.
I'm not even going to go into the last quarter in depth. You saw it as well as I did (although presumably not in a tiny box on a computer screen). The Eagles missed a million chances to put the game away and we came home like a freight freaking train at the end. Petterd's goals put us within two kicks before Sylvia marked 50m out with just under two minutes left. He took his time over it and then botched it anyway. Gee, thanks a lot. Much to the chagrin of Cool Breeze Taylor in the Fox Sports commentary box the Eagles then proceded to refuse to ice the game and instead gave us about three more chances to score in the last minute. Sadly we weren't good enough. Meh - what did you expect?
Incidentally that was our first loss by under ten points since Daniher's last game.
Crumb Watch
Once again there was none. Maric did some nice things in the second half outside of 50. Mind you it's no surprise that crumb doesn't come into it when most of the time we turn it over at 50m.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
5 - Nathan Jones
4 - Jamie Bennell
3 - Brad Miller
2 - Cale Morton
1 - Brent Moloney
Apologies to Johnson, Bruce, McLean, Grimes and Bate (second half only), Davey and Bartram.
Leaderboard
No votes for the leader this week. He went close with a great second half though. Frawley's injury could open the door for Martin in the Seecamp, and Bennell racks up his first votes of the year to put the heat on Cheney in the Hilton voting.
17 - Aaron Davey
12 - Brent Moloney
10 - Nathan Jones
8 - Brad Green, James Frawley (LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
7 - Brad Miller
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year), Brock McLean, Stefan Martin
4 - Matthew Warnock, Jamie Bennell
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce, Russell Robertson
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers, Cale Morton
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
Perfect silence in my loungeroom. Further proof that I'd be in a much better mood if I could sit in a superbox all season. I'd always rather be at the game but there's nothing like the chance to get away from others. Scored free tickets to North vs Port last night - that, and the Adelaide game, are about as close as you get. God forbid I supported one of the big four I'd have a nervous breakdown. Apparently Collingwood fans have to pay $400 extra to sit where I do in the Ponsford Stand. Hillarious!
Next Week
Footscray @ the MCG. 2.10 on Saturday. Great news for us that they're now back in form. It could get ugly. They haven't exactly got the best forward line ever but the way we're going we'll have to ring Phil Gilbert and ask if he's interested in a game.
Final Thoughts
In two years we'll play the same game and win it.
At least today we can say we went as close as we have since that day. The difference between the two sides today was clearly that one is a fallen giant fall of premiership winners, and the other is rapidly scraping it's way off up from the bottom. Experience and cool heads in the balance was what it was all about today, and we're just not good enough to deal with that yet.
Meanwhile in a convenient twist of events when I couldn't be bothered going outside this afternoon - somehow Fox Sports just appeared on my computer screen. I can't explain it. It's a round 7 miracle. Choppy as fuck but well better than the alternative of having to watch the game with... people. Did make it bloody hard to work out what was going on at any given time though.
Glad I wasn't paying for it to be honest. The pre-game 'entertainment' consisted of footage of Spud Frawley and Jason Dunstall doing gymnastics in front of small children in ill-fitting footy jumpers. Completely meaningless television. Just before that Gerard Healy called Cale Morton a "forward target of the future". So many low moments in the history of TV in such a short time. Then they threw to an ad break and those CGU ads that make me wish for nuclear holocaust came on.
So, in a rapidly evolving tradition we copped a goal straight from the first bounce. Surely no team has ever gone two weeks in a row conceding goals within the first 15 seconds. It could only happen to us. Not surprisingly Johnson was demolished in the bounce by Dean Cox and off they went. We were lucky not cop a second from the next bounce when precisely the same thing happened. Indeed it looked like some of the most comical MFC rucking at Subiaco since Nick Smith in the finals against Freo.
First quarter also notable for boundary umpire fiascos. Cam Bruce shanks one that lands closer to Rio De Janerio than Brad Miller but half a metre inside the line and the umpires almost give away a free, then on the other side one rolls out right under the boundary umpire's nose, the players stop and the field umpire had to tell them to play on. Shambolic. Five minutes later there's a questionable Bate kick that lands on the goal line and takes the zaniest bounce in history. Was it over? Who knows/cares, but it certainly wasn't a great day to be one of the minor umpires. Not a great day to be any umpire really - one of them botched the bounce and was caught on the microphone asking "is there something wrong with this" about the ball. No, you're just shit at your job.
Much like last week the first quarter consisted of getting slaughtered at the first bounce, almost repeating the dose on the second and then breaking even thereafter. Only difference was that we weren't kicking goals. As per usual we were pumping balls inside 50 at will but with little reward. Eventually after getting nothing from ten minutes of domination Rivers stuck a kick-in right down LeCras' throat for the Eagles second. BT claimed it was a Mother's Day present - does that mean he's a mother? Don't answer that.
For a quarter where nothing of any interest happened for about 15 minutes, the second term was certainly action packed. Before the whole thing slowed down to a crawl Bruce got a cheap 50 for falling over like a housewife and then the Eagles dominated for a couple of goals. Johnson continued to frustrate Cox in the ruck to such a degree that they eventually moved Deano into the forward line. Sadly it didn't last long so we were only treated to one centre bounce featuring the Stefan Martin Experience. He still looked more likely than Spencer.
Suddenly Jones exploded into life and was responsible for two goals in a minute. First he ran down an Eagle for holding the ball in what would have been a certain goal, leading to a Miller set shot at the other end and then won it out of the centre bounce and set up Miller for a second.
At the other end Jared Rivers, the unluckiest man ever born, courageously got in the way of an almost certain goal and injured his ankle in the process. It went down the other end and Miller got his third in a row on the back of Rivers' courage, but more importantly Mr. Black Cloud was being carried off at the other end looking shithouse. Eventually turned out that he hasn't completely destroyed it, which is something, but he still ended up on crutches so he's gone for the next few weeks.
The Eagles got a couple late to undo all our good work, but it was no surprise that gaps started to open in the backline when not only Rivers was off but Frawley gone with an injury as well. Bate got a late one to close the gap, but with two players down, only one ruckman and the fact that we're generally shit hardly filled me with confidence.
As with every other week this year there were signs but a lack of quality. Some of our run - particuarly from Jones - was sublime, but when we try to hit up short targets and deliver to around the 50m line it all goes horribly wrong. No surprises that when we bombed it in a bit more we had some success. Miller was doing a good job getting it at half forward but we just couldn't get it to a target inside. Bate was ordinary in the first half but he fired up for a great performance in the second and played an important role. Grimes and Maric were also much improved on their first half performance in the third quarter.
Eventually we hit the lead. That wasn't in the script. Surely not supposed to happen. Indeed it wasn't, and justifiably didn't last. Cheap free kick out of a ruck contest to the Eagles and all of a sudden they go nuts and kick four in a row to redress the balance. The fourth was a farce - the West Coast bloke (whoever he was - I couldn't tell) tried to take half the world on, got tackled, hit the ground and THEN handballed for Hunter to soccer through. Just what we needed to really stitch us up. We got a late one back but still went into the last quarter two players down. They lost Kerr, but still had the numbers.
I'm not even going to go into the last quarter in depth. You saw it as well as I did (although presumably not in a tiny box on a computer screen). The Eagles missed a million chances to put the game away and we came home like a freight freaking train at the end. Petterd's goals put us within two kicks before Sylvia marked 50m out with just under two minutes left. He took his time over it and then botched it anyway. Gee, thanks a lot. Much to the chagrin of Cool Breeze Taylor in the Fox Sports commentary box the Eagles then proceded to refuse to ice the game and instead gave us about three more chances to score in the last minute. Sadly we weren't good enough. Meh - what did you expect?
Incidentally that was our first loss by under ten points since Daniher's last game.
Crumb Watch
Once again there was none. Maric did some nice things in the second half outside of 50. Mind you it's no surprise that crumb doesn't come into it when most of the time we turn it over at 50m.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
5 - Nathan Jones
4 - Jamie Bennell
3 - Brad Miller
2 - Cale Morton
1 - Brent Moloney
Apologies to Johnson, Bruce, McLean, Grimes and Bate (second half only), Davey and Bartram.
Leaderboard
No votes for the leader this week. He went close with a great second half though. Frawley's injury could open the door for Martin in the Seecamp, and Bennell racks up his first votes of the year to put the heat on Cheney in the Hilton voting.
17 - Aaron Davey
12 - Brent Moloney
10 - Nathan Jones
8 - Brad Green, James Frawley (LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
7 - Brad Miller
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year), Brock McLean, Stefan Martin
4 - Matthew Warnock, Jamie Bennell
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce, Russell Robertson
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers, Cale Morton
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
Perfect silence in my loungeroom. Further proof that I'd be in a much better mood if I could sit in a superbox all season. I'd always rather be at the game but there's nothing like the chance to get away from others. Scored free tickets to North vs Port last night - that, and the Adelaide game, are about as close as you get. God forbid I supported one of the big four I'd have a nervous breakdown. Apparently Collingwood fans have to pay $400 extra to sit where I do in the Ponsford Stand. Hillarious!
Next Week
Footscray @ the MCG. 2.10 on Saturday. Great news for us that they're now back in form. It could get ugly. They haven't exactly got the best forward line ever but the way we're going we'll have to ring Phil Gilbert and ask if he's interested in a game.
Final Thoughts
In two years we'll play the same game and win it.
Sunday, 3 May 2009
The Foregone Conclusion Cup
If last week was the equivalent of some really long and pointless Swedish movie that you can't quite understand, then this week had the potential to be a Cannibal Holocaust style violent slasher snuff film. In case you were hit on the head by a rogue Brent Grgic slice at Baytec Stadium and have just woken up from the resultant coma - Geelong are quite a good team these days, Grgic doesn't play for them anymore and nobody is quite sure what Kardinia Park is called this week. I'm not sure if the first two are connected.
We, however, are struggling. The green shoots of recovery are there somewhere but we're still a long way from seeing any real returns on our investments. Last week against Adelaide we were arguably half decent but let down by the complete absence of a forward structure for most of the game. The long awaited return of Russell Robertson addressed that issue somewhat, but the fact of the matter still remained that the worst team of the past two years was lining up against the best and a world class porking was on the cards.
Somehow despite the Cats racking up an all-time record for the most disposals in one game with two players on more than 40 possesions, and having 36 scoring shots it didn't happen this way. Whisper it quietly we were even winning at one point. Sure, it was for about two minutes at the end of the first quarter and it stirred the Cats into switching gear and putting us away but it was nice while it lasted. The freak who had a casual $500,000 on Geelong to win $25k surely wouldn't have been too concerned (after all you would have to have grapefruits the size of Peru to put a bet like that on in the first place) but he must have been wondering if Geelong could possibly find a way to throw the match. They couldn't.
Speaking of world records I'm not sure I've ever seen a quicker goal from the first - or indeed any - bounce that didn't involve a downfield free kick or a 50. For some reason Ablett, coming off about 4000 possesions in a month was allowed to stand all on his own in the centre. I'm sure everyone in the world could see what was going to happen next and lo and behold fate didn't disappoint. Straight into his hands, wandered to just outside 50 and slotted it in 9 seconds.
On the strength of that moment alone things looked like they were going to get really, really ugly but in reality after that we spent the next 25 minutes being better than we had any right to be while the Cats seemed to be suffering a major lack of interest. I can understand where they're coming from, having won 48 of the last 51 games including a couple of grand finals it must be difficult to get yourself motivated to be dragged into a slopfest against the worst team in the land. If we'd been able to kick straight we'd have made it even more interesting. The much welcome return of Robertson delivered a couple of nervous looking points but more importantly put somebody into our forward line who could go on a long lead and mark without tripping over and killing themselves.
Down the other end the Cats were going inside 50 without trouble, but a combination of excellent defensive work and poor kicking kept us from being totally destroyed. I'm going to say this every week but Frawley, Warnock, Martin and Rivers are starting to develop into a formidable unit. If we can keep them together in the future that's the springboard to build a decent team from. Even Rivers' luck must have swung around somewhat, the knock he got to the knee in Q3 would probably have ended up with him in hospital over the last few years but this time he was back within minutes taking grabs and filling gaps inside 50. The only blemish on his record was a sloppy shanked kick straight down Johnson's throat in the second.
Not surprisingly, as often happens a good team held to a points draw by a poor team in the first quarter realises what's going on during the quarter time break and come out to rectify the situation before half time. Suddenly they had free players everywhere and were putting more pressure on our players leading to turnovers left, right and centre and textbook rebound football on their behalf. Only Paul Johnson's late goal - and he was at least better than he has been recently - kept us within six goals at the long break and it seemed as if any remaining resistance was going to collapse in a screaming heap.
5 Geelong behinds and a goal to start the third quarter made it look like we were going to get bitchslapped, but Robbo's 2nd and 3rd goals - celebrated wildly despite the scoreboard - dragged it back to 30 points before they got a couple of late ones. We pulled off a couple of pieces of sublime linking football but time and time again we'd do the hard work and turn it over. At least they tried something different in the forward line by sending the Stefan Martin Experience up there for the first time. He gave off a couple of clever assists and looked lively but I'm hardly declaring him to be the future of goalscoring. Similarly Petterd was lively again without ever dominating.
The key fourth quarter highlight was Davey's flying smother in the centre. How good was that? I'm still convinced that we're lacking crumb, but I have to admit that he is dominating in his new role. Hawkins - aka the Geelong Newton - finally flounced his way to a goal to open the quarter but with Ablett off, Scarlett rested and most of their other players struggling to maintain interest we won the last. Incidentally Juice could make a fortune if he franchised his style of gameplay - Hawkins in Geelong, Gill in Adelaide. Could be big bucks in it for him.
Ironically we've now gone into games against Geelong twice in two years expecting to get massacred and come away with a creditable performance both times. Then when we were in relatively decent form last year and played them on the Friday night they cut us to shreds. The moral of the story? Throw ourselves on the mercy of the footballing world every week before we play them.
Nobody seriously expected us to win so what did we really lose today? The pro-tank bin scab faction were probably sitting there in Geelong scarves punting it home, and the rest of us saw a team that is a couple of years away from being truly competitive no matter who ends up joining us via the draft.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
5 - Aaron Davey
4 - James Frawley
3 - Russell Robertson
2 - Brent Moloney
1 - Stefan Martin
Varying degrees of apologies to Miller, Rivers, Jones, Warnock, McLean, McDonald, Petterd, Meesen, Sylvia and Morton
On the other side of the coin we have to work out what's wrong with Bate. Ever since he was one of a handful of contributors in Adelaide a few weeks back he has had three consecutive games of complete pox. You would have thought that the return of Robbo would free him up to play further up the ground, and while he got a little bit of it late on it was still well under his best.
Maric had an absolute nightmare. After showing a lot of promise last season and sneaking into the bests for Casey in most of their early games he turned up today and played undoubtedly the worst game since either of Weetra's spectacular performances at the start of last season. I suppose you give everyone a second chance but good god he'd want to improve significantly on the Keystone Kops trash he served up today.
Leaderboard
For the first couple of weeks it was how far Green, now it's Davey who is streaking to the title. Cheney still leads the Hilton on the strength of Round 1 alone but the voting system could prove controversial if he's still in that position come R22. In reality Bennell is really the moral leader at this point.
17 - Aaron Davey
11 - Brent Moloney
8 - Brad Green, James Frawley (LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean, Stefan Martin
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brad Miller
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce, Russell Robertson
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
Two things that should be outlawed - forcibly if required.
1) Grown men waving flags
It's bad enough as it is, but unlike kids who just swing the thing around without concern and nearly take your eye out the grown man flag waver goes about his craft with an intensity bordering on psychotic. They wave the thing around in intricate patterns as if not following the same sick ritual will cause the world to end.
Judgement - Nobody over 13 years old shall henceforth be permitted to wave a flag unless they are in a cheer squad.
Sure cheer squads should be shot as well but that's for another day.
2) Teenybopper female fans displaying homemade signs.
No person, male or female, older than 13 to bring a handwritten homemade sign declaring their undying love for a player. We're all for women in football here but ask yourself how many times you see a 16-year-old with an "I HEART PLAYER X" handwritten sign when your team is losing. The "ILUVROBBO24" faction dropped off the twig a couple of years ago, but they were out there in numbers and are waiting for us to fire up again so they can come back. There were two girls sitting in front of me today who must have been in their mid-20's and were waving signs about telling us how much they loved Joel Selwood. One day Geelong are going to turn rancid and these people will disappear.
Judgement: Handwritten signs to be banned. Sew a banner with a terrible pun a'la the cheersquad or at least spraypaint it on a
bedsheet and display the thing at the top of the Southern Stand.
Female fans of a legal age shall henceforth follow historical tradition and only declare their love for individual players on the internet or in the back seat of cars outside seedy nightclubs.
Kasey Korner
Caught the last three quarters of the game against Coburg. Newton kicked five and no doubt will get a recall sometime before the end of the season but I was most impressive by Danny Hughes. Would love to see him get a game before the end of the year. Whelan was impressive as well, but to be entirely honest I'm not sure where he fits into our plans at the moment. Bennell has been too good to drop, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to switch the two around at some point. The really interesting one is Wheatley - where does he come back? To be honest I don't see any point to him at the moment.
Oh and there was some kid called Watts who was quite good as well. Makes Morton look like Hulk Hogan at the moment though so I still can't support playing him before the halfway mark of the year. Could be an absolute stud in the future though if his senior debut was anything to go by.
The Tombstone Report
It's the year of players mysteriously getting injured. First Garland, then McDonald and now Sam Blease - leg snapped in two during a schoolyard kickaround. My god.
For this reason if Watts is going to play school football then I volunteer to go to each game and throw myself in front of him at every contest.
Radio Watch
Triple M is my preferred listening at a game, but overall it is an absolutely gash radio station. Don't you just want to stab Pete and Myf in the face? And the claim in their jingle that it's "the breakfast show that Melbourne wakes up to" should be investigated by the Advertising Standards Tribunal if the ratings are anything to go by.
Next Week
West Coast in Perth in the 4.40pm Sunday game. They're hardly setting the world on fire at the moment but there's more chance of peace in the Middle East than there is of us winning anywhere west of Melbourne at the moment.
We, however, are struggling. The green shoots of recovery are there somewhere but we're still a long way from seeing any real returns on our investments. Last week against Adelaide we were arguably half decent but let down by the complete absence of a forward structure for most of the game. The long awaited return of Russell Robertson addressed that issue somewhat, but the fact of the matter still remained that the worst team of the past two years was lining up against the best and a world class porking was on the cards.
Somehow despite the Cats racking up an all-time record for the most disposals in one game with two players on more than 40 possesions, and having 36 scoring shots it didn't happen this way. Whisper it quietly we were even winning at one point. Sure, it was for about two minutes at the end of the first quarter and it stirred the Cats into switching gear and putting us away but it was nice while it lasted. The freak who had a casual $500,000 on Geelong to win $25k surely wouldn't have been too concerned (after all you would have to have grapefruits the size of Peru to put a bet like that on in the first place) but he must have been wondering if Geelong could possibly find a way to throw the match. They couldn't.
Speaking of world records I'm not sure I've ever seen a quicker goal from the first - or indeed any - bounce that didn't involve a downfield free kick or a 50. For some reason Ablett, coming off about 4000 possesions in a month was allowed to stand all on his own in the centre. I'm sure everyone in the world could see what was going to happen next and lo and behold fate didn't disappoint. Straight into his hands, wandered to just outside 50 and slotted it in 9 seconds.
On the strength of that moment alone things looked like they were going to get really, really ugly but in reality after that we spent the next 25 minutes being better than we had any right to be while the Cats seemed to be suffering a major lack of interest. I can understand where they're coming from, having won 48 of the last 51 games including a couple of grand finals it must be difficult to get yourself motivated to be dragged into a slopfest against the worst team in the land. If we'd been able to kick straight we'd have made it even more interesting. The much welcome return of Robertson delivered a couple of nervous looking points but more importantly put somebody into our forward line who could go on a long lead and mark without tripping over and killing themselves.
Down the other end the Cats were going inside 50 without trouble, but a combination of excellent defensive work and poor kicking kept us from being totally destroyed. I'm going to say this every week but Frawley, Warnock, Martin and Rivers are starting to develop into a formidable unit. If we can keep them together in the future that's the springboard to build a decent team from. Even Rivers' luck must have swung around somewhat, the knock he got to the knee in Q3 would probably have ended up with him in hospital over the last few years but this time he was back within minutes taking grabs and filling gaps inside 50. The only blemish on his record was a sloppy shanked kick straight down Johnson's throat in the second.
Not surprisingly, as often happens a good team held to a points draw by a poor team in the first quarter realises what's going on during the quarter time break and come out to rectify the situation before half time. Suddenly they had free players everywhere and were putting more pressure on our players leading to turnovers left, right and centre and textbook rebound football on their behalf. Only Paul Johnson's late goal - and he was at least better than he has been recently - kept us within six goals at the long break and it seemed as if any remaining resistance was going to collapse in a screaming heap.
5 Geelong behinds and a goal to start the third quarter made it look like we were going to get bitchslapped, but Robbo's 2nd and 3rd goals - celebrated wildly despite the scoreboard - dragged it back to 30 points before they got a couple of late ones. We pulled off a couple of pieces of sublime linking football but time and time again we'd do the hard work and turn it over. At least they tried something different in the forward line by sending the Stefan Martin Experience up there for the first time. He gave off a couple of clever assists and looked lively but I'm hardly declaring him to be the future of goalscoring. Similarly Petterd was lively again without ever dominating.
The key fourth quarter highlight was Davey's flying smother in the centre. How good was that? I'm still convinced that we're lacking crumb, but I have to admit that he is dominating in his new role. Hawkins - aka the Geelong Newton - finally flounced his way to a goal to open the quarter but with Ablett off, Scarlett rested and most of their other players struggling to maintain interest we won the last. Incidentally Juice could make a fortune if he franchised his style of gameplay - Hawkins in Geelong, Gill in Adelaide. Could be big bucks in it for him.
Ironically we've now gone into games against Geelong twice in two years expecting to get massacred and come away with a creditable performance both times. Then when we were in relatively decent form last year and played them on the Friday night they cut us to shreds. The moral of the story? Throw ourselves on the mercy of the footballing world every week before we play them.
Nobody seriously expected us to win so what did we really lose today? The pro-tank bin scab faction were probably sitting there in Geelong scarves punting it home, and the rest of us saw a team that is a couple of years away from being truly competitive no matter who ends up joining us via the draft.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
5 - Aaron Davey
4 - James Frawley
3 - Russell Robertson
2 - Brent Moloney
1 - Stefan Martin
Varying degrees of apologies to Miller, Rivers, Jones, Warnock, McLean, McDonald, Petterd, Meesen, Sylvia and Morton
On the other side of the coin we have to work out what's wrong with Bate. Ever since he was one of a handful of contributors in Adelaide a few weeks back he has had three consecutive games of complete pox. You would have thought that the return of Robbo would free him up to play further up the ground, and while he got a little bit of it late on it was still well under his best.
Maric had an absolute nightmare. After showing a lot of promise last season and sneaking into the bests for Casey in most of their early games he turned up today and played undoubtedly the worst game since either of Weetra's spectacular performances at the start of last season. I suppose you give everyone a second chance but good god he'd want to improve significantly on the Keystone Kops trash he served up today.
Leaderboard
For the first couple of weeks it was how far Green, now it's Davey who is streaking to the title. Cheney still leads the Hilton on the strength of Round 1 alone but the voting system could prove controversial if he's still in that position come R22. In reality Bennell is really the moral leader at this point.
17 - Aaron Davey
11 - Brent Moloney
8 - Brad Green, James Frawley (LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean, Stefan Martin
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brad Miller
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce, Russell Robertson
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
Two things that should be outlawed - forcibly if required.
1) Grown men waving flags
It's bad enough as it is, but unlike kids who just swing the thing around without concern and nearly take your eye out the grown man flag waver goes about his craft with an intensity bordering on psychotic. They wave the thing around in intricate patterns as if not following the same sick ritual will cause the world to end.
Judgement - Nobody over 13 years old shall henceforth be permitted to wave a flag unless they are in a cheer squad.
Sure cheer squads should be shot as well but that's for another day.
2) Teenybopper female fans displaying homemade signs.
No person, male or female, older than 13 to bring a handwritten homemade sign declaring their undying love for a player. We're all for women in football here but ask yourself how many times you see a 16-year-old with an "I HEART PLAYER X" handwritten sign when your team is losing. The "ILUVROBBO24" faction dropped off the twig a couple of years ago, but they were out there in numbers and are waiting for us to fire up again so they can come back. There were two girls sitting in front of me today who must have been in their mid-20's and were waving signs about telling us how much they loved Joel Selwood. One day Geelong are going to turn rancid and these people will disappear.
Judgement: Handwritten signs to be banned. Sew a banner with a terrible pun a'la the cheersquad or at least spraypaint it on a
bedsheet and display the thing at the top of the Southern Stand.
Female fans of a legal age shall henceforth follow historical tradition and only declare their love for individual players on the internet or in the back seat of cars outside seedy nightclubs.
Kasey Korner
Caught the last three quarters of the game against Coburg. Newton kicked five and no doubt will get a recall sometime before the end of the season but I was most impressive by Danny Hughes. Would love to see him get a game before the end of the year. Whelan was impressive as well, but to be entirely honest I'm not sure where he fits into our plans at the moment. Bennell has been too good to drop, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to switch the two around at some point. The really interesting one is Wheatley - where does he come back? To be honest I don't see any point to him at the moment.
Oh and there was some kid called Watts who was quite good as well. Makes Morton look like Hulk Hogan at the moment though so I still can't support playing him before the halfway mark of the year. Could be an absolute stud in the future though if his senior debut was anything to go by.
The Tombstone Report
It's the year of players mysteriously getting injured. First Garland, then McDonald and now Sam Blease - leg snapped in two during a schoolyard kickaround. My god.
For this reason if Watts is going to play school football then I volunteer to go to each game and throw myself in front of him at every contest.
Radio Watch
Triple M is my preferred listening at a game, but overall it is an absolutely gash radio station. Don't you just want to stab Pete and Myf in the face? And the claim in their jingle that it's "the breakfast show that Melbourne wakes up to" should be investigated by the Advertising Standards Tribunal if the ratings are anything to go by.
Next Week
West Coast in Perth in the 4.40pm Sunday game. They're hardly setting the world on fire at the moment but there's more chance of peace in the Middle East than there is of us winning anywhere west of Melbourne at the moment.
Saturday, 25 April 2009
Player Watch
I was driving around the back streets of St. Kilda today cruising for hookers trying to buy a house. Turned a corner and who do I see hooning around on a BMX sans helmet but Bradford J. Miller.
Tempted to scream pro-MFC propaganda out the window but expected that he'd vault over the handlebars and I'd cause him to neck himself.
At least the pro-tanking spineless coward faction might have sent me a bunch of flowers as a thanks.
Tempted to scream pro-MFC propaganda out the window but expected that he'd vault over the handlebars and I'd cause him to neck himself.
At least the pro-tanking spineless coward faction might have sent me a bunch of flowers as a thanks.
The Truth Is Out There
In the last twenty years I've watched Melbourne in four states and one territory. I've seen us win by 120 points, lose by the same, blow a 47 point lead in the last quarter and come back from 51 down at halftime. However I can confidently say that what we saw tonight was the most bizarre match I've ever witnessed.
Seriously, that shit was like an episode of Twin Peaks. 3.5 quarters without a solitary goal and then at the 17 minute mark of the last quarter we're in it up to our necks. Explain that? I sure as hell can't.
Usually, I sit there for four quarters stressing and ignoring minor details such as what's actually taking place, so the goals act as mental cues to fill in the blanks of any particuarly interesting happenings. That's not going to happen for obvious reasons. In fact I'm not sure if anything particuarly interesting happened all day. They told us it was going to be Hurricane Katrina-esque weather conditions, and even though it was colder than a witches tit the rain didn't come in any noticeable fashion.
Sadly, nobody bothered to tell the players who proceeded to serve up one of the most anonymous, pointless and god damn it nearly awesome games of footy for years. You would have understood a 51-34 scoreline if it had been pissing down with a force 10 gale, the sort that sends sailors to their deaths, blowing across the ground but it really wasn't. In fact other than the temperature issues it was a pretty perfect day for football. When the Meesen Magic jumped like a gazelle in the opening bounce and put it straight into the hands of Moloney (or was it Jones? Nothing came of it, so Jones is a suspect) who whacked it inside 50 I thought that we were set for something special. We weren't.
Let the future record show that our scores at the end of each quarter were as follows;
0.1, 0.3, 1.6, 4.10
This is our lowest score of any sort since we racked up a casual 3.9 and got Neil Balme fired in 1997. The last time we went so low in Victoria was R16, 1996 in Geelong. Stats fans rejoice, though, that it's not our lowest score at the MCG in the last 50 years. Step forward the R12 1989 debacle vs Geelong when we racked up a big 2.8.20. Before that you have to go back to R16, 1971 for a 4.10.34 against the mighty Fitzroy.
However I'm willing to bet that none of those games featured us goalling at the 17 minute mark of the last quarter to be within striking distance. To say the Adelaide fans started to get a bit nervous was an understatement. They didn't quite wear the same look of abject terror that Freo fans had when we turned them over last year, but another goal and it would have gotten interesting.
Frankly I can't even be bothered trying to remember what happened tonight. From memory it went a bit like this;
* Scrum in the centre
* Ball goes towards our forward line
* Ball is rebounded under very little pressure
* Ball hangs around in the middle for a while
* Adelaide kick a point
* Everyone dies a little inside.
It took the forgotten man of the forward line Lynden Dunn to get our first two goals, and just as he was scrounging for the record books to find out how many people had been their sides only goalkicker, McLean added another to ruin his fun but make things interesting. Newton missed his second sitter and Jetta an easily gettable chance before McDonald slotted one to drag it back to within three goals.
Unfortunately after briefly threatening glory the forward structure once again fell to pieces and the Crows managed to lock it down for a win. Of interest to Meesen fans was his flying shot from 50m out which didn't make the distance, or score, but bore a distinct resemblence to the one and only shot on goal I ever saw Jamie Shanahan take.
Once again we were stooged for a lack of a forward line. The defence is still our strongest point, and the midfields and ruck division aren't losing out TOO badly (except Johnson who has been pox) but what's the point when you've got nobody to kick it to? Miller and Petterd are trying their arses off but getting nothing, Bate has been disappointing recently, Jetta needs time in the 2's, Sylvia has played his one good quarter for the year and put the queue in the rack and Newton is just shit.
Robertson kicked five in the 2's today. He's hardly the future, but at the moment he could be the difference between competitive and uncompetitive up front. If nothing else he'll take the heat off Miller. Surely next week it's Robbo and THE CELEBRATOR in - Jetta (omitted), Newton (shot dead).
There was a lot of "we're being rorted by the umpires" feeling going on. I'll admit there were a couple of slightly dodgy ones, but I don't think it explains Newton the tit missing two sitters and McLean hoofing the ball into the hands of the opposition at every opportunity.
Finally I don't usually care for the opposition, even to the extent of learning who half their players are, but Adelaide aren't particuarly good are they? Everything else is going to overshadowed by our floppy forward performance, but it's not just me who thinks they weren't very good today is it? Granted our defence played well, but all over the place they were just ordinary. Restricting a slopfest to a tiny score is one thing, but can they really hang their hat on it given the abysmal state our forward structure is in?
That's it. I have nothing more to say.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal
5 - Brent Moloney
4 - James Frawley
3 - Aaron Davey
2 - Jared Rivers
1 - Lynden Dunn
Buggered if I'm giving votes to Turnover Machine McLean. Everyone else will, but 28 possesions mean nothing when kicks are in the minority and hardly any of them hit a target. Eight tackles are great, but they don't get you in single handedly. See also Jones, Nathan.
Leaderboard
12 - Aaron Davey
9 - Brent Moloney
8 - Brad Green
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year and LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean
4 - Matthew Warnock, Stefan Martin, Brad Miller, James Frawley
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
14,000 my arse. That's the dictionary definition of 'seasonally adjusted'. Imagine if the weather had turned out like it was supposed to? The place would have been empty.
Chief nutbag of the day was the woman behind me who spent all four quarters yelling "COME ON CROWS [pause] COME ON!" every five seconds. By full time she'd become a cult hero.
Armoured Personnel Carrier Corner
Fact: I'd rather win five games than four.
Fact: We're not good enough to win five anyway.
Outcome: Pro and anti-tank factions are happy even if they do want to cut each other's throat.
Numerology Corner
In case you're wondering Stefan Martin isn't the only person ever to change to a higher number during their career (excluding people who changed back to a previous number like Farmer in '99). One of Sydney's cavalcade of nobodies in the 80's tops everyone.
1985 - #46
1986 and 1988 - #12
1989 and 1990 - #33
1991 - #50
Now, Darren McAsey was hardly likely to be anyone's favourite player anyway but imagine trying to keep up with that on your jumper?
Incidentally if you're old enough to remember the 80's and early 90's but want to completely confuse yourself just look at some Sydney teamsheets from that time. You are guaranteed to see names that you've never seen before in your life. I'm not talking about cult figures like Sanford Wheeler and The Indian Rubber Man Jamie Lawson - I'm about Brett Page, Aldo Dipetta and the briefly glamorous Jim West. Speaking of briefly glamorous - Shane Fell - 1 season, 30 goals and goodbye. That's odd.
Perhaps the hapless Brisbane Bears of the late 80's are more your go? Try 1992's Adam Kerinaiua, or Rudi Frigo? How about 203cm monster Ian Kidgell or his svelt 60kg colleague Corey Bell? Me, I'm a Richard Umbers man myself.
Can't decide? Then Matthew AhMat is your man - 8 games, 8 losses spread between both great teams.
Mind you, let's be honest, does anyone other than a Melbourne fan have the slightest idea who Scott Simister was. And what exactly did Haydn Robins do for two seasons before he was flogged to Richmond as part of our ongoing 'talent' exchange scheme (Chris Sullivan, John Howat, Michael Pickering, Clay Sampson, Strawbs O'Dwyer, Phil Egan, Simon Eishold, Ross Funcke et al)
See, wasn't that a great deal more educational than anything you saw (or didn't) at the game today? Forget this season, how about a sponsorship from Name a Game to write reviews of early 90's matches instead?
Next Week
God help us all it's Geelong at the far more sensible time of 2.10 on Sunday. Make no mistake, they won't be as charitable as the Crows were in keeping the scores down. In fact they're likely to slap the living bejesus out of us. Remember 1 billion to nothing at quarter time last year? I guess if that's all you have to beat then it shouldn't be too bad a day.
If I was playing Fantasy Selection Committee it would be (*drum roll*)
IN: Robertson, Maric, Spencer, Wonaeamirri
OUT: Jetta, Newton, Sylvia, Johnson
Maric didn't play in the 2's today, but I have a feeling that might have been as cover in case Bartram didn't come up after losing his dad yesterday (RIP). Showed enough at the end of last year to warrant a decent run of matches now, and what better time to come in then when we're face-to-face with the apocalypse? That'll be dandy for him.
Final Thoughts
That was nice. What time does the real game start?
Seriously, that shit was like an episode of Twin Peaks. 3.5 quarters without a solitary goal and then at the 17 minute mark of the last quarter we're in it up to our necks. Explain that? I sure as hell can't.
Usually, I sit there for four quarters stressing and ignoring minor details such as what's actually taking place, so the goals act as mental cues to fill in the blanks of any particuarly interesting happenings. That's not going to happen for obvious reasons. In fact I'm not sure if anything particuarly interesting happened all day. They told us it was going to be Hurricane Katrina-esque weather conditions, and even though it was colder than a witches tit the rain didn't come in any noticeable fashion.
Sadly, nobody bothered to tell the players who proceeded to serve up one of the most anonymous, pointless and god damn it nearly awesome games of footy for years. You would have understood a 51-34 scoreline if it had been pissing down with a force 10 gale, the sort that sends sailors to their deaths, blowing across the ground but it really wasn't. In fact other than the temperature issues it was a pretty perfect day for football. When the Meesen Magic jumped like a gazelle in the opening bounce and put it straight into the hands of Moloney (or was it Jones? Nothing came of it, so Jones is a suspect) who whacked it inside 50 I thought that we were set for something special. We weren't.
Let the future record show that our scores at the end of each quarter were as follows;
0.1, 0.3, 1.6, 4.10
This is our lowest score of any sort since we racked up a casual 3.9 and got Neil Balme fired in 1997. The last time we went so low in Victoria was R16, 1996 in Geelong. Stats fans rejoice, though, that it's not our lowest score at the MCG in the last 50 years. Step forward the R12 1989 debacle vs Geelong when we racked up a big 2.8.20. Before that you have to go back to R16, 1971 for a 4.10.34 against the mighty Fitzroy.
However I'm willing to bet that none of those games featured us goalling at the 17 minute mark of the last quarter to be within striking distance. To say the Adelaide fans started to get a bit nervous was an understatement. They didn't quite wear the same look of abject terror that Freo fans had when we turned them over last year, but another goal and it would have gotten interesting.
Frankly I can't even be bothered trying to remember what happened tonight. From memory it went a bit like this;
* Scrum in the centre
* Ball goes towards our forward line
* Ball is rebounded under very little pressure
* Ball hangs around in the middle for a while
* Adelaide kick a point
* Everyone dies a little inside.
It took the forgotten man of the forward line Lynden Dunn to get our first two goals, and just as he was scrounging for the record books to find out how many people had been their sides only goalkicker, McLean added another to ruin his fun but make things interesting. Newton missed his second sitter and Jetta an easily gettable chance before McDonald slotted one to drag it back to within three goals.
Unfortunately after briefly threatening glory the forward structure once again fell to pieces and the Crows managed to lock it down for a win. Of interest to Meesen fans was his flying shot from 50m out which didn't make the distance, or score, but bore a distinct resemblence to the one and only shot on goal I ever saw Jamie Shanahan take.
Once again we were stooged for a lack of a forward line. The defence is still our strongest point, and the midfields and ruck division aren't losing out TOO badly (except Johnson who has been pox) but what's the point when you've got nobody to kick it to? Miller and Petterd are trying their arses off but getting nothing, Bate has been disappointing recently, Jetta needs time in the 2's, Sylvia has played his one good quarter for the year and put the queue in the rack and Newton is just shit.
Robertson kicked five in the 2's today. He's hardly the future, but at the moment he could be the difference between competitive and uncompetitive up front. If nothing else he'll take the heat off Miller. Surely next week it's Robbo and THE CELEBRATOR in - Jetta (omitted), Newton (shot dead).
There was a lot of "we're being rorted by the umpires" feeling going on. I'll admit there were a couple of slightly dodgy ones, but I don't think it explains Newton the tit missing two sitters and McLean hoofing the ball into the hands of the opposition at every opportunity.
Finally I don't usually care for the opposition, even to the extent of learning who half their players are, but Adelaide aren't particuarly good are they? Everything else is going to overshadowed by our floppy forward performance, but it's not just me who thinks they weren't very good today is it? Granted our defence played well, but all over the place they were just ordinary. Restricting a slopfest to a tiny score is one thing, but can they really hang their hat on it given the abysmal state our forward structure is in?
That's it. I have nothing more to say.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal
5 - Brent Moloney
4 - James Frawley
3 - Aaron Davey
2 - Jared Rivers
1 - Lynden Dunn
Buggered if I'm giving votes to Turnover Machine McLean. Everyone else will, but 28 possesions mean nothing when kicks are in the minority and hardly any of them hit a target. Eight tackles are great, but they don't get you in single handedly. See also Jones, Nathan.
Leaderboard
12 - Aaron Davey
9 - Brent Moloney
8 - Brad Green
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year and LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean
4 - Matthew Warnock, Stefan Martin, Brad Miller, James Frawley
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce
2 - James McDonald, Jared Rivers
1 - Matthew Bate, Lynden Dunn
Crowd Watch
14,000 my arse. That's the dictionary definition of 'seasonally adjusted'. Imagine if the weather had turned out like it was supposed to? The place would have been empty.
Chief nutbag of the day was the woman behind me who spent all four quarters yelling "COME ON CROWS [pause] COME ON!" every five seconds. By full time she'd become a cult hero.
Armoured Personnel Carrier Corner
Fact: I'd rather win five games than four.
Fact: We're not good enough to win five anyway.
Outcome: Pro and anti-tank factions are happy even if they do want to cut each other's throat.
Numerology Corner
In case you're wondering Stefan Martin isn't the only person ever to change to a higher number during their career (excluding people who changed back to a previous number like Farmer in '99). One of Sydney's cavalcade of nobodies in the 80's tops everyone.
1985 - #46
1986 and 1988 - #12
1989 and 1990 - #33
1991 - #50
Now, Darren McAsey was hardly likely to be anyone's favourite player anyway but imagine trying to keep up with that on your jumper?
Incidentally if you're old enough to remember the 80's and early 90's but want to completely confuse yourself just look at some Sydney teamsheets from that time. You are guaranteed to see names that you've never seen before in your life. I'm not talking about cult figures like Sanford Wheeler and The Indian Rubber Man Jamie Lawson - I'm about Brett Page, Aldo Dipetta and the briefly glamorous Jim West. Speaking of briefly glamorous - Shane Fell - 1 season, 30 goals and goodbye. That's odd.
Perhaps the hapless Brisbane Bears of the late 80's are more your go? Try 1992's Adam Kerinaiua, or Rudi Frigo? How about 203cm monster Ian Kidgell or his svelt 60kg colleague Corey Bell? Me, I'm a Richard Umbers man myself.
Can't decide? Then Matthew AhMat is your man - 8 games, 8 losses spread between both great teams.
Mind you, let's be honest, does anyone other than a Melbourne fan have the slightest idea who Scott Simister was. And what exactly did Haydn Robins do for two seasons before he was flogged to Richmond as part of our ongoing 'talent' exchange scheme (Chris Sullivan, John Howat, Michael Pickering, Clay Sampson, Strawbs O'Dwyer, Phil Egan, Simon Eishold, Ross Funcke et al)
See, wasn't that a great deal more educational than anything you saw (or didn't) at the game today? Forget this season, how about a sponsorship from Name a Game to write reviews of early 90's matches instead?
Next Week
God help us all it's Geelong at the far more sensible time of 2.10 on Sunday. Make no mistake, they won't be as charitable as the Crows were in keeping the scores down. In fact they're likely to slap the living bejesus out of us. Remember 1 billion to nothing at quarter time last year? I guess if that's all you have to beat then it shouldn't be too bad a day.
If I was playing Fantasy Selection Committee it would be (*drum roll*)
IN: Robertson, Maric, Spencer, Wonaeamirri
OUT: Jetta, Newton, Sylvia, Johnson
Maric didn't play in the 2's today, but I have a feeling that might have been as cover in case Bartram didn't come up after losing his dad yesterday (RIP). Showed enough at the end of last year to warrant a decent run of matches now, and what better time to come in then when we're face-to-face with the apocalypse? That'll be dandy for him.
Final Thoughts
That was nice. What time does the real game start?
Sunday, 19 April 2009
Bring Your Quarter To The Slaughter
Jubilant scenes on Brunton Avenue, 4.59pm
I don't need to tell you this, but the weight lifted off the shoulders by realising that you're not going to go 0-22 is amazing. The fact that it came against a unit imploding like a condemned building is not entirely important right now. Neither is the fact that if we'd played another two minutes we'd probably have lost. Like a horse that bolts to a massive lead in the Melbourne Cup and almost dies in the last 100m before winning by a nose it's the result that counts.
It's sad that it's come to this, but before we go any further I have to point out one important stat. That was the first game we have won in the first month of a season since 2006. Even then we had to wait until Round 4. You remember, Rivers copping the worst 50m penalty of all time in the longest 4th quarter EVER and we eventually made the 8. Today the 50's were deserved, the quarter was short as and we certainly won't make the 8 but it was still satisfying.
Let's be quite honest, the first quarter was one of the biggest slopfests you would ever have seen in your life. We gave away the first goal before the first bounce after Warnock biffed Morton, but other than that - and a couple of early misses for the Tiges - the story of the quarter was that the players of Fitzroy 1996 would have been hanging their heads in shame at some of the mistakes. It was absolutely comical football. Not only was the ball being butchered by almost everybody with extreme prejudice but even when we did get it forward we managed to hit the post four times. In a row. After he and Moloney both rushed shots they should have snaffled, Miller got the first to give us the lead going into quarter time.
The obvious lowlight of the first quarter was Brad Green's injury. Crunched in a perfectly fair contest (read: the AFL will probably issue a 92 week suspension) he looked at first like he was dead, then seemed ok. The radio called it concussion, then it was scans at the Epworth, then he was going for surgery for a broken jaw and is out for 8 weeks. Fark. I know I said it's easier to understand an injury when it takes place during a game but did it have to be to one of the few people we have who actually knows what they're doing? It seemed that he and Moloney were the only ones who could hit a target early on and I thought that without him we were rooted. Not so.
Unfortunately due to watching Green being carried from the ground many may have missed one of the more amusing errors in recent times. The Richmond guy (who? As if I care) picks the ball up in the centre, turns around and drops a 20m handball right into the hands of Jamie Bennell who doesn't have a Richmond player in the same postcode. Welcome to every blooper reel for the next ten years whoever you are.
The second quarter was like masterpiece theatre compared to the first. The Tigers continued to pile on absolutely comical errors and we managed to drag ourselves back to normality on-route to an eight goal quarter. For all my angst about him I have to admit that Colin Sylvia played an unbelievable quarter. Two running goals from outside 50, clean disposal and chase like a madman. He was making a mockery of the D-Grade reserves style stuff that Richmond were serving up. Suddenly as he kicked his second we were 34 points up 13 minutes into the quarter, and we were either set for a memorable victory or a heartbreaking capitulation.
Then they invented some sort of forward line structure and threw Richardson down there to take a few marks and got a few in the middle. You thought "oh god, here we go" but late goals for Bate - pretty much his sole contribution - and a last minute snap from Miller about a second before the siren gave us back a handy advantage.
As usual I don't pretend to know anything about football but tell me they wouldn't have gone a lot better had Richardson been playing up front for the whole four quarters? We were doing whatever we liked before he went up there and provided some sort of a target. It's very cute having him rumble around the wings picking up touches and almost winning the Brownlow but that means fuck all if your key forwards are for the tip.
Incidentally it was our best second quarter against Richmond since 1993. A game I remember extremely vividly because;
a) It's the biggest win I've ever seen us have
b) Jakovich and Andy Lovell (!?) kicked 8 apiece
c) A bird shit on my hand in the bottom deck of the Ponsford during the 3/4 time break. Very traumatic for a 12-year-old.
Other than Green's injury things were looking pretty positive. Bate didn't get near it until he kicked his goal and the Tiges started to look a million times better when they got their forwards right, but 31 points is the biggest half time lead we've had since Round 10, 2006. In a game we only won by 13 points (he says for dramatic foreshadowing purposes).
Then, after what surely must have been the biggest spray of all time from the soon to be unemployed Wallace, the Tigers came out and... copped the first goal. Their skills were indisputably better than they had been in the first half, but when Davey snapped one after about eight minutes and we were 38 in front it looked like party freaking time. Alas something must have snapped in their collective brains as they suddenly realised the gravity of the situation and started having a massive crack. While Richo still looked like their only truly dangerous forward we started to miss tackles and butcher the ball going forward and they took advantage of it with a couple of goals.
The enigmatic Newton missed a sitter from 25m out on a slight angle and then backed up thirty seconds later by kicking a goal on the run from 50m out to keep our lead at just under five goals. He's an interesting one Newton - in a way he played a great game today but is it wrong to expect more? His kicking for goal is generally shite, but do you take that for the surprisingly decent defensive intensity and the two goal hauls? Could have some sort of a future if he, and Miller, were packed off to the Self Confidence boot-camp but in reality there's a sign on his car space saying "RESERVED FOR J WATTS". Does he go for Robbo? At what point does Jurrah push for his spot? I was relatively satisfied with his game today - other than that miss from right in front - but he's got to crank things up a bit if he wants to be there next year. At least if he gets the arse he can join another Melbourne delistee Nick Gill in forming the "Awkward Tall Forwards with Mixed Returns" coterie group.
The last quarter was what you would officially describe as "nerve shattering". Only one down on the bench, but you'd think we'd had no rotation since the 2nd quarter as everyone stopped dead. They butchered their chances early on, but even with Warnock and Johnson double-teaming Richardson you just had the feeling that he was going to sink us. However, before that could happen Ricky Petterd basically saved the game with a heroic passage of play that should be on all sorts of highlight tapes. He threw himself backwards into an absolute meat mincer of a marking contest, hit the deck and still managed to lay a huge tackle on the Richmond bloke for holding the ball. Duly converted and a little bit of breathing room.
Ricky was good today. I still dispute the idea that he's the answer to small forwardry, but overall he's been quite good down there this year - and his kicking for goal is much better than expected. Interested to see what happens when Robertson comes back though.
In the end it turned out to be absolutely crucical as we really did stop dead after that. Deledio showed up and goaled after doing precisely nothing all day and Richo managed to get one on target to cut the gap back to 16 with about six minutes left. Cue arseholes the size of manhole covers in the stands - forget the distraught Richmond fans I think throwing it away from there would have caused me to neck myself. Richo botched another one (thanks son) and both Jetta and Newton had chances to ice the game but missed. 26 minute mark and the margin is cut to nine with a goal. There were only thirty seconds left (fuck countdown clocks, take a radio if you really want to know how long there is left) but when they went forward and Morton snapped at goal you just visualised somebody giving a free kick away out of the centre + 50 and having us lose the game. Happily he missed and even though the umpire chose not to pay the biggest dropping the ball IN HISTORY against Frawley in the dying seconds it wouldn't have mattered as we had it locked up.
Siren and wild scenes, tempered by the fact that we know we beat nothing, and a massive weight off our shoulders.
Crowd Watch
Strangely subdued performance by the Richmond fans in the top of the Olympic Stand. The wild comeback probably saved them from a bit of blood in the streets treatment on the day, but there's no telling what random animal waste is going to end up on the doorstep of Punt Road tomorrow morning.
The only person of interest was the guy sitting a row over from me who had obviously hit his frustration limit and spent four quarters abusing Richmond and calling for Wallace to be executed. A particular highlight was the tuneless rendition of their theme song with "Tigerland" replaced with the words "Gold Coast". Not sure exactly what it all meant but I could kind of feel where he was coming from. He was only about 30 so it's not like he can take any pride in Premierships won when he was 2 years old.
Other than that it was a look of shell shock all round. Poor bastards.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
So hard this one. Throw a blanket over most of the teamsheet, put it in a blender for three minutes, serve cold andcome out with this...
5 - McLean
4 - Miller
3 - Sylvia
2 - Petterd
1 - Bruce
Could have gone anywhere really. In fact on Big Footy I used my 12 votes on 12 different players. So, enormous apologies to (in order);
Davey, Dunn, Meesen, Newton, Moloney, Johnson, Frawley, Bartram, Bennell, Warnock, Rivers, Morton, Martin.
It's cruel, but it's good in the weeks where it's hard to even fill five spots. Which, let's be honest, happens far more often than weeks where there's too many to fit.
Pretty much everyone except Green, Bate and Jetta were major contributors. I was impressed at times by Nifty Nev - especially his spin out of traffic - but another 53% efficiency tells me he needs to develop more. At least he was responsible for our solitary front-and-centre crumbed goal of the year.
Leaderboard
With Green gone, and Cheney having dropped out of favor after a fast start the field is well open for the Jakovich and Seecamp. For those of you who give a rats the winning scores in the past have been;
Jakovich
2008 - 29
2007 - 34
2006 - 47
2005 - 38
Seecamp
2008 - 14
2007 - 16
2006 - 19
2005 - 10
Hilton
2008 - 17
2007 - 5
2006 - 10
2005 - n/a
No votes yet for the Strawbs O'Dwyer for ruckman. Johnson won with 13 last year, but nobody has come close to polling until the Meese today.
9 - Aaron Davey
8 - Brad Green
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year and LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Nathan Jones, Brock McLean
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brent Moloney, Stefan Martin, Brad Miller
3 - Ricky Petterd, Colin Sylvia, Cameron Bruce
2 - James McDonald
1 - Matthew Bate
Kasey Korner
Lost by 4pts to Port Melbourne in a random night game. Unfortunately I couldn't go, but by all accounts Robertson continued to get better. Still don't understand why Maric isn't playing seniors for us, and Jurrah continued his development.
More importantly in the 2's the Ayatollah of Rock and Rollah Watts made his debut. Allegedly solid and kicked a goal. Straight to the VFL 1's I say. It's pearls before swine having him play against thinly veiled suburban hacks in the reserves.
Next Week
Adelaide at the MCG in the absolutely bizarre timeslot of 4.40pm. Say f'ing what? No problems for me as I live next door to the ground and - frankly - have nothing better to do with my life but it's not exactly family or country supporter friendly. When is anything other than a Perth game scheduled in that timeslot? Another big handout from the twats at the AFL.
As for the game itself you'd think that even having just been bitchslapped by Geelong at home that they'd be too good for us, but we've got a good record against them at the MCG. I'm not going to put my house on a win but I would expect us to continue our good work from this week in preparation for the Geelong game.
Here's a visual representation of what that game will look like;
Cue our new forward line;
Final Thoughts
It's not the journey, it's the destination.
Tuesday, 14 April 2009
In The Event of a Major Disaster The Season Management Plan Will Swing Into Immediate Action
In order to avoid Demonblog being added to the Federal Government blacklist of tasteless and offensive websites I choose to focus mainly on the first quarter and a half of today's game. For the first few paragraphs anyway, then it's on for young and old.
To be honest I spent most of the second half with my head in my hands anyway, so expect even less than usual. I'd watch the replay to relive the fun but in a moment of rare quality control my television committed suicide rather than show it.
Any mention of today's first half must be prefaced by saying that Collingwood were sloppy and allowed us to do pretty much whatever we wanted - but my god it looked good when we did. Despite getting rumbled out of the centre from the first bounce we looked great running with the ball and were cutting the Pies midfield to shreds on route to *gasp* half decent delivery into the forward line. We comprehensively dominated the first ten minutes and there's was nothing they could do to stop it. Goals to Miller (on the second go) and Green put us 13 points in front and by quarter time we had not only kicked five goals in a first quarter at the MCG for just the second time in a year and a half but were looking like we were up to it as well. Traditional MFC style cock-teasing, or a beautiful glimpse into the future? You decide.
The Stefan Martin Experience (featuring Matthew Warnock) consistently rebounded the ball out of the defensive 50m cooly and calmly. Having seen the way they (and poor Col Garland) have played over the last couple of seasons depresses me that one of them wasn't around when we were good and relying on the likes of Nicholson for defensive 50 possessions. I'm dying to get Whelan back in there as well. Said it last week, will hopefully say it for the next five months but our backline is our best asset at the moment. It could all come crashing down, but a few fairly cut price selections have come off which is just the sort of luck we could do with elsewhere.
There was even a brief flash of centre bounce dominance where Spencer and Johnson started getting taps and winning the thing. In fact for the first fifteen minutes of the second quarter it looked as if there was some danger it was going to continue. Somewhere deep inside I was even warming up for a bit of GOF at the final siren. Even Collingwood's goals came mainly from our errors - if we'd been cleaner we'd have restricted them even further.
The best statistic was the one that had damned us so much the week before. 6 contested marks in the first quarter alone represented an increase of 5 on the entire four quarters of last week. Those marks, as much as anything else, contributed to the strong position that we found ourselves in early. SME fans rejoice, he top scored with two.
Unfortunately when you're in our position while you expect to give up a few goals from bad play, you've got to take your own chances sometimes to even it up. Nathan Jones ran to 50 just before the end of the quarter, after the Pies had gotten a big error-assisted run on, and sprayed it. Petterd had one in the forward line where he did everything he could despite being criminally outnumbered but didn't have any support whatsoever.
And that's where the joy ends. Summary - we spent a great deal of time playing a top 8 side off the park. Stop reading here, because after this it all goes horribly wrong.
Repeat - If you are of the persuasion who prefers to think that every sign is a good sign then you might want to look away now.
6 contested marks in the first quarter, 4 more in the next three quarters. Suddenly after we'd botched a couple of chances to get a mini-break in the 2nd quarter, and Cheney had sliced a kick straight onto Didak's chest to level the scores it all started going horribly, horribly wrong. Or more to the point it started going very right for the Pies.
Everyone knows they're a much better side than us and suddenly they decided to play like it. The first 45 minutes reminded me of the 2007 Queen's Birthday game when they sat back on our notoriously dodgy kick-ins all day and let us do whatever we wanted - resulting in a bag of 7 from Robbo (remember him?) and a shock victory. They weren't going to make that mistake again. Suddenly the pressure was turned up and we couldn't handle it. Possessions were flying everywhere and the backline was under siege. Ten minutes into the third quarter we were officially stuffed and looked out on our feet.
Once again it was the backline that saved us from a fearful massacre. The usual suspects were doing their best to keep the inevitable at bay, and Davey added another layer of calm to the defensive effort but like every other week of the last couple of years there's only so many times you can keep a superior team out before they make you pay. It's ok if you've got some sort of decent forward line, or can get the ball down there (think how badly Carlton and their toilet backline would have been in the last few years without Fev?) quickly and accurately. When the Pies started manning up and we lost the motivation to go quickly inside 50 we were stuffed.
None of Bate, Miller or Petterd can claim to have had a great day at the office but I refuse to actually blame any of them (except maybe Sylvia who was shite) because they were trying to deal with wonky delivery, being outnumbered and rarely - if ever - having somebody there to mop up the crumbs. As much as I liked Davey's game in the backline and midfield this is exactly the role he needs to be playing in the absence of Robertson and THE CELEBRATOR. It's all well and good to play well defensively but unless we kick a decent score that's not going to count for much. And, as in today's case, eventually the pressure on the midfield and defence will be too much and the other team will smash you.
The last quarter was an absolute disgrace, but what is there to write about that? We barely got hands on it enough times to do anything worth talking about. You knew that the world had turned on it's axis when Travis Cloke - a player so shit that I'm surprised we didn't swap the #1 pick for him - started kicking goals. Did that man seriously win a Best and Fairest? I can take the likes of Anthony and Didak cutting us to shreds, but when the bloke who has an accurate goalkicking record only because they don't count the 30% of OOF's and shots that didn't make the distance, starts strutting around like he's single handedly won the thing then it's time to pass the bucket around for a spew session.
I've almost hit the wall after the last two and a half years. Just two weeks in and footy has already becoming exceedingly depressing. Now I know what it's like to be a Richmond fan. I'm fully aware that we've got the likes of Grimes, Strauss, Blease and Watts to look forward to - as well as a couple of super high draft picks next year - but when you watch the likes of McLean and Sylvia go around does it give you any faith that we're going to find a genuinely game changing superstar anytime soon? Today was one of Brock's few bad games - and last week was another - but can we finally admit that Sylvia is never going to be anything special?
Heartbreaking to think that even if you traded some of these people for picks that we'd probably draft somebody even worse.
Speaking of Richmond I hope that somebody takes notice of their performance at Skilled Stadium today. Much like last year when we went down there in even worse circumstances and put up a credible fight, they played Geelong as a laughing stock today and came out with some credit.
In conclusion... at least we kicked accurately?
Rookie O Rama - Week Two
The (sometimes) Fantastic Four had their second starts for the following results;
Cheney - Not so great. Obviously had signficantly more respect paid to him by the Pies and struggled to get clean touches. Retains his place for now but could be in trouble when Whelan and Wheatley are back in the frame. Definate future though.
Jetta - Rotten day, highlighted by his failed attempt at a fingertip mark right in front of the oncoming Miller. Needs to go back to the 2's and work on things. Is a certainty to be dropped for next week if Wonaeamirri is right.
Bennell - Surely out for Whelan. Didn't do.. much? Hard to judge so far due to almost complete anonymity.
Spencer - Better than last week, but still got monstered in the centre. Sure he's lively around the ground but after a couple of botched kicks last week he has seemingly given up and taken to handballing it all over the shop instead. It won't happen but I still want to see if Meesen does any better. Needs time in the reserves to hone his craft and we're not exactly going anywhere that means we shouldn't at least try somebody else.
Johnson wasn't up to much either. I'd say a ruckman is going to be top of the shopping list at the end of the year.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
Difficult again due to there being a big fat cluster of 'decent' performances and no standouts. Davey comes out of it on top due to the fact that he kicks the bloody thing rather than constantly indulging in handball circle work like everyone else.
5 - Aaron Davey (24 kicks, 4 handballs. Will be instantly dropped for this serious breach of discipline.)
4 - The Stefan Martin Experience (I heart old octopus arms. Had novelty and junk time goals kicked on him but there should have been plenty more)
3 - Brad Green (Potentially the only player on the list good enough to waltz into any other team in the comp)
2 - Nathan Jones (Gets a heap of it, actually used it well occasionally. Needs to stop getting done for holding the ball every five seconds)
1 - Matthew Warnock (Reliability plus)
Apologies to Morton and Bruce who got a bit of it, and didn't butcher it too shockingly BUT hardly created any excitement.
Leaderboard
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year and LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Aaron Davey
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brent Moloney, Stefan Martin
3 - Brad Green
2 - James McDonald, Nathan Jones
1 - Ricky Petterd
Crowd Watch
I can, under oath, state that there were officially a significant amount more Collingwood fans there today - and not just in the spaz heavy top deck of the Ponsford either. We did seem to have the run of the bad decisions today, and didn't we hear about it? Chief critic was the guy two rows behind me who never actually managed a complete sentence and communicated in grunts and random words. When we got given the most obvious deliberate OOF in history you could hear the veins nearly burst out of his forehead.
Psychology Central
What we've seen from opposition fans in the last couple of weeks has been fairly typical of the position we're in. You can dredge up as many stereotypes about them as you like, but the fact of the matter is that we've got as many nutbags as anyone - the difference is that people really lose their mind when they play the percieved (actual in our case) worst team in the competition because they're scared to death of losing. Don't deny it, in the odd times when we've been good we've had the same feelings. I remember playing the Sean Charles led St. Kilda when they were at their lowest ebb and feeling like I was going to hurl for three quarters because they were beating us. There is a terror of being beaten by the bottom side that causes otherwise odd people to turn into raving monsters.
Sponsor Watch
Now that the Russians are on board how about a bit of this? Or a taste of this for opponents. Embrace the Russian lifestyle comrades.
Next Week
Port Adelaide at Football Park. And my, what a magnificent record we have there! Your correspondant will be live in Adelaide to see the horror unfold first hand. Never once in the history of this website have we won a game there - we haven't even got within 50 points since 2003 for gods sake.
UPDATE - A few hours later and with more time to think about the game I think that I've reached the "brace for slop" level already and will comfortably ride out the season in a wave of depression.
Of course everyone else knew that this would be the case before the start of the year but for some stupid reason I tried to convince myself that we were going to pull off a miracle and not finish in the bottom four. Now it's clear that we will and I'm just... shattered.
But sometimes what happens on the field pales into comparison with what happens off it.
THREE Collingwood fans were arrested for allegedly bashing a Demon player's father outside the MCG after the game yesterday.
Witnesses said they were sickened by what they described as an unprovoked attack on Brad Jones, the father of Demon Nathan Jones, as he was leaving the ground with son Zac, 14, after the Magpies' 53 point win.
Witnesses said the Collingwood supporters were abusing Melbourne fans outside the ground before allegedly punching Mr Jones in the face and upper body as Zac watched on in shock.
During the brawl one of the attackers lost his shirt as Mr Jones tried to defend himself.
Police arrested three men at the scene about 5pm.
A crowd gathered to watch the arrest and Pies and Demons fans swore at the men in disgust, witnesses said.
The sad thing is you're only reading that because of the connection to a player. That sort of shit shouldn't happen to anybody but it does. The sooner that spastics of all variety are cleansed from the football community the better. They certainly need to have a look at the way they serve alcohol to all comers.
To be honest I spent most of the second half with my head in my hands anyway, so expect even less than usual. I'd watch the replay to relive the fun but in a moment of rare quality control my television committed suicide rather than show it.
Any mention of today's first half must be prefaced by saying that Collingwood were sloppy and allowed us to do pretty much whatever we wanted - but my god it looked good when we did. Despite getting rumbled out of the centre from the first bounce we looked great running with the ball and were cutting the Pies midfield to shreds on route to *gasp* half decent delivery into the forward line. We comprehensively dominated the first ten minutes and there's was nothing they could do to stop it. Goals to Miller (on the second go) and Green put us 13 points in front and by quarter time we had not only kicked five goals in a first quarter at the MCG for just the second time in a year and a half but were looking like we were up to it as well. Traditional MFC style cock-teasing, or a beautiful glimpse into the future? You decide.
The Stefan Martin Experience (featuring Matthew Warnock) consistently rebounded the ball out of the defensive 50m cooly and calmly. Having seen the way they (and poor Col Garland) have played over the last couple of seasons depresses me that one of them wasn't around when we were good and relying on the likes of Nicholson for defensive 50 possessions. I'm dying to get Whelan back in there as well. Said it last week, will hopefully say it for the next five months but our backline is our best asset at the moment. It could all come crashing down, but a few fairly cut price selections have come off which is just the sort of luck we could do with elsewhere.
There was even a brief flash of centre bounce dominance where Spencer and Johnson started getting taps and winning the thing. In fact for the first fifteen minutes of the second quarter it looked as if there was some danger it was going to continue. Somewhere deep inside I was even warming up for a bit of GOF at the final siren. Even Collingwood's goals came mainly from our errors - if we'd been cleaner we'd have restricted them even further.
The best statistic was the one that had damned us so much the week before. 6 contested marks in the first quarter alone represented an increase of 5 on the entire four quarters of last week. Those marks, as much as anything else, contributed to the strong position that we found ourselves in early. SME fans rejoice, he top scored with two.
Unfortunately when you're in our position while you expect to give up a few goals from bad play, you've got to take your own chances sometimes to even it up. Nathan Jones ran to 50 just before the end of the quarter, after the Pies had gotten a big error-assisted run on, and sprayed it. Petterd had one in the forward line where he did everything he could despite being criminally outnumbered but didn't have any support whatsoever.
And that's where the joy ends. Summary - we spent a great deal of time playing a top 8 side off the park. Stop reading here, because after this it all goes horribly wrong.
Repeat - If you are of the persuasion who prefers to think that every sign is a good sign then you might want to look away now.
6 contested marks in the first quarter, 4 more in the next three quarters. Suddenly after we'd botched a couple of chances to get a mini-break in the 2nd quarter, and Cheney had sliced a kick straight onto Didak's chest to level the scores it all started going horribly, horribly wrong. Or more to the point it started going very right for the Pies.
Everyone knows they're a much better side than us and suddenly they decided to play like it. The first 45 minutes reminded me of the 2007 Queen's Birthday game when they sat back on our notoriously dodgy kick-ins all day and let us do whatever we wanted - resulting in a bag of 7 from Robbo (remember him?) and a shock victory. They weren't going to make that mistake again. Suddenly the pressure was turned up and we couldn't handle it. Possessions were flying everywhere and the backline was under siege. Ten minutes into the third quarter we were officially stuffed and looked out on our feet.
Once again it was the backline that saved us from a fearful massacre. The usual suspects were doing their best to keep the inevitable at bay, and Davey added another layer of calm to the defensive effort but like every other week of the last couple of years there's only so many times you can keep a superior team out before they make you pay. It's ok if you've got some sort of decent forward line, or can get the ball down there (think how badly Carlton and their toilet backline would have been in the last few years without Fev?) quickly and accurately. When the Pies started manning up and we lost the motivation to go quickly inside 50 we were stuffed.
None of Bate, Miller or Petterd can claim to have had a great day at the office but I refuse to actually blame any of them (except maybe Sylvia who was shite) because they were trying to deal with wonky delivery, being outnumbered and rarely - if ever - having somebody there to mop up the crumbs. As much as I liked Davey's game in the backline and midfield this is exactly the role he needs to be playing in the absence of Robertson and THE CELEBRATOR. It's all well and good to play well defensively but unless we kick a decent score that's not going to count for much. And, as in today's case, eventually the pressure on the midfield and defence will be too much and the other team will smash you.
The last quarter was an absolute disgrace, but what is there to write about that? We barely got hands on it enough times to do anything worth talking about. You knew that the world had turned on it's axis when Travis Cloke - a player so shit that I'm surprised we didn't swap the #1 pick for him - started kicking goals. Did that man seriously win a Best and Fairest? I can take the likes of Anthony and Didak cutting us to shreds, but when the bloke who has an accurate goalkicking record only because they don't count the 30% of OOF's and shots that didn't make the distance, starts strutting around like he's single handedly won the thing then it's time to pass the bucket around for a spew session.
I've almost hit the wall after the last two and a half years. Just two weeks in and footy has already becoming exceedingly depressing. Now I know what it's like to be a Richmond fan. I'm fully aware that we've got the likes of Grimes, Strauss, Blease and Watts to look forward to - as well as a couple of super high draft picks next year - but when you watch the likes of McLean and Sylvia go around does it give you any faith that we're going to find a genuinely game changing superstar anytime soon? Today was one of Brock's few bad games - and last week was another - but can we finally admit that Sylvia is never going to be anything special?
Heartbreaking to think that even if you traded some of these people for picks that we'd probably draft somebody even worse.
Speaking of Richmond I hope that somebody takes notice of their performance at Skilled Stadium today. Much like last year when we went down there in even worse circumstances and put up a credible fight, they played Geelong as a laughing stock today and came out with some credit.
In conclusion... at least we kicked accurately?
Rookie O Rama - Week Two
The (sometimes) Fantastic Four had their second starts for the following results;
Cheney - Not so great. Obviously had signficantly more respect paid to him by the Pies and struggled to get clean touches. Retains his place for now but could be in trouble when Whelan and Wheatley are back in the frame. Definate future though.
Jetta - Rotten day, highlighted by his failed attempt at a fingertip mark right in front of the oncoming Miller. Needs to go back to the 2's and work on things. Is a certainty to be dropped for next week if Wonaeamirri is right.
Bennell - Surely out for Whelan. Didn't do.. much? Hard to judge so far due to almost complete anonymity.
Spencer - Better than last week, but still got monstered in the centre. Sure he's lively around the ground but after a couple of botched kicks last week he has seemingly given up and taken to handballing it all over the shop instead. It won't happen but I still want to see if Meesen does any better. Needs time in the reserves to hone his craft and we're not exactly going anywhere that means we shouldn't at least try somebody else.
Johnson wasn't up to much either. I'd say a ruckman is going to be top of the shopping list at the end of the year.
2009 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes
Difficult again due to there being a big fat cluster of 'decent' performances and no standouts. Davey comes out of it on top due to the fact that he kicks the bloody thing rather than constantly indulging in handball circle work like everyone else.
5 - Aaron Davey (24 kicks, 4 handballs. Will be instantly dropped for this serious breach of discipline.)
4 - The Stefan Martin Experience (I heart old octopus arms. Had novelty and junk time goals kicked on him but there should have been plenty more)
3 - Brad Green (Potentially the only player on the list good enough to waltz into any other team in the comp)
2 - Nathan Jones (Gets a heap of it, actually used it well occasionally. Needs to stop getting done for holding the ball every five seconds)
1 - Matthew Warnock (Reliability plus)
Apologies to Morton and Bruce who got a bit of it, and didn't butcher it too shockingly BUT hardly created any excitement.
Leaderboard
5 - Kyle Cheney (LEADER: 2009 Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year and LEADER: 2009 Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Aaron Davey
4 - Matthew Warnock, Brent Moloney, Stefan Martin
3 - Brad Green
2 - James McDonald, Nathan Jones
1 - Ricky Petterd
Crowd Watch
I can, under oath, state that there were officially a significant amount more Collingwood fans there today - and not just in the spaz heavy top deck of the Ponsford either. We did seem to have the run of the bad decisions today, and didn't we hear about it? Chief critic was the guy two rows behind me who never actually managed a complete sentence and communicated in grunts and random words. When we got given the most obvious deliberate OOF in history you could hear the veins nearly burst out of his forehead.
Psychology Central
What we've seen from opposition fans in the last couple of weeks has been fairly typical of the position we're in. You can dredge up as many stereotypes about them as you like, but the fact of the matter is that we've got as many nutbags as anyone - the difference is that people really lose their mind when they play the percieved (actual in our case) worst team in the competition because they're scared to death of losing. Don't deny it, in the odd times when we've been good we've had the same feelings. I remember playing the Sean Charles led St. Kilda when they were at their lowest ebb and feeling like I was going to hurl for three quarters because they were beating us. There is a terror of being beaten by the bottom side that causes otherwise odd people to turn into raving monsters.
Sponsor Watch
Now that the Russians are on board how about a bit of this? Or a taste of this for opponents. Embrace the Russian lifestyle comrades.
Next Week
Port Adelaide at Football Park. And my, what a magnificent record we have there! Your correspondant will be live in Adelaide to see the horror unfold first hand. Never once in the history of this website have we won a game there - we haven't even got within 50 points since 2003 for gods sake.
UPDATE - A few hours later and with more time to think about the game I think that I've reached the "brace for slop" level already and will comfortably ride out the season in a wave of depression.
Of course everyone else knew that this would be the case before the start of the year but for some stupid reason I tried to convince myself that we were going to pull off a miracle and not finish in the bottom four. Now it's clear that we will and I'm just... shattered.
But sometimes what happens on the field pales into comparison with what happens off it.
THREE Collingwood fans were arrested for allegedly bashing a Demon player's father outside the MCG after the game yesterday.
Witnesses said they were sickened by what they described as an unprovoked attack on Brad Jones, the father of Demon Nathan Jones, as he was leaving the ground with son Zac, 14, after the Magpies' 53 point win.
Witnesses said the Collingwood supporters were abusing Melbourne fans outside the ground before allegedly punching Mr Jones in the face and upper body as Zac watched on in shock.
During the brawl one of the attackers lost his shirt as Mr Jones tried to defend himself.
Police arrested three men at the scene about 5pm.
A crowd gathered to watch the arrest and Pies and Demons fans swore at the men in disgust, witnesses said.
The sad thing is you're only reading that because of the connection to a player. That sort of shit shouldn't happen to anybody but it does. The sooner that spastics of all variety are cleansed from the football community the better. They certainly need to have a look at the way they serve alcohol to all comers.
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