Friday, 9 March 2018
The only thing we have to fear is The Fear itself
Never before have I needed an off-season to end like this one. Every new story about what novel/unique/shithouse 'innovations' the AFL is about to introduce has driven me a step closer to locking myself in the house, creating a little fort from couch cushions and watching the season on TV. Ironically, that is probably exactly what they want me to do. I'm waiting to find out that this is all just to distract us from somebody famous being revealed as a massive nonce
As a trial run for my future as a bitter and twisted shut-in, I declined the option of a three hour round trip to Casey and hovered over my television with emoji style 😍 eyes bursting out like a Warner Brothers cartoon character whenever Christian Petracca touched the ball. After another week being made to feel stupid for following a sport that is apparently no good in its current format (while simultaneously having the fourth largest average crowd of any league in the bloody world) his performance was a timely reminder that there are very good reasons to plaster on a fake smile and keep plowing through until the flag exit strategy pays off.
Wasn't life simpler before the football 'industry' became a 24/7/365 race to force everyone in Australia (and if you believe delusional fantasists, soon the world) to pay attention to the AFL? It's at least partially my fault for being sucked in, if I didn't follow the news I'd never know what they were proposing until it happened. Just like it used to be. One year I didn't even know we'd played our first pre-season game until after it happened. Now after 11 seasons of being emotionally all-in on the idea of Melbourne winning meaningful silverware I've got a sinking feeling that it won't happen until we're playing 11-a-side games on pontoons in the Bay of Bengal.
Instead of changing everything, what about looking at simple solutions to supposed problems. Here's a free idea on how to save a few seconds every week, make players give the ball back to the umpire when it's at their feet instead of treating them like servants. One mannerless shitbag Saints player ran across the line with the ball in his hand during the third quarter, then dropped it at the boundary umpire's feet and walked off. The counter suggestion would be to just abolish the throw-in entirely, and I was pleased that Paul Roos brought some much needed sanity to this discussion of that topic by pointing out how it would just create more congestion. The centre bounce itself can do one, but I'm willing to punch on (not sure with who) until the cows come home to save stoppages.
If you're hopelessly in love with a club that plays in it, the carnies in charge of the Australian Football League have got you over a barrel. Slaughtering the head of the league probably pre-dates Sir Kenneth Luke, but for all the abuse we used to pile on Demetriou at least he tried to turn a blind eye to outrageous tanking and cut us a massive rescue cheque before we ended up in deep financial shit. Somewhere along the line the AFL has become the neediest, most insecure sporting organisation in the world - not even trying to conceal their desperation to have anyone from overseas pat us on the head and tell us how good we are. Some argue that we have to get foreign money into the game, I say bring back the days where players lifted bricks until 5pm and played footy on the side.
Lots of people were prepared to go along with AFLX as a bit of pre-season fun, but how can you trust the motives of a competition where the CEO is spinning shit like this? Now they're using puppet media outlets to set up the idea of rewarding mid-table mediocrity with a wildcard round. Because the only criteria you need for AFL House to take an idea seriously is that they do it in America. Next they'll be supporting rampant gun crime. In the immortal words of legendary sports broadcaster Alan Partridge:
I'm not just tense about the ongoing threat of city hall committing cultural vandalism on a game that's not theirs to ruin, there are other factors contributing to my malaise. For one, The Fear is back. It's a different strain to the 2013 variety when I thought we were about to be wound up, now I'm terrorised by the prospect of what on paper could (COULD) be a golden generation not reaching their potential. I can't even picture winning a flag, so for now I'm willing to settle for one token finals appearance as part reward for the thousands of hours of unholy tripe I've watched since 2007. Anything else would be a welcome bonus.
That's why Round 23 - the new 186 - hurt me far more than I let on. It's why I was on the floor, throwing my dignity out the window and screaming at Adelaide to kick goals against West Coast like my life depended on it. Psychologists would have a field day with me at the best of times, but this was a special occasion. I just needed one monkey off my back before concentrating on the rest. Now we've got the wait another six months to even try and erase that stain. And if it doesn't work this time that's another year, and then another, and the next thing you know it's all over. There's a reason I have this hanging above my desk - it's my life story.
I expect to die unfulfilled, but with the usual caveats and exemptions about the pre-season, watching this made me believe in a life-altering season more than any time since momentarily hitting the top of the ladder in late 2005. Ironically just as this happens I'm suffering a midlife crisis over no longer being young, carefree and fantastic, and am seriously considering grabbing at money like somebody in one of these and returning to shift work. As I watched us carve the Saints like a Christmas ham in the first quarter I had second thoughts about this approach. Imagine going through every fluctuating emotion since Brock McLean's R1 2007 broken leg and becoming unavailable for anywhere between one and all games in the (potential) glory years? If we could just storm to a surprise Footscray/Richmond style flag immediately that would be wonderful.
That I can even stretch to dream of a shock premiership run is enough to have me breaking out in lumps. To ensure not getting too far ahead of myself, I read encouraging season previews like this and try to remember that the perceived great leap forward is being judged on keeping the most important players upright for 22 games. Our depth has improved beyond fish pond levels, but we're still as vulnerable as anyone to an injury assisted crash. If the casualty list is short like 2016 then I think we can overcome the death march run home to make the finals. If players drop like flies like last year we'd want to be deeply ensconced (!) inside the eight on return from the Darwin game against Fremantle.
Even nearly 24 hours later I'm still confused at how much notice to take of what happened. St Kilda has more no name products than Aldi, including several who look like they'd be right at home in an 80s pub brawl, but it still can't have been anywhere near their best 22. Not that it was our top side either (sans Viney, Anal-Bullet and Sizzle Sr at a minimum + Harmes and Lewis if you're generous), but close enough to. Besides, I'm not worried about beating fellow middle of the road teams, it's the top sides and the shitboxes that concern me. Viney might miss Round 1 due to his dicky foot, but for now we can cover him to a reasonable level. Corey Maynard is not Jack Viney, and never will be, but nor is he flotsam that we have to play because there's nobody else available.
The most important thing about the second match of a series sponsored by a company nobody's any the wiser about two years later, is that nobody got seriously hurt. The second most important was the occasional lightning flash of brilliant football that makes you throw your arms in the air and ask where this has been for the last decade of your life. And because I'm always looking for an out to explain why we won't succeed, I hope we don't look back at the way our defence fell to bits when Sizzle Jr went off with a sore back and go "ahh, we missed that hint". The saving grace here was St Kilda kicking into the forward 50 like they were all drunk.
It was practically a re-run of our much higher stakes game against them in Round 21. We dashed off to a solid lead by quarter time, then slowed down, unexpectedly died in the arse during the third quarter, and recovered to win reasonably comfortably. The key difference is that only 4500 people turned up to see it, some of whom are probably still trying to recover their car from a cavernous pothole in the 'car park'.
Those of you who remember Chris Dawes winning our goalkicking with 20 - each of them harder fought than a World War I trench battle - will understand just how important it was to see multiple players providing goalkicking options. There was a bit of that last year, but we couldn't maintain it long enough to build a thumping percentage to insulate against a shock final round collapse. Now we must take advantage of our increasing power to merrily kick the shit out of a few plankton sides, and ensure that in the event of a tie after 22 games we're not reliant on other teams to win or lose by certain margins.
I can't get across how much I enjoyed Petracca's game without being arrested for public indecency, but everything you need to know about him as a super-weapon was demonstrated in our first goal. We flipped the script by torching another team on a quick break, but it still might not have turned into anything if Truck hadn't strong-armed his opponent out of the way to set up an open goal. Then after ripping the Saints from arsehole to breakfast in the first quarter he went into the middle and did them over there as well. What. A. Man.
At one point he found himself deep in the forward pocket and hit some weird, inverted torp that centered directly to an unguarded Bernie Vince. I can only think he was really having a shot and it accidentally found a free player, but am willing to entertain the prospect that like a quick Hamburglar handball off the deck he actually has sixth sense vision and meant it. He is my football fantasy - I'm even keen on his bullshit novelty NBA celebration routines with Oliver. If you're going to do anything that annoys opposition fans, make it something that only happens after a goal.
It was quite a night for players from the Petracca draft - McCartin and Brayshaw both played promising games after a shocking run with injury, and avoided the instant 000 scenario of crashing into each other. Gus is behind because of all the footy he's missed, but has the general building blocks of an excellent player. On the other side McCartin played the game of his life to earn a nomination in the Kingsley Klub pre-season XVIII.
We temporarily conceded the lead via two quick goals, one from an absurdly random free kick directly in front of goal, but that was effectively the last anyone saw of the Saints until the siren went. The rest of the quarter was a Harlem Globetrotters style exhibition of effortless, funky ball movement that made you fall in love with the sport all over again. When we didn't score instantly, St Kilda defenders would be tormented by a much welcome torrent of forward pressure.
Every once in a while they'd get a break from us clobbering them and escape the 50, only to blow their chance with horrible service to the forwards. We would then bounce down the other end, where a rotating cast of characters would thump through a goal. It's hard to fault an eight goal quarter, but when it happens in the first there is a nagging sense that you're never going to have it as good again for the rest of the day. Unless you were playing us when we were total wank. After goals from Garlett and Melksham x2, Tyson, Vince from Petracca's mystery ball and Fritsch people started to forget Jack Watts ever played for us.
If you were watching any other club you'd think a landslide was on, but with Melbourne you knew the inevitable correction couldn't be too far away. When they kicked the goal right at the end of the quarter I had that familiar "oh here we go" feeling. Realistically in a trial game it shouldn't have mattered if we did throw away a good start, but after going 6-1 in the last three pre-seasons (+3 if you consider AFLX legitimate) I've become accustomed to the good life. Before Round 1 starts at least.
To nobody's surprise we didn't carry on after quarter time, but even with the game slowed down and the opposition finally deciding to turn up the margin kept going up. They were a much tougher proposition, now but were still attacking like it was the first time they'd ever played the sport. If you've been paying close attention to our AFLW side you'd have recognised the 'hit it and hope' method, which was about as successful for them as it has been for our women in 2018. We chucked in a bit of that as well, but it was balanced by well worked goals and Oliver effortlessly fanging them through.
The brakes went on the outright rampage of the first quarter, but we still extended the lead into half time. I'm still not comfortable writing about us like we're a good side, which is why the third quarter was a handy reality check. First there was a half time interview between Simon Goodwin, and Garry Lyon wearing an implausible barnet that looked like fibre optic cabling. No AFL coach has said anything important in public since Mick Malthouse berated Mark Stevens so we were never going to learn anything remarkable. The only thing I got from it, other than the National Broadband Network running across Gaz's fringe, was that as much as Goodwin put a brave face on talk about the cancelled camp debacle he was still filthy about it.
Instead of matey Dorothy Dixers, Garry should have known the interview would be played at half time and asked - no matter how long ago it was recorded - why there's always one quarter where we roll over and die with scant resistance. He would have looked like an oracle. Given that our backline was practically at full strength it's concerning that they burst like a squashed bug the moment McDonald was packed away. It wasn't entirely their fault, we lost what had been complete dominance of the stoppages and the Saints decided to take their time looking for targets instead of panic bombing to a contest. Result - several players in red and blue standing around like traffic cones while St Kilda forwards roamed free as a bird.
Before you had time to breathe we'd copped six goals and had blown a 39 point lead. This is the point where somebody will bemoan the absence of Lewis under the assumption that he'd have applied some sick leadership shit to stop it. If that's the case he must have been distracted when Collingwood were fisting us in the first quarter last year. For many years the task of trying to calm everyone down would have fallen to Nathan Jones, but he was barely seen all night. The idea of becoming a good side without him suffering another crushing neck injury from carrying everyone on his shoulders is alien to me, but for the first time I really suspected that the rising tide might sink him. In the meantime I'm sure he welcomes the opportunity to become just a cog in the wheel rather than the straw that stirs the drink.
Their momentum was finally halted by accident, with Jake Melksham sliding through a perfectly legitimate attempt to gather the ball and straight into Jack Steven's ankle. Jeff Garlett steadied the ship not long after, and we were back in front at the last change. Any rational human could understand that Steven's injury was a racing accident, which is why David "What have you got to worry about Melbourne fans?" King suggested it was the perfect example of why the sliding rule was so important. There was not a hint of irony about it, nor did any of the umpires feel strongly enough to pay a free at the time. He was not as vocal about an incident earlier in the game where Mitch Hannan was pinged for desperately lunging onto the ball and having a Saints player run into his head.
Speaking of people who've had their head run into, the last quarter opened with a fortuitous bullshit free to Brayshaw right in front of goal. Josh Wagner must have felt guilty about it, because the first time the ball went down the other end he tackled somebody in the face to give it back. That was St Kilda's lot, Gus got a second, Hannan another as a direct result of a nervy fumble, then Bugg turned up his own in the square for a third.
Other than a rancid miss in the first quarter I was happy with Bugg, his forward pressure was excellent. Doesn't mean he's a Round 1 starter, but it makes a change to have capable players waiting in the wings. I enjoy how now every time he goes near it they have to talk about him punching that Sydney bloke in the head as if he committed a human rights violation. Bad luck getting six weeks for a badly aimed jumper punch, but let's not lose sight of the fact that the victim played 84% of the next game when painting Bugg as the second coming of Jack the Ripper.
To add to the general fiasco that is my personal year 2018 to date, I missed the next five minutes when the excitement of the JLT Community Series caused our electricity to lose the plot. I don't know if you've ever tried to restart a Foxtel box after a quick power outage, but it's like waiting for paint to dry. If it happened in the fourth quarter of a real game I'd punch on, so that's a great advertisement for why I have to keep going to live matches. I half expected to come back and find we'd conceded five, or that everyone had done a knee. Fortunately no. The most disastrous thing I saw as it returned was Billy Stretch buggering up a shot from the pocket.
As everyone went into self-preservation mode there was a quick Gawn injury scare, before it was revealed to be nothing more than cramp. Maybe it's because our performance had calmed my nerves, maybe it was because I was dying to go to bed and couldn't face the prospect of fretting about it, but I had a gut feeling when the injury was alleged that everything was going to be alright. And indeed it was, he gingerly went to the sidelines for some stretching and all was right with the world.
The last came courtesy of Hogan, whose two goal total didn't go near telling you how well he played. His work pushing up the ground was glorious. We don't need one man to kick 70 when he can play a part in setting up 100 for his teammates. I'm more than happy for him to go to CHF and kick as McDonald's lead. Even the idea is starting to make me sweat, I think I need to sit down and watch some 2013 'highlights' as the footy equivalent of a cold shower.
Paul Prymke Plate for Pre-Season Performance votes
5 - Christian Petracca
4 - Max Gawn
3 - Clayton Oliver
2 - Jesse Hogan
1 - Dom Tyson
Apologies to Brayshaw, Garlett, Lever and Bugg.
Surprise Leaderboard
The award that would not die. I said it would only be awarded if two or less players were tied at the top, and here we are. Congratulations to Maximum Truck on their win.
7 - Max Gawn, Christian Petracca
5 - Alex Neal-Bullen
4 - James Harmes
3 - Clayton Oliver
2 - Jesse Hogan
1 - Bayley Fritsch, Dom Tyson
Banner Watch
St Kilda made the contest easy by not bringing one. 2-0 Dees for the pre-season.
The week after next
Via a Casey vs Box Hill practice match next week it's off to Round 1, and god may have mercy on our souls. Notwithstanding Geelong sending out a reserves team and being thrashed by Gold Coast I'm not entirely convinced by them as premiership contenders. However, I'm less convinced about us on that front so I'm still assuming defeat. The obvious Melbourne thing to do is to beat them, then lose to Brisbane and North.
Final Thoughts
I'm riding an unprecedented wave of MFC-related positivity. If it all goes tits up from here I may end up bouncing off the walls of a rubber room.
Saturday, 3 March 2018
Uphill skiing
Talk about making life difficult for yourself. You'd think three weeks of holding opponents to 0.0 in the first quarter would have meant three thumping victories and the instant award of the premiership flag without the need for a Grand Final. Instead we've used the other nine quarters to come up with one narrow loss against rubbish, one thumping loss against rubbish and one thrilling win against a premiership contender. Just when you think you know the answers, this team changes the questions.
Crucially, this time when playing against a far better side we didn't just drop dead at the quarter time siren never to recover. There was some well suicidal play in the last few minutes, but you could forgive semi-pro players for running out of legs after nearly four quarters of thrashing into their opposition at maximum pace. I'm sympathetic to the people who don't watch this league because they're not keen on the standard, but for my money this game was a perfect example of why sometimes a brutal, full intensity slog is just as good as a free flowing, spirit of the game initiative rigged spectacle fest.
It's easy to be full of praise about our side when they narrowly held on to win for the first time in three weeks. But the washing away of some of the roadtrip from hell curse aside, how could any breathing human not love watching Daisy Pearce, Karen Paxman and Elise O'Dea at a minimum? That's a three player combo that almost ranks alongside the Jurassic Pack of 1998 Seecamp, Ingerson, and Shanahan in my heart. The nature of the competition is that every team will have its cohort of battlers (and if you're a Melbourne fan, is this new to you?) but those three are dynamite.
Obviously Daisy is the star attraction, and one day when DemonbracketW is an established competition I expect we'll just go back and retrospectively give her the 2017/18 titles she would have won in a landslide anyway. After being tagged to buggery last week, the captain climbed off the deck and played a blinding first half that helped set up the win. Then in the thick of the battle in the last quarter she was in everything to keep us in front, even quickly recovering from being flattened to be back in the play seconds later. What a legend.
I'm not used to having the most loved player in the land. And not a "Look, I'm wacky me. Wahey!" type like Robert Murphy who people say they ' love' just to seem more cultured. There's a reason I named a medal after her before she retired, and I can confidently predict that with allowances for there not being a senior football league until her late 20s that she'll be the first AFLW player to become a life member. Either that or I'm just unnecessarily excited over the prospect of unexpectedly re-entering the finals race when all seem doomed.
The opening of the game was more Freo than Collingwood, immediately on the attack and straight into the key performance indicator of wasting inside 50s. At least we were trying something different, as part of a post-National Lampoon's Vacation cull that also saw Laura Duryea and her comedy number ones get the boot, Alyssa Mifsud was dumped for a third time. She was replaced by charismatically named top draft pick Eden Zanker, who didn't do much other than a five minute period in the second quarter when she threatened to have the most electrifying debut since Brent Heaver. She didn't need to be the focal point, for once we did what other teams continually do against us and ripped a couple of goals out of nowhere.
After risking the reputation of that kid from the Chemist Warehouse ad by only ever kicking one career goal, Daisy took a quick handball off the ground and snapped around the corner for the opener. A few minutes later she did the same, presumably leading to the kid ripping off his Melbourne jumper like he was Hulk Hogan, running around the house like a madman and eventually realising that he doesn't need to stay in character because they're just going to repeat the old ad for years to come. The second goal came with the compliments of the enigmatic Aleisha Newman, who contested the mark, then followed up with a smother that created the opportunity. With not a single kick into space for her to run on to, Newman could have gone missing but compensated with a great forward pressure game.
Zanker's first chance came as the result of Karen Paxman doing something that you rarely see in an AFL game. The world has gone crazy for Dustin Martin fending people off with his arm, but Paxman quite literally just lifted the ball up and pushed it her opponent away with it. It deserved a goal just for novelty value. What happens if you stuff the ball straight into your opponent's head in that situation, is it a high contact free against?
Consistent with the last two weeks - other than the brief period of serious Collingwood dominance at the start last week - we constantly had the ball forward but couldn't make anything of it. On the other hand Brisbane never looked likely to score either, so Daisy's second snap for the second of the quarter was at least reward for effort, if not any comfort considering what had happened over the last two weeks. I was half willing them to score a point just so we wouldn't risk losing from an unloseable position yet again. On the other hand, the stats nerd in me wanted to join what must be an exclusive club of teams that have kept opposition clubs scoreless in the opening quarter three times in a row.
Based on recent experience the Brisbane coach probably didn't even give a team talk at the quarter time break and just sent his troops out safe in the knowledge that we'd probably get comfortable and self-destruct. Public expectation was half met, the good times surprisingly carried on as per the first quarter but less surprisingly weren't converted into goals. It wasn't just the usual desperate hit-and-hope stuff like Shaun Smith was down there, we'd also lost the ability to get the ball into dangerous places and create half chances. Naturally after piling the pressure on for several minutes we conceded. At least we kept it to that, while only scoring three behinds ourselves.
Brisbane has a solid team, but I think we can all agree that the best thing about them is the woman with the fierce mullet. Apparently it's being worn in full irony as part of charity fundraising, which is heart-warming but I was desperately hoping she was entirely serious and had no idea that it looked so hilarious. She's like what you'd get if a poxy sketch comedy program did a skit about bogans, and in this case I choose to suspend my disbelief and believe that it's real. She provided the Lions more than just a zany, party at the back barnet, calming Pearce down after her barnstorming first half. I'd like to think the attitude goes with the Prisoner Cell Block H style hair, and she spent the third quarter threatening to shank Daisy after lock up.
In a quarter where there must have been a record number of smothers, pressure acts and most likely whatever one percenters are, our best opportunity came when a loose ball bobbled towards Tegan Cunningham in the square with nobody in front of her. She was unable to manoeuvre her extra long leg to it on the bounce and it shot off her knee for another point. At the other end we were lucky not to concede a second goal when a Brisbane player walked through a flappy-armed attempt at a tackle then missed an open goal.
It was clear that our big forward line wasn't going to suddenly start pulling off a Wayne Carey style festival of contested marks, so we tried something else by benching Cunningham after half time. It might have worked, had Kate Hore not missed a sitter and Cranston's attempt to thrash one through from 40 metres gone wide. In what was obviously going to stay a low scoring game, we just needed to get six points on the board in one go instead of stringing it together with consecutive behinds and hoping we could keep the other side out. The story of our footballing lives was played out again when all the struggle was cancelled out by Brisbane kicking a goal against the run of play. I thought the men had a lot of stereotypical plays, but adjusted for shorter game length the women have well and truly got them covered.
Ironically after being downplayed at the start of the quarter, Cunningham turned out to be our saviour. With a second goalless quarter 90 seconds away, a long bomb by Shelley Scott dipped at the last minute and fell into her hands uncontested. From a slender angle she made it look difficult but converted. The glory was short lived, seconds later she had a head clash with a Brisbane player that left her sprawled on the turf, wearing the old crimson mask and probably thinking she was back in the WNBL.
Cunningham was never seen again, but nor was the Brisbane player who'd also necked herself in the contest. Given our struggles to kick a goal through a tall forward set-up them losing a defender was probably a better deal for us. She may have come in handy for stopping our first goal of the last quarter, created by Elise O'Dea cannoning through an opponent after a ball-up to clear space for Kate Hore to quickly snap one out of a pack. If you love crumb, this was the game for you. If you're keen on teams putting the opposition away when they had the chance, keep walking.
That goal extended the margin to 15, and if you thought we were home from there you've never watched a Melbourne team play. It shouldn't have come as a surprise that the killer blow was lacking here, two premiership matches ago you saw them fail to rack up handy percentage against Brisbane when given the chance. The handy points slowly disappeared, before the margin was cut to six by a series of escalating debacles. First Brooke Patterson - who otherwise played her best game yet - crossed the line while kicking in, then at the bounce our ex(hibition game player), and 2017 Casey Fields tormentor Sabrina Frederick-Traub legally shoved her opponent away, grabbed the ball and kicked a training drill goal.
That left us trying to defend a one goal lead for several minutes while clearly out of gas. Not surprisingly the ball spent most of that time camped in Brisbane's attack, as they tried to find the draw that would effectively seal their Grand Final spot at our expense. A desperate defensive effort, and one golden chance where the player didn't connect with her kick, kept them at bay.
The siren went with Daisy (who else?) trying desperately to get over the line while making it look like she wasn't trying desperately to get over the line. As she crossed it with approximately one second left a Brisbane player charged through and knocked the ball out of her hands while trying to tackle. She may have had a case for holding the ball - and a shot from an obscure angle after the siren to draw - if the tackle had connected, but the umpire denied her and was rewarded with a look that suggested she was going to shank the umpire with a broken bottle. I couldn't agree with myself more:
Sucked in pic.twitter.com/EUYNLuaujv— Adam 1.0 (@Demonblog) March 2, 2018
2018 Daisy Pearce Medal
5 - Daisy Pearce4 - Elise O'Dea
3 - Brooke Patterson
2 - Karen Paxman
1 - Lauren Pearce
Apologies in the one vote space to Hickey, Hore, Scott, Newman, Smith and Guest.
Leaderboard
And then there were the big three. Assuming for now that we've only got two games left to play, the line of doom makes its first appearance for the season and it will take something outrageous for Cunningham et al to get in the mix. It's not so much that they have to get maximum votes, the trouble is keeping the other three out of them.
14 - Elise O'Dea, Karen Paxman
12 - Daisy Pearce
6 - Tegan Cunningham
5 - Richelle Cranston
4 - Laura Duryea, Bianca Jakobsson
-------- Abandon hope ye below this line --------
3 - Mel Hickey, Brooke Patterson, Shelley Scott
2 - Meg Downie, Lily Mithen
1 - Erin Hoare, Lauren Pearce, Katherine Smith
Banner Watch
Brisbane didn't have one, so we could have had the players run through a roll of Sorbent with a slogan written in texta and still won. Dees recover from a sticky patch to go 3-2 for the season.
Commentary Corner
Against all odds I don't mind Leigh Montagna as a rookie caller, but he'll never get anywhere in this industry without littering his call with some catchphrases and/or hysterical screaming. Look at Jason Bennett, reduced to providing a solid, insightful call of VFL games while the likes of Brayshaw, Taylor and Zempilas go off like they're strapped to the electric chair. Speaking of Dwayne, I think Kate Sheahan might be his daughter not Mike's. Both of them bring to mind that line from The Simpsons, "do you ever think anything you don't say?" And for all the "oh no, I'm not complaining because she's a woman" anxiety when she called an AFL game years ago, Kelly Underwood is fine. Your views may vary, why not start a blog and tell everyone about it?
My review of the commentary is based on the final three quarters only, because for the first their audio mix was so out of whack that you could have had Darryl Eastlake yelling through a megaphone and he'd still have been drowned out by the crowd effects. With not a word of a lie I had my back turned at the first bounce, and when a spectactor starting banging together what were presumably those inflatable orange dickhead sticks I thought somebody was vigorously knocking on my front door.
Crowd Watch
Football fans, just because somebody offers you an inflatable plastic orange stick it doesn't mean you need to take it. More importantly, you're under no obligation to whack it together like a trained seal. Kids love it, but they also try to stick forks in electrical sockets unless you educate them properly.
Meanwhile, are you the person with the number 35 banner hanging over the fence that says #fansnotfriends? If so, could you explain what that means in relation to Cat Phillips? Is it some sort of obscure frisbee in-joke? Otherwise it just looks like overt stalking that will end in a restraining order.
Next Week
Carlton are (at the time of writing) 2-2 with a percentage of 55.7, and are likely to lose to Adelaide on Saturday night. We are now within striking range of Brisbane, and can get our destiny back in our own hands going into the last round with a big win. If that's not a recipe for disaster I don't know what is.
Late-breaking scheduling shenanigans pending, I should be making my AFLW live debut. Time to slap on an asbestos suit and see if they still have a washing machine sitting at the bottom of a staircase. Maybe a dodgy Asian betting syndicate will cut the lights to influence the result. Will anyone notice the difference?
As far as team changes go I can't see them messing too severely with a winning lineup. The only considerations for me are that I'd still rather Duryea in defence than Cordner, and Whitford didn't do much on debut. You wouldn't think they'd need to alter much to beat Carlton, but if we'd beaten sides that
Final Thoughts
Life goes on in AFLW land, and the great escape remains on if we do the sensible thing next week. The problem is that I'm almost certain Brisbane aren't going to make the same mistake that we did against Collingwood, and will most likely spread them from one end of Queensland to the other. Unless we finally click in attack and kick shit out of the Blues it might all be for naught. Watch this space.
Sunday, 25 February 2018
More of the good stuff, less of the bad stuff
Two days into our season the 2018 'Beat North in Every Format' redemption campaign is 66% complete. Now to rumble them by any means necessary in Round 3 and we can get on with having a realistic ping at the eight. To paraphrase that classic 90s banner - 'first beat North, then worry about the good sides'. Given that they've been good, bad and mediocre in the last 11 years and they've still beaten us every time I'm willing to take it.
In an abridged pre-season there's no room for messing around, so we went in with much of our best side. The only absolute certainties missing were former Demonbracket winners Viney and Jetta, plus Garlett, who might want to think about a Tonya Harding style clobbering for Bayley Fritsch during the week. On the other hand, nobody but enthusiasts know more than a handful of North players at the best of times so it's hard to tell whether their side full of workmanlike homebrand unknowns was anywhere near the best XVIII. That usually doesn't matter, they could donate one of their 250 different commemorative jumpers to a team of raffle winners and we'd spontaneously combust.
I spent the last week steadfastly refusing to accept that the season was about to start. Life was easier - but ultimately less rewarding - when you turned up in February expecting to see shite. Now I've been curled up in terror in all summer worried that we're somehow going to nobble ourselves and miss out on the much anticipated great leap forward. There was an amusing reaction to Mark Robinson suggesting we wouldn't make the eight, with people whirling into full siege mentality mode and hurling abuse at him. What right do we have to assume anything after last year? The underrated angle was him doing it in a video sitting next to David King, who famously told us to stop worrying and enjoy footy midway through last year. Various demonstrations of why we won't be comfortable until we're standing under a premiership flag were not far behind.
The traditional pre-season nerves hit me just as the coverage was about to start, only for Fox Sports to extract the piss violently by opening with a Round 23 'highlights' package about our great choke. Somewhere David King was realising exactly why the Veil of Negativity still clings to us like napalm. As much as I could have done without a reminder of what happened that weekend, it did focus me on what needs to be done this season. Batter sides that need to be battered, and always be hunting the opposition. Given our 10 Years of Terror against North (notwithstanding victory in a Kick-and-Clap picnic tournament), it would have been better viewing to spin a video of all the times they've stitched us up by margins big and small. Still, until we make up for the no tackles in 10 minutes game we deserve to be reminded of it at every available opportunity. You know you'd have a bad run when you're scarred by not having the chance to be Elimination Final cannon fodder.
Where better to start the climb back towards the eight than at the Casey Fields of the South, a windswept suburban park with the none-more-pre-season name of "Kingston Twin Ovals". For the purposes of historical record, could somebody confirm if we were playing on Twin Oval A or Twin Oval B? There was probably a Little Athletics meet going on at the other one. Either that or a swap meet, because the announced crowd was a flag year 1957, which would be our lowest pre-season turnout since 1200 idiots (including yours truly) watched us beat Richmond at Princes Park in 2007. Either it was a typo or the people of Hobart aren't as interested in the Roos as I thought. (Update - those in attendance suggest that even 1957 seems generous. I guess I'm just conditioned to expecting that people care about practice matches. Apparently not in Hobart.)
The suggestion that North weren't serious about winning was furthered by Brad Scott handing over the keys to somebody else and instead lurking around the back of the box menacingly. He'd already set up the novelty move of playing Majak Daw at full back against the Sizzle/Hogan Twin Towers, and spent most of the game sitting on a Bunnings plastic chair watching the chaos unfold. It wasn't the worst experimental move of all time, and his extendable hands bashed away a few inside 50s, but it showed the difference in where the teams are at. The most experimental thing we did was letting Clayton Oliver show up with a humorous haircut.
It hardly compares to the start of Round 1, but any anticipation for the start of the pre-season went out the window when the first bounce went violently askew. It was quite the anti-climax when I was all keyed up for a low-intensity rematch of the epic Gawn vs Goldstein World Heavyweight Championship contest from Hobart two years ago. Who are the knobs trying to shorten the length of play in a game when so much time is wasted re-doing horrible bounces? I'm usually against changing things for alleged spectacle improvements, but the bounce has had it. If everyone's so desperate to cater to consumers, theatregoers and wankers in Sydney, how are you meant to explain the wild bounce/recall scenario? Either that or just let the thing fling off in random directions and good luck to whoever gets an advantage.
After a second false start courtesy of an anti-Gawn free from the ball-up, the two put on another solid ruck clash. Goldstein is not the titan he used to be, but it was still a tough battle and by the end Max had won a decisive victory. Where are the joyless entertainment fanatics who want to abolish stoppages when this sort of fantastic battle is on? If you don't enjoy two enormous humans grappling for supremacy you may not have a pulse. Maximum was back at full strength, his taps and second efforts were a masterclass for aspiring ruckmen, and if he keeps doing that for the rest of the year uninjured it's going to give us a tremendous leg-up around the ground. We got away with not having him last year, and played some really good footy at times when he wasn't there, but a performance like this shows the difference between a competent backup and a master craftsman.
I've got plenty of respect to people who can properly tune out of pre-season games and not care what happens, but alas I'm not one of them. Not going to anything until Round 1 is as close as I'll get to being cool about the warm-up games, and when North went forward straight away the pessimist in me (and how could you not be one considering our most recent outing in a game of actual Australian rules football?) thought "oh Jesus, here we go again, we're going to lose to North here as well". If I was in a disaster movie I'd be the panicky idiot who runs around screaming "we're all going to die!"
Other than a few moments of light concern during the first half there was no need to be dramatic. Alex Neal-Bullen started the game like he was Alex Dustin-Martin and kicked the first goal, before turning provider for a dreamy lead by Sizzle Sr. The Bullet's pass was nice, and McDonald's finish was solid but it was the lead that made me quiver with ecstasy. Imagine teleporting back to 2013 and telling your past self that in five years' time you'd be as excited about Tom McDonald (under siege key defender, zero career goals) playing forward as Jesse Hogan (next big thing, great white hope, future injury victim). Old you would call the authorities and report a lunatic on the loose.
After looking much more dangerous than his attacking partner in the opening quarter, Sizzle went back to being a highly-functioning cog in the wheel as Hogan tormented a backline full of project players and nobodies. He still does quirky, alternative things that will surprise and baffle for years to come. There was one set shot so close he could have almost leant back and dinked it through with the lightest of touches, but instead took a run-up so excessive that he nearly had to catch the Spirit of Tasmania back. Then you look beyond those two behemoths and find Christian Petracca outmuscling champion rig owner Daw, see Bayley Fritsch running riot in senior company, factor in Mitch Hannan and Jeff Garlett and start to think that maybe things are going to turn out ok. If we can get the ball down there enough, and don't enough up getting scorched on the counter unless we score.
We looked the better side, both on-paper and on-field, but it wasn't all good news. The first Roos goal came after a clearly flubbed kick by Lewis, which somehow failed to factor into what was announced as a 100% disposal efficiency at quarter time. You'd have thought one of the commentators would have questioned it, but like newsreaders they will follow whatever's written on screen. One day on Sydney radio a lady dutifully read out text that finished with the phrase "like a bowling ball" (and you can guess the rest) because that's what the paper said. You could quite easily pull off the same prank on a footy commentator.
Lewis wasn't bad in the first quarter (before being packed away due to a minor injury concern), but I wouldn't bet my house on both he and Vince making it to Round 23 in the same backline. One of them fine, but somebody get out of the way for Neville Jetta and let's tighten things up instead of sending everyone up the ground to attack and being clocked whenever we lose the ball. My one game sample of Jake Lever since I started to pay an interest in him suggests he loves to wander up the ground as well, so I look forward to Nifty being called upon to rush back and try to stop his opponent several hundred times this year.
Vince did kick a goal, from one of those infuriating free kicks where the player crunches a perfect tackle but runs a fingernail across the other player's back and is penalised, but I hold significant concern for his chances of getting to the end of the year without a stint at Casey. I respect what he's done up to now, but given that we're developing a side with depth at last there's no need to drag two fading stars along for the ride. Lewis has an extra year on the contract so barring any injuries or radical changes of heart from him he'll get preference.
North's defence might have been about as fearsome as the one we once put out featuring Tom Gillies, but it's hard to deny we looked good going into attack. The problem was that in the most traditional Melbourne FC fashion we were terrifically vulnerable to quick kicks the other way catching us out, and were so ropey after turning the ball over that the preposterously named Billy Hartung's ability to run quickly scored him a nomination to join the Kent Kingsley Klub pre-season training squad.
The difference this time to most games, is that when we copped an end-to-end lightning speed goal in the last minute of the quarter we didn't just pack a man behind the ball to make flappy motions with his arms and try to stem the bleeding - we burst out of the middle and responded through the unusual duo of Maynard and Bugg. Swings and roundabouts. As long there's more (whichever is the good one) than (the bad one) we're heading in the right direction.
You couldn't argue with six goals in a first quarter, but more important was the way we got them. It wasn't just hit and hope stuff that was almost accidentally bundled through (and after intently watching four weeks of our AFLW team that was quite the relief), we were making them with solid, attractive play. This was with Oliver and his rude haircut being relatively well held, and Nathan Jones so quiet early on that I didn't think he was playing. At last there are options, and I pray to the footballing gods that we can stay fit enough that most of them aren't needed. Oliver did bust free of the shackles after half time, and some of his handballs in traffic were eye-watering. No matter how hard the tag is, they will never fully guard against him finding the ball in the middle of a pack and instinctively knowing exactly which direction to handball in and how hard. He is a mastermind.
Because the commentator was the erudite and sensible Anthony Hudson rather than a Dwayne Russell style shrieking banshee, the abolition of the nine point goal (somewhere Paul Wheatley wept) was treated as an irrelevant side-note to the game and only mentioned when somebody had a long shot. In contrast, Dwayne did the next game and mentioned it about 30 seconds in as if it was the biggest news since Cyclone Tracy. He must be in charge of the AFL website, they're still running a score box hopefully showing a column with zeroes as if they may come back at any moment. Mind you, they're also advertising games at possibly fictional grounds called LDV, MTB and TVL so who knows what's going on. I'm surprised they didn't put us at MTB just to set up Mt. Buller gags for tedious dickheads. Some poxy betting company Twitter account tried to do a snow gag and suggested we'd be calling off our September trips to Aspen, which would be fine if that wasn't still in the US summer. Aspiring Twitter comedians, know your limitations.
Nine goals in the first quarter was reminiscent of the shootout on the day of the original Gawn vs Goldstein battle, except that this time the side kicking into the breeze didn't spot the other a 40 point lead before having a go. In fact our goals were barely aided by wind, and it wasn't until the second quarter when the legally mandated raging Hobart gale to one end started up. It slowed down our scoring, just as the game was threatening to become a tribute to the NBL's late Hobart Tassie Devils who used to play just down the road. North certainly improved with the benefit of it, but only to the tune of cutting nine points from the quarter time margin. I hope for the sake of their fans (but ultimately don't care) that they had good players out, because I don't much fancy their chances of escaping the bottom four in this state.
What looked early like a Reverse Stranglewank, where we jump out to a big lead then collapse, was kept reasonably calm courtesy of a late goal by the impressive Harmes. And it was a lovely goal too, he started the attacking chain on the half-back flank, and charged down the other end to be on the end Bugg's centring pass. The Master of Buggery hasn't been given much credit since he lobbed that ill-advised haymaker against the Swans, but without his persistent efforts to keep the ball from going out of bounds the goal never happens. That was a theme of the day, other than the usual suspect North nutters like Cunnington and Ziebell we always wanted it more, he could have very easily let the ball roll out for a throw-in and made it somebody else's problem but was rewarded for fighting his heart out to try and keep it in.
Given the increasing strength of the wind it was no surprise that we improved our position at the start of the third quarter, most notably from a McDonald kick to Hogan in the square which suggests that if they stay fit it will be a lethal forward combo. Even if they were playing against a no-name defence the essentials of a great combination were there. Hulk was still content to hang out the back and try to strong-arm the opposition, but having one up the ground and one in front of goal on a rotating basis is going to be a great help.
North had one last gasp left in them, indirectly kicking a goal against the run of play courtesy of (SURPRISE!) a player standing on his own inside 50. By now the wind was blowing sideways, so he missed everything with the set shot, but from the resulting throw-in Lever was pinched holding the ball and they managed to convert at the second opportunity. I knew men's footy was back when that cut the margin to 19 and I was already fretting about who how we were going to go defending into the wind in the last quarter. Enter Max Gawn, putting a hit-out down James Harmes' throat for the reply goal not long after. That prompted North to declare their work was done, Hannan and AFLX Hall of Famer Melksham goalled immediately after and we were home with time to spare. Milkshake's goal came from a perfect ruck tap from Total Football Tom McSizzle, and my nerves reduced to a sensible pre-season level.
The sixth goal of the quarter came from the impressive Anal-Bullet (to the sound of somebody in the crowding saying "wow!" into an effects mic), and the Chris Sullivan Line was breached late by Bayley Fritsch. Whether the line should be extended when defending into a raging gale in the last quarter or not is debatable, we don't get that far in front often enough to perform situational testing. With all appropriate caveats for North's weakened team, it was pleasing that we did it without Oliver or Jones particularly prominent. Instead the unheralded XXX combination of Anal-Bullet and Long Dong Harmes were running riot. There is also an NQR nickname for Fritsch, but like Cameron Pedersen this is a family program so we're not getting involved in it.
I enjoyed how many of our scores punished North mistakes. Here's to that translating to the real stuff, our nufty disposal has fed percentages up and down the league for years and now I want to take revenge one team at a time. Our first goal of the last quarter was created by Mr Intercepts himself, but this time Lever gathered a loose ball to set up future Round 1 starter Fritsch and insulate us against a collapse. Shortly after Lever was left flat-footed by a quick kick over the top that led to a goal, but even though he looks like a lost member of My Chemical Romance you'd expect based on this that we'll get our money's worth out of him.
The game was dead after Fritsch generously gave a goal away to Gawn after a mark at the top of the square, and all that was left was to get to the final siren without anyone being seriously injured or reported. At one point a close Michael Hibberd pursuit caused Ziebell to go over the fence in comic fashion, but replays proved he was just being dramatic and Hibberd had nothing to do with it.
All in all, a solid hitout that only partially counts as a win over North. If we turn up in Round 3 and are five goals down at quarter time none of this will matter. I look to the big picture in hope.
Votes
Due to the lack of games to choose from - unless we throw in a random intra-club - the intention was not to award the Paul Prymke Plate for Pre-Season performance. However, I've had an unpredictable change of heart, and as long as no more than two players are tied for the lead after the second practice match we will name a winner(s).
Part of the glory of pre-season votes is that players randomly disappear for quarters at a time, so while you often get real games where there's unanimous verdicts on the bests (I have even been known to pick the card occasionally) good luck finding two people who have the same view on a practice match.
5 - Alex Neal-Bullen
4 - James Harmes
3 - Max Gawn
2 - Christian Petracca
1 - Bayley Fritsch
Apologies to Oliver, Hogan, Melksham, Bugg and Salem.
Banner Watch
After last week's AFLW fiasco where the industrially printed thing fell to bits before the players appeared, it was nice to see straining crepe paper barely holding together by the skin of its teeth. No North banner was shown, so I'm just going to assume they didn't bring one and give the Dees a win. 1-0 for the pre-season.
Uniform Watch
I'm not entirely keen on the way the black Zurich box sits on the jumper, but if they've got truckloads of money (until some massive natural disaster puts them on their arse) I'm willing to live with it.
The week after next
St Kilda at Casey. Given that it's a Thursday night I sure as hell won't be there. In fact given the Demonblog Towers are now located in the outer suburbs (and are not Towers) and I'd almost have gotten to Wangaratta quicker than Cranbourne, I can't see myself ever going to Cranbourne again. We will be providing our usual level of in-depth analysis off the TV, but if you want to chip in with crowd watch observations get in touch via the usual channels.
If both teams bring their best sides, and I wouldn't be surprised if the AFLX players are utilised sparingly, this will be a better test of where we're at. I'd say they are a notch below us due to lack of star power (my god, how nice is it to write that?), and Riewoldt taking a well-earned break from his life of MFC torment, so a comfortable win would be a good sign before Round 1. And if we lose meh, as long as nobody's hurt and nothing exceedingly demoralising happens it's not going to hurt us in the long run.
Final Thoughts
We have no God-given right to make the finals, and considering our brutal run home I still think it's mad to assume the best, but this is definitely the collection of players who should at least give us a decent swing at joy in the next five years. If they don't I'm giving up on footy and moving to Micronesia.
In an abridged pre-season there's no room for messing around, so we went in with much of our best side. The only absolute certainties missing were former Demonbracket winners Viney and Jetta, plus Garlett, who might want to think about a Tonya Harding style clobbering for Bayley Fritsch during the week. On the other hand, nobody but enthusiasts know more than a handful of North players at the best of times so it's hard to tell whether their side full of workmanlike homebrand unknowns was anywhere near the best XVIII. That usually doesn't matter, they could donate one of their 250 different commemorative jumpers to a team of raffle winners and we'd spontaneously combust.
I spent the last week steadfastly refusing to accept that the season was about to start. Life was easier - but ultimately less rewarding - when you turned up in February expecting to see shite. Now I've been curled up in terror in all summer worried that we're somehow going to nobble ourselves and miss out on the much anticipated great leap forward. There was an amusing reaction to Mark Robinson suggesting we wouldn't make the eight, with people whirling into full siege mentality mode and hurling abuse at him. What right do we have to assume anything after last year? The underrated angle was him doing it in a video sitting next to David King, who famously told us to stop worrying and enjoy footy midway through last year. Various demonstrations of why we won't be comfortable until we're standing under a premiership flag were not far behind.
The traditional pre-season nerves hit me just as the coverage was about to start, only for Fox Sports to extract the piss violently by opening with a Round 23 'highlights' package about our great choke. Somewhere David King was realising exactly why the Veil of Negativity still clings to us like napalm. As much as I could have done without a reminder of what happened that weekend, it did focus me on what needs to be done this season. Batter sides that need to be battered, and always be hunting the opposition. Given our 10 Years of Terror against North (notwithstanding victory in a Kick-and-Clap picnic tournament), it would have been better viewing to spin a video of all the times they've stitched us up by margins big and small. Still, until we make up for the no tackles in 10 minutes game we deserve to be reminded of it at every available opportunity. You know you'd have a bad run when you're scarred by not having the chance to be Elimination Final cannon fodder.
Where better to start the climb back towards the eight than at the Casey Fields of the South, a windswept suburban park with the none-more-pre-season name of "Kingston Twin Ovals". For the purposes of historical record, could somebody confirm if we were playing on Twin Oval A or Twin Oval B? There was probably a Little Athletics meet going on at the other one. Either that or a swap meet, because the announced crowd was a flag year 1957, which would be our lowest pre-season turnout since 1200 idiots (including yours truly) watched us beat Richmond at Princes Park in 2007. Either it was a typo or the people of Hobart aren't as interested in the Roos as I thought. (Update - those in attendance suggest that even 1957 seems generous. I guess I'm just conditioned to expecting that people care about practice matches. Apparently not in Hobart.)
The suggestion that North weren't serious about winning was furthered by Brad Scott handing over the keys to somebody else and instead lurking around the back of the box menacingly. He'd already set up the novelty move of playing Majak Daw at full back against the Sizzle/Hogan Twin Towers, and spent most of the game sitting on a Bunnings plastic chair watching the chaos unfold. It wasn't the worst experimental move of all time, and his extendable hands bashed away a few inside 50s, but it showed the difference in where the teams are at. The most experimental thing we did was letting Clayton Oliver show up with a humorous haircut.
It hardly compares to the start of Round 1, but any anticipation for the start of the pre-season went out the window when the first bounce went violently askew. It was quite the anti-climax when I was all keyed up for a low-intensity rematch of the epic Gawn vs Goldstein World Heavyweight Championship contest from Hobart two years ago. Who are the knobs trying to shorten the length of play in a game when so much time is wasted re-doing horrible bounces? I'm usually against changing things for alleged spectacle improvements, but the bounce has had it. If everyone's so desperate to cater to consumers, theatregoers and wankers in Sydney, how are you meant to explain the wild bounce/recall scenario? Either that or just let the thing fling off in random directions and good luck to whoever gets an advantage.
After a second false start courtesy of an anti-Gawn free from the ball-up, the two put on another solid ruck clash. Goldstein is not the titan he used to be, but it was still a tough battle and by the end Max had won a decisive victory. Where are the joyless entertainment fanatics who want to abolish stoppages when this sort of fantastic battle is on? If you don't enjoy two enormous humans grappling for supremacy you may not have a pulse. Maximum was back at full strength, his taps and second efforts were a masterclass for aspiring ruckmen, and if he keeps doing that for the rest of the year uninjured it's going to give us a tremendous leg-up around the ground. We got away with not having him last year, and played some really good footy at times when he wasn't there, but a performance like this shows the difference between a competent backup and a master craftsman.
I've got plenty of respect to people who can properly tune out of pre-season games and not care what happens, but alas I'm not one of them. Not going to anything until Round 1 is as close as I'll get to being cool about the warm-up games, and when North went forward straight away the pessimist in me (and how could you not be one considering our most recent outing in a game of actual Australian rules football?) thought "oh Jesus, here we go again, we're going to lose to North here as well". If I was in a disaster movie I'd be the panicky idiot who runs around screaming "we're all going to die!"
Other than a few moments of light concern during the first half there was no need to be dramatic. Alex Neal-Bullen started the game like he was Alex Dustin-Martin and kicked the first goal, before turning provider for a dreamy lead by Sizzle Sr. The Bullet's pass was nice, and McDonald's finish was solid but it was the lead that made me quiver with ecstasy. Imagine teleporting back to 2013 and telling your past self that in five years' time you'd be as excited about Tom McDonald (under siege key defender, zero career goals) playing forward as Jesse Hogan (next big thing, great white hope, future injury victim). Old you would call the authorities and report a lunatic on the loose.
After looking much more dangerous than his attacking partner in the opening quarter, Sizzle went back to being a highly-functioning cog in the wheel as Hogan tormented a backline full of project players and nobodies. He still does quirky, alternative things that will surprise and baffle for years to come. There was one set shot so close he could have almost leant back and dinked it through with the lightest of touches, but instead took a run-up so excessive that he nearly had to catch the Spirit of Tasmania back. Then you look beyond those two behemoths and find Christian Petracca outmuscling champion rig owner Daw, see Bayley Fritsch running riot in senior company, factor in Mitch Hannan and Jeff Garlett and start to think that maybe things are going to turn out ok. If we can get the ball down there enough, and don't enough up getting scorched on the counter unless we score.
We looked the better side, both on-paper and on-field, but it wasn't all good news. The first Roos goal came after a clearly flubbed kick by Lewis, which somehow failed to factor into what was announced as a 100% disposal efficiency at quarter time. You'd have thought one of the commentators would have questioned it, but like newsreaders they will follow whatever's written on screen. One day on Sydney radio a lady dutifully read out text that finished with the phrase "like a bowling ball" (and you can guess the rest) because that's what the paper said. You could quite easily pull off the same prank on a footy commentator.
Lewis wasn't bad in the first quarter (before being packed away due to a minor injury concern), but I wouldn't bet my house on both he and Vince making it to Round 23 in the same backline. One of them fine, but somebody get out of the way for Neville Jetta and let's tighten things up instead of sending everyone up the ground to attack and being clocked whenever we lose the ball. My one game sample of Jake Lever since I started to pay an interest in him suggests he loves to wander up the ground as well, so I look forward to Nifty being called upon to rush back and try to stop his opponent several hundred times this year.
Vince did kick a goal, from one of those infuriating free kicks where the player crunches a perfect tackle but runs a fingernail across the other player's back and is penalised, but I hold significant concern for his chances of getting to the end of the year without a stint at Casey. I respect what he's done up to now, but given that we're developing a side with depth at last there's no need to drag two fading stars along for the ride. Lewis has an extra year on the contract so barring any injuries or radical changes of heart from him he'll get preference.
North's defence might have been about as fearsome as the one we once put out featuring Tom Gillies, but it's hard to deny we looked good going into attack. The problem was that in the most traditional Melbourne FC fashion we were terrifically vulnerable to quick kicks the other way catching us out, and were so ropey after turning the ball over that the preposterously named Billy Hartung's ability to run quickly scored him a nomination to join the Kent Kingsley Klub pre-season training squad.
The difference this time to most games, is that when we copped an end-to-end lightning speed goal in the last minute of the quarter we didn't just pack a man behind the ball to make flappy motions with his arms and try to stem the bleeding - we burst out of the middle and responded through the unusual duo of Maynard and Bugg. Swings and roundabouts. As long there's more (whichever is the good one) than (the bad one) we're heading in the right direction.
You couldn't argue with six goals in a first quarter, but more important was the way we got them. It wasn't just hit and hope stuff that was almost accidentally bundled through (and after intently watching four weeks of our AFLW team that was quite the relief), we were making them with solid, attractive play. This was with Oliver and his rude haircut being relatively well held, and Nathan Jones so quiet early on that I didn't think he was playing. At last there are options, and I pray to the footballing gods that we can stay fit enough that most of them aren't needed. Oliver did bust free of the shackles after half time, and some of his handballs in traffic were eye-watering. No matter how hard the tag is, they will never fully guard against him finding the ball in the middle of a pack and instinctively knowing exactly which direction to handball in and how hard. He is a mastermind.
Because the commentator was the erudite and sensible Anthony Hudson rather than a Dwayne Russell style shrieking banshee, the abolition of the nine point goal (somewhere Paul Wheatley wept) was treated as an irrelevant side-note to the game and only mentioned when somebody had a long shot. In contrast, Dwayne did the next game and mentioned it about 30 seconds in as if it was the biggest news since Cyclone Tracy. He must be in charge of the AFL website, they're still running a score box hopefully showing a column with zeroes as if they may come back at any moment. Mind you, they're also advertising games at possibly fictional grounds called LDV, MTB and TVL so who knows what's going on. I'm surprised they didn't put us at MTB just to set up Mt. Buller gags for tedious dickheads. Some poxy betting company Twitter account tried to do a snow gag and suggested we'd be calling off our September trips to Aspen, which would be fine if that wasn't still in the US summer. Aspiring Twitter comedians, know your limitations.
Nine goals in the first quarter was reminiscent of the shootout on the day of the original Gawn vs Goldstein battle, except that this time the side kicking into the breeze didn't spot the other a 40 point lead before having a go. In fact our goals were barely aided by wind, and it wasn't until the second quarter when the legally mandated raging Hobart gale to one end started up. It slowed down our scoring, just as the game was threatening to become a tribute to the NBL's late Hobart Tassie Devils who used to play just down the road. North certainly improved with the benefit of it, but only to the tune of cutting nine points from the quarter time margin. I hope for the sake of their fans (but ultimately don't care) that they had good players out, because I don't much fancy their chances of escaping the bottom four in this state.
What looked early like a Reverse Stranglewank, where we jump out to a big lead then collapse, was kept reasonably calm courtesy of a late goal by the impressive Harmes. And it was a lovely goal too, he started the attacking chain on the half-back flank, and charged down the other end to be on the end Bugg's centring pass. The Master of Buggery hasn't been given much credit since he lobbed that ill-advised haymaker against the Swans, but without his persistent efforts to keep the ball from going out of bounds the goal never happens. That was a theme of the day, other than the usual suspect North nutters like Cunnington and Ziebell we always wanted it more, he could have very easily let the ball roll out for a throw-in and made it somebody else's problem but was rewarded for fighting his heart out to try and keep it in.
Given the increasing strength of the wind it was no surprise that we improved our position at the start of the third quarter, most notably from a McDonald kick to Hogan in the square which suggests that if they stay fit it will be a lethal forward combo. Even if they were playing against a no-name defence the essentials of a great combination were there. Hulk was still content to hang out the back and try to strong-arm the opposition, but having one up the ground and one in front of goal on a rotating basis is going to be a great help.
North had one last gasp left in them, indirectly kicking a goal against the run of play courtesy of (SURPRISE!) a player standing on his own inside 50. By now the wind was blowing sideways, so he missed everything with the set shot, but from the resulting throw-in Lever was pinched holding the ball and they managed to convert at the second opportunity. I knew men's footy was back when that cut the margin to 19 and I was already fretting about who how we were going to go defending into the wind in the last quarter. Enter Max Gawn, putting a hit-out down James Harmes' throat for the reply goal not long after. That prompted North to declare their work was done, Hannan and AFLX Hall of Famer Melksham goalled immediately after and we were home with time to spare. Milkshake's goal came from a perfect ruck tap from Total Football Tom McSizzle, and my nerves reduced to a sensible pre-season level.
The sixth goal of the quarter came from the impressive Anal-Bullet (to the sound of somebody in the crowding saying "wow!" into an effects mic), and the Chris Sullivan Line was breached late by Bayley Fritsch. Whether the line should be extended when defending into a raging gale in the last quarter or not is debatable, we don't get that far in front often enough to perform situational testing. With all appropriate caveats for North's weakened team, it was pleasing that we did it without Oliver or Jones particularly prominent. Instead the unheralded XXX combination of Anal-Bullet and Long Dong Harmes were running riot. There is also an NQR nickname for Fritsch, but like Cameron Pedersen this is a family program so we're not getting involved in it.
I enjoyed how many of our scores punished North mistakes. Here's to that translating to the real stuff, our nufty disposal has fed percentages up and down the league for years and now I want to take revenge one team at a time. Our first goal of the last quarter was created by Mr Intercepts himself, but this time Lever gathered a loose ball to set up future Round 1 starter Fritsch and insulate us against a collapse. Shortly after Lever was left flat-footed by a quick kick over the top that led to a goal, but even though he looks like a lost member of My Chemical Romance you'd expect based on this that we'll get our money's worth out of him.
The game was dead after Fritsch generously gave a goal away to Gawn after a mark at the top of the square, and all that was left was to get to the final siren without anyone being seriously injured or reported. At one point a close Michael Hibberd pursuit caused Ziebell to go over the fence in comic fashion, but replays proved he was just being dramatic and Hibberd had nothing to do with it.
All in all, a solid hitout that only partially counts as a win over North. If we turn up in Round 3 and are five goals down at quarter time none of this will matter. I look to the big picture in hope.
Votes
Due to the lack of games to choose from - unless we throw in a random intra-club - the intention was not to award the Paul Prymke Plate for Pre-Season performance. However, I've had an unpredictable change of heart, and as long as no more than two players are tied for the lead after the second practice match we will name a winner(s).
Part of the glory of pre-season votes is that players randomly disappear for quarters at a time, so while you often get real games where there's unanimous verdicts on the bests (I have even been known to pick the card occasionally) good luck finding two people who have the same view on a practice match.
5 - Alex Neal-Bullen
4 - James Harmes
3 - Max Gawn
2 - Christian Petracca
1 - Bayley Fritsch
Apologies to Oliver, Hogan, Melksham, Bugg and Salem.
Banner Watch
After last week's AFLW fiasco where the industrially printed thing fell to bits before the players appeared, it was nice to see straining crepe paper barely holding together by the skin of its teeth. No North banner was shown, so I'm just going to assume they didn't bring one and give the Dees a win. 1-0 for the pre-season.
Uniform Watch
I'm not entirely keen on the way the black Zurich box sits on the jumper, but if they've got truckloads of money (until some massive natural disaster puts them on their arse) I'm willing to live with it.
The week after next
St Kilda at Casey. Given that it's a Thursday night I sure as hell won't be there. In fact given the Demonblog Towers are now located in the outer suburbs (and are not Towers) and I'd almost have gotten to Wangaratta quicker than Cranbourne, I can't see myself ever going to Cranbourne again. We will be providing our usual level of in-depth analysis off the TV, but if you want to chip in with crowd watch observations get in touch via the usual channels.
If both teams bring their best sides, and I wouldn't be surprised if the AFLX players are utilised sparingly, this will be a better test of where we're at. I'd say they are a notch below us due to lack of star power (my god, how nice is it to write that?), and Riewoldt taking a well-earned break from his life of MFC torment, so a comfortable win would be a good sign before Round 1. And if we lose meh, as long as nobody's hurt and nothing exceedingly demoralising happens it's not going to hurt us in the long run.
Final Thoughts
We have no God-given right to make the finals, and considering our brutal run home I still think it's mad to assume the best, but this is definitely the collection of players who should at least give us a decent swing at joy in the next five years. If they don't I'm giving up on footy and moving to Micronesia.
Saturday, 24 February 2018
The sound of a rapidly deflating balloon
All season I've been mocking Channel 7 for putting on dull Carlton games, and as predicted when they finally put us on they were rewarded with an exciting thrashing. That it had to come as our expense via a Hindenberg style explosion will be no concern to them.
Maybe we were thrashed by a winless side because of the Contiki tour via Perth, or because it was 37 degrees. More likely it came down to a structure that makes kicking goals look more complicated than nuclear fusion, a defence that went to pieces in the heat and the general realisation about halfway through the third quarter that we're not as good as we thought two weeks ago.
Hooray for working in the community, building our brand and helping rake in a shitload of sponsorship money but it felt cruel to send part time players into those conditions. It didn't seem to affect the Pies, who rallied from several players looking like they were about to expire midway through to win running away. Conversely our team looked like they were going to add to the wingless AFLW team structure by dying before the final siren.
It was Round 23 (an incident like 186 so infamous that you need only refer to it in general terms and people know) all over again, going into a game against Collingwood as red-hot favourites in a week where a loudmouth ex-player questioned their coach and comprehensively shitting the bed. The only difference was that this time all the best work was done in the first quarter (albeit after a shaky start) before a catastrophic collapse all but ruined our finals hopes.
The women's football weekend had already been a disappointment, on Friday night Footscray eviscerated Carlton and pinched our records for largest win and highest score. They had a player kick seven, we've now had that in total over two games. Some will question why I care so much, but I can't help getting emotionally involved when a Melbourne team is involved. While I don't care what Casey do as long as nobody gets hurt, if the MFC Under 19s came back tomorrow I'd probably be going troppo over their results too. The badge changes regularly, the jumper seems to be different every week, but there's just something about Melbourne that gets me right there. It would quite romantic if the relationship wasn't practically abusive.
We all know how badly this went in the end, and big quarter time lead notwithstanding there were definite signs of what we were in for during the opening minutes. In stark contrast to last week we were mauled out of the centre at the start and the opposition immediately went on the offensive. The only thing that saved us from a goal - or in fact any score - was that Collingwood had the attacking power of the Tongan air force. Which is what made what happened after quarter time, giving them acres of space to do as they pleased, even more offensive.
The Pies must have had about five inside 20s for no score, and we turned the tables on last week by going forward on the counter and actually converting a set shot after Kate Hore ragdolled an opponent for holding the ball. It was an impressive start, but like many of our players she was rarely ever seen again. That goal killed off Collingwood's initial burst and the normal order of things was restored, they went back to being filth and we went back to desperately trying to craft goalscoring opportunities to no avail.
Shelley Scott - who has forcibly retired one of my key gimmicks by selling her dairy farm - had two chances in 30 seconds for a point and a chase-down tackle - before falling into the same deep chasm as most of her other teammates. My theory that it was no Mifsud, no Melbourne were in tatters. We looked no more likely to kick goals with her there than not, and the Adelaide game must now be seen as a complete fluke. It took what may have been the now ex-dairy farmer's final effective intervention of the night to set up O'Dea for a tap-in from the square and extend the margin to 13. We were going
so well that Scott wasted what should have been an easy goal shortly after by trying to throw another dinky handball to O'Dea in the square. At the time it didn't seem so important, but a third goal to nil in the first quarter might have set the Pies back enough to kill them off, instead they had a second life and took full advantage.
Our kick-in routines remained unchecked for a ninth consecutive quarter of not conceding a behind. To prove that we didn't points to do wacky things in defence, there was a moment in Collingwood's early rush where Meg Downie (who turned to play have a pretty good game and looked like the only defender we had who'd played the game before) tried an ill-advised switch across goal and put it out on the full. The Pies were so toothless that despite winning the free in the pocket they still didn't score. Mind you, after holding a team to no inside 50s in a first quarter last week and losing I wasn't going to mentally bank the points against a side who'd threatened for the first five minutes.
Still, I was confident of victory against a winless side. To the point where Lynden Dunn turned up on TV as their assistant coach and I magnanimously thought I'd like them to win for him. Of course I didn't actually want that, but in my head it felt like doing the right thing by him to think it. There's nothing that can stop me from loving him. Even that article where he said he wished he'd gone to Collingwood 10 years ago. Of course he does, he'd have won a flag instead of playing for a rabble and being a sub every second week.
One part of me was trying to remain calm in the face of the Freo Fuck Up, but the hopeful version had been buoyed by the clean-up of North in the earlier game and thought that if we could even up on the clearances and the temperature dropped a few degrees we might have a chance of stealing our scoring records back. How about no. Yet again whatever was being said at quarter time, and thanks to Channel 7 showing us we can only assume the players understood the language of cliches Mick Stinear was speaking in, it didn't work. Once more we built a great platform in the first quarter then let the other side back in almost immediately. My prediction last week that Special K spokeswoman Mo Hope would finally discover her form and give us a flogging had a stuttering start with two botched shots in a row. She got there eventually, but not until after they found a player who could kick straight to set alarm bells off by cutting the margin to a goal.
Daisy Pearce not being able to get near it should have been a key indicator that we were in trouble. I thought that perhaps she was spending lots of time on the bench as an unconventional variety of the rope-a-dope where you get in front in difficult conditions then unleash the stars halfway through the game and rampage to victory. The importance of getting the ball into her hands was made clear when she hit a perfect pass into the corridor that should have set up a golden scoring opportunity but was dropped, allowing the Pies to dash off the other direction and only narrowly flub a chance with a free player in the square. The signs that the game had turned around were glaring obvious though, and when the Hope Prophecy came true with two goals in a row it looked like disappointing losses to Collingwood were the new disappointing losses to North Melbourne.
After already getting North Melbourne's Billy Hartung of North into the off-season wing of the Kent Kingsley Klub earlier in the day, this was a fair question:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-partner="tweetdeck"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Has Hope done enough (adjusting for avg AFLW scoreline) for a Kingsley?</p>— Brett Gregory (@bgregs84) <a href="https://twitter.com/bgregs84/status/967322321496129536?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 24, 2018</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Why not induct the entire side and their coach instead? Given that we've now played one good game out of four that'll be it for me describing other sides as no good and expecting to beat them. Maybe we're the ones who are no good? One thing I know is that I won't be trusting this side to go on with a dominant first quarter again until at least 2019. Our best players couldn't get it, and our worst players were getting near it far too often.
When even the official Twitter account dropped the usual forced positivity and said "Not our finest quarter" you knew we were in trouble. Forget the Collingwood coach getting the arse, Mick Stinear should spend the week in controversy corner after this. Now even if we win every game for the rest of the season - with some good teams to come, and Carlton who will probably beat us if we play like this - we're a game and 38% behind second placed Brisbane. Season over just like that.
There's nothing more Melbourne than seeing a side fail to meet expectations. The only thing that differentiated it from a men's game in similar circumstances was the lack of supporters cracking the sads about games in the Territory and claiming we'd be winning by 12 goals if it was being played in Victoria. If it was already becoming grim we weren't helped by Katherine Smith exiting after a head knock. Not only was that one player less to rotate in the heat, but it meant more pressure on the often baffled surviving defenders.
With Smith gone and our season hanging by a thread the start of the third quarter would have been a fantastic time for the rope-a-dope to start paying off. So of course after we wasted a run of attacks, a turnover allowed the Pies to pissbolt the other way and kick an easy goal from the square. Champion Data - feel free to confirm that nobody has kicked less of those goals than us this year. Every score has to go through a torturous process akin to dealing with a government agency.
The ongoing farce continued with Duryea (with normally positioned 1s on her jumper for the first time all year) gifting a goal via a 50 and we were in a gigantic bloody hole. The hits just kept on coming, with another immediately after. Yet another mediocre team taking advantage of the registered charity that is the Melbourne Football Club.
Finally Mifsud made her own chance by dragging a player down holding the ball and it pegged one back to keep things interesting. Then that goal was nearly handed back by our loose-as-a-goose defence. Get Duryea's silly numbers back on, this was her worst game yet. I wasn't convinced by first gamer Teague, and Cordner was only marginally better than last year. Credit to Collingwood, they perfectly exploited our disarray. Duryea must have been homesick after a week on the road, with a few seconds left in the third quarter the runner was desperately suggesting a long kick and she responded with a tiny dink straight to a Pies player. She was having such a disappointing night that at one point some attempted bumpage with an opponent ended with her falling over.
Until normal circumstances an 18 point deficit at three quarter time would not be insurmountable, but adjusted for the lower scoring in AFLW and our horribly complicated attempts at attacking I was ready to concede. An early Hore opportunity narrowly rolled wide, and rinse/repeat keeping the ball locked into the attacking 50 came to nothing. As an indication of how our night was going, two players tried to tackle the same opponent and instead crashed into each other while she
trotted off untouched. If you haven't seen the game you will not even remotely be surprised to discover that after all that attacking we let them go the other way and kick the sealer. What a swizz.
Following this club is like signing up to a pyramid scheme. Every week other teams make goals out of nothing while we have no idea how to get the ball through the goal convincingly. Newman kicking goal of the year was great three weeks ago but she's done practically nothing all since, and I'm not sure Scott was still playing after half time. Compare with the Collingwood skipper casually ripping through a goal from 35 metres on the run. Priority next year has to be some players who can kick 40 metres, most weeks our ball movement out of defence is good, and the midfield usually do their job but every goal feels like it comes by accident.
Blowing another chance to win as favourites against Collingwood irritated me, but not as much as being sucked in by our week of premiership favouritism. Don't believe the hype.
2018 Daisy Pearce Medal
5 - Karen Paxman
4 - Elise O'Dea
3 - Mel Hickey
2 - Meg Downie
1 - Richelle Cranston
Apologies to nobody, half of the above were lucky to get in.
Leaderboard
With three to play Daisy's disappointing trip to Dar... err... Alice Springs has left her with everything to do. History shows Paxman is almost certain to poll in any game where she doesn't spend three quarters off injured, so with 15 votes maximum on offer I can't see anyone but her or O'Dea winning from here.
12 - Karen Paxman
10 - Elise O'Dea
7 - Daisy Pearce
6 - Tegan Cunningham,
5 - Richelle Cranston
4 - Laura Duryea, Bianca Jakobsson
3 - Mel Hickey, Shelley Scott
2 - Meg Downie, Lily Mithen
1 - Erin Hoare, Katherine Smith
Banner Watch
Never saw one for either side. Nil-all draw. Dees 1-1-2 down for the season.
UPDATE:
We did have one, and wacky slogan it was very nice. It was also the last anyone saw of Newman for the day. Dees now 2-2 for the season.
Next Week
Back to Victoria for what is now a must win game against Brisbane. At quarter time last week we'd have been playing to all but sew up a Grand Final spot, now it's a desperate attempt to remain in the top half of the table. This is the sort of explosive decompression that you usually only get when a plane window pops out mid-flight. Maybe we'll hold them to nil in the first quarter then lose.
Final Thoughts
At least one Melbourne side won today.
Maybe we were thrashed by a winless side because of the Contiki tour via Perth, or because it was 37 degrees. More likely it came down to a structure that makes kicking goals look more complicated than nuclear fusion, a defence that went to pieces in the heat and the general realisation about halfway through the third quarter that we're not as good as we thought two weeks ago.
Hooray for working in the community, building our brand and helping rake in a shitload of sponsorship money but it felt cruel to send part time players into those conditions. It didn't seem to affect the Pies, who rallied from several players looking like they were about to expire midway through to win running away. Conversely our team looked like they were going to add to the wingless AFLW team structure by dying before the final siren.
It was Round 23 (an incident like 186 so infamous that you need only refer to it in general terms and people know) all over again, going into a game against Collingwood as red-hot favourites in a week where a loudmouth ex-player questioned their coach and comprehensively shitting the bed. The only difference was that this time all the best work was done in the first quarter (albeit after a shaky start) before a catastrophic collapse all but ruined our finals hopes.
The women's football weekend had already been a disappointment, on Friday night Footscray eviscerated Carlton and pinched our records for largest win and highest score. They had a player kick seven, we've now had that in total over two games. Some will question why I care so much, but I can't help getting emotionally involved when a Melbourne team is involved. While I don't care what Casey do as long as nobody gets hurt, if the MFC Under 19s came back tomorrow I'd probably be going troppo over their results too. The badge changes regularly, the jumper seems to be different every week, but there's just something about Melbourne that gets me right there. It would quite romantic if the relationship wasn't practically abusive.
We all know how badly this went in the end, and big quarter time lead notwithstanding there were definite signs of what we were in for during the opening minutes. In stark contrast to last week we were mauled out of the centre at the start and the opposition immediately went on the offensive. The only thing that saved us from a goal - or in fact any score - was that Collingwood had the attacking power of the Tongan air force. Which is what made what happened after quarter time, giving them acres of space to do as they pleased, even more offensive.
The Pies must have had about five inside 20s for no score, and we turned the tables on last week by going forward on the counter and actually converting a set shot after Kate Hore ragdolled an opponent for holding the ball. It was an impressive start, but like many of our players she was rarely ever seen again. That goal killed off Collingwood's initial burst and the normal order of things was restored, they went back to being filth and we went back to desperately trying to craft goalscoring opportunities to no avail.
Shelley Scott - who has forcibly retired one of my key gimmicks by selling her dairy farm - had two chances in 30 seconds for a point and a chase-down tackle - before falling into the same deep chasm as most of her other teammates. My theory that it was no Mifsud, no Melbourne were in tatters. We looked no more likely to kick goals with her there than not, and the Adelaide game must now be seen as a complete fluke. It took what may have been the now ex-dairy farmer's final effective intervention of the night to set up O'Dea for a tap-in from the square and extend the margin to 13. We were going
so well that Scott wasted what should have been an easy goal shortly after by trying to throw another dinky handball to O'Dea in the square. At the time it didn't seem so important, but a third goal to nil in the first quarter might have set the Pies back enough to kill them off, instead they had a second life and took full advantage.
Our kick-in routines remained unchecked for a ninth consecutive quarter of not conceding a behind. To prove that we didn't points to do wacky things in defence, there was a moment in Collingwood's early rush where Meg Downie (who turned to play have a pretty good game and looked like the only defender we had who'd played the game before) tried an ill-advised switch across goal and put it out on the full. The Pies were so toothless that despite winning the free in the pocket they still didn't score. Mind you, after holding a team to no inside 50s in a first quarter last week and losing I wasn't going to mentally bank the points against a side who'd threatened for the first five minutes.
Still, I was confident of victory against a winless side. To the point where Lynden Dunn turned up on TV as their assistant coach and I magnanimously thought I'd like them to win for him. Of course I didn't actually want that, but in my head it felt like doing the right thing by him to think it. There's nothing that can stop me from loving him. Even that article where he said he wished he'd gone to Collingwood 10 years ago. Of course he does, he'd have won a flag instead of playing for a rabble and being a sub every second week.
One part of me was trying to remain calm in the face of the Freo Fuck Up, but the hopeful version had been buoyed by the clean-up of North in the earlier game and thought that if we could even up on the clearances and the temperature dropped a few degrees we might have a chance of stealing our scoring records back. How about no. Yet again whatever was being said at quarter time, and thanks to Channel 7 showing us we can only assume the players understood the language of cliches Mick Stinear was speaking in, it didn't work. Once more we built a great platform in the first quarter then let the other side back in almost immediately. My prediction last week that Special K spokeswoman Mo Hope would finally discover her form and give us a flogging had a stuttering start with two botched shots in a row. She got there eventually, but not until after they found a player who could kick straight to set alarm bells off by cutting the margin to a goal.
Daisy Pearce not being able to get near it should have been a key indicator that we were in trouble. I thought that perhaps she was spending lots of time on the bench as an unconventional variety of the rope-a-dope where you get in front in difficult conditions then unleash the stars halfway through the game and rampage to victory. The importance of getting the ball into her hands was made clear when she hit a perfect pass into the corridor that should have set up a golden scoring opportunity but was dropped, allowing the Pies to dash off the other direction and only narrowly flub a chance with a free player in the square. The signs that the game had turned around were glaring obvious though, and when the Hope Prophecy came true with two goals in a row it looked like disappointing losses to Collingwood were the new disappointing losses to North Melbourne.
After already getting North Melbourne's Billy Hartung of North into the off-season wing of the Kent Kingsley Klub earlier in the day, this was a fair question:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-partner="tweetdeck"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Has Hope done enough (adjusting for avg AFLW scoreline) for a Kingsley?</p>— Brett Gregory (@bgregs84) <a href="https://twitter.com/bgregs84/status/967322321496129536?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 24, 2018</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Why not induct the entire side and their coach instead? Given that we've now played one good game out of four that'll be it for me describing other sides as no good and expecting to beat them. Maybe we're the ones who are no good? One thing I know is that I won't be trusting this side to go on with a dominant first quarter again until at least 2019. Our best players couldn't get it, and our worst players were getting near it far too often.
When even the official Twitter account dropped the usual forced positivity and said "Not our finest quarter" you knew we were in trouble. Forget the Collingwood coach getting the arse, Mick Stinear should spend the week in controversy corner after this. Now even if we win every game for the rest of the season - with some good teams to come, and Carlton who will probably beat us if we play like this - we're a game and 38% behind second placed Brisbane. Season over just like that.
There's nothing more Melbourne than seeing a side fail to meet expectations. The only thing that differentiated it from a men's game in similar circumstances was the lack of supporters cracking the sads about games in the Territory and claiming we'd be winning by 12 goals if it was being played in Victoria. If it was already becoming grim we weren't helped by Katherine Smith exiting after a head knock. Not only was that one player less to rotate in the heat, but it meant more pressure on the often baffled surviving defenders.
With Smith gone and our season hanging by a thread the start of the third quarter would have been a fantastic time for the rope-a-dope to start paying off. So of course after we wasted a run of attacks, a turnover allowed the Pies to pissbolt the other way and kick an easy goal from the square. Champion Data - feel free to confirm that nobody has kicked less of those goals than us this year. Every score has to go through a torturous process akin to dealing with a government agency.
The ongoing farce continued with Duryea (with normally positioned 1s on her jumper for the first time all year) gifting a goal via a 50 and we were in a gigantic bloody hole. The hits just kept on coming, with another immediately after. Yet another mediocre team taking advantage of the registered charity that is the Melbourne Football Club.
Finally Mifsud made her own chance by dragging a player down holding the ball and it pegged one back to keep things interesting. Then that goal was nearly handed back by our loose-as-a-goose defence. Get Duryea's silly numbers back on, this was her worst game yet. I wasn't convinced by first gamer Teague, and Cordner was only marginally better than last year. Credit to Collingwood, they perfectly exploited our disarray. Duryea must have been homesick after a week on the road, with a few seconds left in the third quarter the runner was desperately suggesting a long kick and she responded with a tiny dink straight to a Pies player. She was having such a disappointing night that at one point some attempted bumpage with an opponent ended with her falling over.
Until normal circumstances an 18 point deficit at three quarter time would not be insurmountable, but adjusted for the lower scoring in AFLW and our horribly complicated attempts at attacking I was ready to concede. An early Hore opportunity narrowly rolled wide, and rinse/repeat keeping the ball locked into the attacking 50 came to nothing. As an indication of how our night was going, two players tried to tackle the same opponent and instead crashed into each other while she
trotted off untouched. If you haven't seen the game you will not even remotely be surprised to discover that after all that attacking we let them go the other way and kick the sealer. What a swizz.
Following this club is like signing up to a pyramid scheme. Every week other teams make goals out of nothing while we have no idea how to get the ball through the goal convincingly. Newman kicking goal of the year was great three weeks ago but she's done practically nothing all since, and I'm not sure Scott was still playing after half time. Compare with the Collingwood skipper casually ripping through a goal from 35 metres on the run. Priority next year has to be some players who can kick 40 metres, most weeks our ball movement out of defence is good, and the midfield usually do their job but every goal feels like it comes by accident.
Blowing another chance to win as favourites against Collingwood irritated me, but not as much as being sucked in by our week of premiership favouritism. Don't believe the hype.
2018 Daisy Pearce Medal
5 - Karen Paxman
4 - Elise O'Dea
3 - Mel Hickey
2 - Meg Downie
1 - Richelle Cranston
Apologies to nobody, half of the above were lucky to get in.
Leaderboard
With three to play Daisy's disappointing trip to Dar... err... Alice Springs has left her with everything to do. History shows Paxman is almost certain to poll in any game where she doesn't spend three quarters off injured, so with 15 votes maximum on offer I can't see anyone but her or O'Dea winning from here.
12 - Karen Paxman
10 - Elise O'Dea
7 - Daisy Pearce
6 - Tegan Cunningham,
5 - Richelle Cranston
4 - Laura Duryea, Bianca Jakobsson
3 - Mel Hickey, Shelley Scott
2 - Meg Downie, Lily Mithen
1 - Erin Hoare, Katherine Smith
Banner Watch
Never saw one for either side. Nil-all draw. Dees 1-1-2 down for the season.
UPDATE:
We did have one, and wacky slogan it was very nice. It was also the last anyone saw of Newman for the day. Dees now 2-2 for the season.
With the focus on Aliesha Newman #bannerwatch pic.twitter.com/HKT3ujB5kf
— Suzanne Considine (@suzcon) February 25, 2018
Next Week
Back to Victoria for what is now a must win game against Brisbane. At quarter time last week we'd have been playing to all but sew up a Grand Final spot, now it's a desperate attempt to remain in the top half of the table. This is the sort of explosive decompression that you usually only get when a plane window pops out mid-flight. Maybe we'll hold them to nil in the first quarter then lose.
Final Thoughts
At least one Melbourne side won today.
Monday, 19 February 2018
Same old piss in a new bottle - the AFLX story
My deeply held belief against watching AFLX lasted until approximately 15 seconds after I heard we'd made the final. After briefly grappling with my conscience, I decided that I may never see Melbourne win anything real, so something fake would be the next best thing and crumpled like a Yugoslavian car. My reward for selling out was to see us narrowly beat a side of Hawthorn's kids in a game vaguely resembling Australian rules football and for Neville Jetta to be presented with a trophy that looked like it was bought at Lincraft.
The game wasn't terrible, but what might be perfectly suited for people pissfarting around in a suburban park competition was rendered dull as dishwater by having high paid professionals doing it. I like the idea of there being a code where Jake Melksham is the greatest player ever born, and we're one of the top three teams in history, but could happily leave it there. Fat chance of that, they're already changing the rules (because what's an AFL competition without rule changes?) and taking it overseas. Hopefully it will be left there.
I note that the sort of people who are still open to this concept as anything more than a hit and giggle wankfest have split into two groups - one orthodox line who want more stoppages and contests, and the opposition who demand different parts of the ground to be worth different scores like a game of Test Match. Usually I'd demand that they let the game evolve naturally, but in this case making it insanely ridiculous and carting in Rugby 7s style specialist players and recent retirees would be the best thing to do.
Fortunately while I was occupying myself researching 1920 Seconds fixtures and checking Twitter to make sure nobody had necked themselves, Nick Miller offered to watch the lot and report back. We had concerns that as he's 'overseas' that he wouldn't get to the end of the matches without rushing out the door with ball in hand looking for the nearest rectangular ground to have a kick in. He bravely soldiered through to the end (of a night supposed to be the shortened version of the game, which had so many matches it actually went longer than a normal trip to the footy), not giving up either when a mime turned up saying nothing, or when Brian Taylor turned up saying anything.
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What to say of AFLX? Personally I tuned in because it’s the Dees, and I’d probably watch Mitch King play backgammon in Siberia for an official MFC backgammon team. The players seemed to enjoy it, but they haven’t played competitive footy in 6 months, so who wouldn’t enjoy a low pressure, bruise-free, hit out to blow out the cobwebs? It looks like it would be a pretty good game to play as a mid-week social sport (sort of an AFL equivalent of touch rugby), but then I thought there was already AFL 9s to fill that niche. And as far as positive comments go, that is all I have to say about that.
If you’ve been living under a rock, and have somehow avoided the AFL’s shameless self-promotion of AFLX, it is “a new and exciting game created by the AFL to showcase some of the most thrilling elements of Australian Football to attract new fans”. LOL. They say that a camel is a horse designed by a committee. AFLX is a camel designed by the boffins at AFL HQ to serve no apparent purpose other than the ubiquitous goals “to grow the game internationally” and/or “attract women to the game”, whichever fits at the time. Basically Gillon was watching the Big Bash last summer and decided he wanted to do that for AFL, missing the patently obvious fact that AFL was already the T20 version of the game. Not since the 1850s has any version of Australian football ever taken a full day, let alone five.
But was it a success? Short answer – no. For the long answer I will defer to Richard Hinds – “AFLX is the first attempted use of Victoria's new voluntary euthanasia laws. AFLX is a nothing of a game. One that combines neither the best aspects of Australian Rules, nor those of any other sport, but rather dilutes them so greatly that even the leather-lunged commentary box spruikers struggled to maintain their well-paid enthusiasm." I’ll leave it at that.
I watched the action on delay from overseas, because what else would one want to do on a Friday night in New York City than watch a replay of the mighty Dees? [Bring back Plato's Retreat - Editor]. For the record; these were our lineups:
Game 1: Petracca, Melksham, Maynard, T McDonald, Neal-Bullen, Bugg, Wagner. Int: Harmes, Brayshaw, Stretch.
Game 2: In: Fritsch, Jetta. Out: Brayshaw, Maynard.
Game 3: In: Maynard, Brayshaw. Out: Fritsch, Stretch.
Did Not Play: Spargo, Baker, Johnstone.
First up was Carlton, and we went in with what looks like a full strength team. It was surprising how seriously we took this, not even giving a token run to three of the four zero-gamers in our squad. Big Max Gawn on the commentary described stand in Coach Craig Jennings as a “different cat” who was very keen to win. So I guess we chalk it up to that. Although I’m not sure what this approach achieved, other than blowing out the cobwebs for a few blokes we already know are best 22, and (spoiler alert) winning our first silverware of any kind since the 1989 Night Series championship.
Carlton led early via a couple of behinds each way and a 10-pointer (never a zooper goal) to Williamson until Jake Melksham happened. First he missed an attempted screamer from a kick in, collected his own #crumb and slammed one through from right on the 40m arc for a 10-pointer. Next he took an uncontested mark 50m out, beat the man on the mark and converted his second 10-pointer in under a minute. A few minutes later, after a brief interlude for some Carlton scores, Melksham converted his third 10-pointer after McDonald marked 30m out and handballed back for the 10-point shot. (Whilst fun to watch in the NBA, the day this becomes a thing in the AFL, is the day I give up. Never change the scoring system Gillon).
In the final minute of the half Tom McDonald slotted a delightful set shot for a 10-pointer and Wagner put through another right on the half time siren [Any bastard kicking regulation goals in this game? - Ed]. With the Dees leading 53-30 at half time, that was it for the contest. Whilst the fans snoozed in the second half Petracca and Bugg scored more 10-pointers and Harmes nabbed a regular goal to wrap-up a comfortable 82-54 win.
The second match was against North, with diehard fans watching in hope of breaking the North hoodoo, which now sits at 17 regular AFL games. Though does a win in this format really count? Unfortunately, no.
North opened with a 10-pointer, before Tom McDonald converted a couple of regular goals to give Melbourne a lead they would never relinquish. From there Bugg, Harmes, Fritsch (3), Melksham and Sir Neville Jetta converted regular goals and Melksham another 10 to give the Dees a 70-46 victory.
The highlight of this game was undoubtedly the commentary of Max Gawn, who provided a few laughs to lighten the drudgery of the on field action, and Brayden Preuss’s tackle on a slightly-too-arrogant Tom McDonald, which included a little bit of #niggle to rub it in.
All that set up a “Grand Final” clash with Hawthorn, with Coach Jennings going back to his best line-up for the decider. Apparently Hawthorn had Gunston, Breust, Schoenmakers and Shiels in their squad, none of whom made an appearance, so it’s fair to say they took the game somewhat less seriously.
The game followed a familiar script for the night with the Dees conceding the first goal, before Bugg found a way to fix his shoddy goal kicking by converting from the goal line. Then Melksham converted a 10-pointer and we never relinquished the lead, though at least they were occasionally challenged.
Melksham’s ability to convert on either foot, off one step, from around the 50m arc is phenomenal. We saw it a number of times in the second half of 2017 and it was on full display on Friday night. He had a shaky start, but has become a sensational recruit. Since becoming a forward in round 12 last year kicked a goal in every remaining game, with a string of 11111332213 giving him 19 in 11 games. He’s surely one of the first picked each week now and could easily kick 35-40 goals this year.
I don’t know where Hawthorn find their recruits but they seem to have a few more unsociable types in their pipeline in Worpel and Campbell Brown doppelganger Blake Hardwick, which led to a few fantastic moments of #niggle, including a minor scuffle in which Sir Neville Jetta was clearly victorious over Campbell Br-, sorry, Hardwick.
With the Hawks challenging lateish in the second half, the Dees were, for once, aided by a novelty umpiring decision. McDonald was run down with prior opportunity, (and whilst he got a clear handball away, let’s not pretend as though the AFL won’t make that holding the ball shortly) allowing Anal-Bullet to collect and convert a 10-pointer for the Dees. The Hawks kept coming, peppering the goals in the final three minutes, although the Dees were able to hold on and win 56-46. It would be nice to see the regular team display that sort of composure in the season proper.
Stray Thoughts
2018 NBA Jam Medal - Votes awarded based on performance across all three matches.
3 - Jake Melksham
2 - Sir Neville Jetta
1 – Christian Petracca
Apologies to Alex Neal-Bullen
Off the back of his barnstorming #demonbracket victory I was going to honor Sir Neville Jetta with this award (because, in the spirit AFL HQ, why give a stuff about honesty and fairness). But then Melksham happened. The bloke put together without doubt the greatest performance in the history of AFLX. Congrats to the inaugural (and hopefully final) medal winner.
Banner Watch
I didn’t see banners on the TV feed. Were there banners? Did they have three for the three games? If so, does this mean the cheer squad had a reserve banner just in case? So many questions, for which I have absolutely zero answers.
Apologies for the failure of this segment, although let’s be honest it stopped being interesting a long time before this.
Final Thoughts (incorporating 'was it worth it?')
Despite beating North and claiming some bogus silverware, no, no it was not. Please kill this game with fire.
The game wasn't terrible, but what might be perfectly suited for people pissfarting around in a suburban park competition was rendered dull as dishwater by having high paid professionals doing it. I like the idea of there being a code where Jake Melksham is the greatest player ever born, and we're one of the top three teams in history, but could happily leave it there. Fat chance of that, they're already changing the rules (because what's an AFL competition without rule changes?) and taking it overseas. Hopefully it will be left there.
I note that the sort of people who are still open to this concept as anything more than a hit and giggle wankfest have split into two groups - one orthodox line who want more stoppages and contests, and the opposition who demand different parts of the ground to be worth different scores like a game of Test Match. Usually I'd demand that they let the game evolve naturally, but in this case making it insanely ridiculous and carting in Rugby 7s style specialist players and recent retirees would be the best thing to do.
Fortunately while I was occupying myself researching 1920 Seconds fixtures and checking Twitter to make sure nobody had necked themselves, Nick Miller offered to watch the lot and report back. We had concerns that as he's 'overseas' that he wouldn't get to the end of the matches without rushing out the door with ball in hand looking for the nearest rectangular ground to have a kick in. He bravely soldiered through to the end (of a night supposed to be the shortened version of the game, which had so many matches it actually went longer than a normal trip to the footy), not giving up either when a mime turned up saying nothing, or when Brian Taylor turned up saying anything.
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What to say of AFLX? Personally I tuned in because it’s the Dees, and I’d probably watch Mitch King play backgammon in Siberia for an official MFC backgammon team. The players seemed to enjoy it, but they haven’t played competitive footy in 6 months, so who wouldn’t enjoy a low pressure, bruise-free, hit out to blow out the cobwebs? It looks like it would be a pretty good game to play as a mid-week social sport (sort of an AFL equivalent of touch rugby), but then I thought there was already AFL 9s to fill that niche. And as far as positive comments go, that is all I have to say about that.
If you’ve been living under a rock, and have somehow avoided the AFL’s shameless self-promotion of AFLX, it is “a new and exciting game created by the AFL to showcase some of the most thrilling elements of Australian Football to attract new fans”. LOL. They say that a camel is a horse designed by a committee. AFLX is a camel designed by the boffins at AFL HQ to serve no apparent purpose other than the ubiquitous goals “to grow the game internationally” and/or “attract women to the game”, whichever fits at the time. Basically Gillon was watching the Big Bash last summer and decided he wanted to do that for AFL, missing the patently obvious fact that AFL was already the T20 version of the game. Not since the 1850s has any version of Australian football ever taken a full day, let alone five.
But was it a success? Short answer – no. For the long answer I will defer to Richard Hinds – “AFLX is the first attempted use of Victoria's new voluntary euthanasia laws. AFLX is a nothing of a game. One that combines neither the best aspects of Australian Rules, nor those of any other sport, but rather dilutes them so greatly that even the leather-lunged commentary box spruikers struggled to maintain their well-paid enthusiasm." I’ll leave it at that.
I watched the action on delay from overseas, because what else would one want to do on a Friday night in New York City than watch a replay of the mighty Dees? [Bring back Plato's Retreat - Editor]. For the record; these were our lineups:
Game 1: Petracca, Melksham, Maynard, T McDonald, Neal-Bullen, Bugg, Wagner. Int: Harmes, Brayshaw, Stretch.
Game 2: In: Fritsch, Jetta. Out: Brayshaw, Maynard.
Game 3: In: Maynard, Brayshaw. Out: Fritsch, Stretch.
Did Not Play: Spargo, Baker, Johnstone.
First up was Carlton, and we went in with what looks like a full strength team. It was surprising how seriously we took this, not even giving a token run to three of the four zero-gamers in our squad. Big Max Gawn on the commentary described stand in Coach Craig Jennings as a “different cat” who was very keen to win. So I guess we chalk it up to that. Although I’m not sure what this approach achieved, other than blowing out the cobwebs for a few blokes we already know are best 22, and (spoiler alert) winning our first silverware of any kind since the 1989 Night Series championship.
Carlton led early via a couple of behinds each way and a 10-pointer (never a zooper goal) to Williamson until Jake Melksham happened. First he missed an attempted screamer from a kick in, collected his own #crumb and slammed one through from right on the 40m arc for a 10-pointer. Next he took an uncontested mark 50m out, beat the man on the mark and converted his second 10-pointer in under a minute. A few minutes later, after a brief interlude for some Carlton scores, Melksham converted his third 10-pointer after McDonald marked 30m out and handballed back for the 10-point shot. (Whilst fun to watch in the NBA, the day this becomes a thing in the AFL, is the day I give up. Never change the scoring system Gillon).
In the final minute of the half Tom McDonald slotted a delightful set shot for a 10-pointer and Wagner put through another right on the half time siren [Any bastard kicking regulation goals in this game? - Ed]. With the Dees leading 53-30 at half time, that was it for the contest. Whilst the fans snoozed in the second half Petracca and Bugg scored more 10-pointers and Harmes nabbed a regular goal to wrap-up a comfortable 82-54 win.
The second match was against North, with diehard fans watching in hope of breaking the North hoodoo, which now sits at 17 regular AFL games. Though does a win in this format really count? Unfortunately, no.
North opened with a 10-pointer, before Tom McDonald converted a couple of regular goals to give Melbourne a lead they would never relinquish. From there Bugg, Harmes, Fritsch (3), Melksham and Sir Neville Jetta converted regular goals and Melksham another 10 to give the Dees a 70-46 victory.
The highlight of this game was undoubtedly the commentary of Max Gawn, who provided a few laughs to lighten the drudgery of the on field action, and Brayden Preuss’s tackle on a slightly-too-arrogant Tom McDonald, which included a little bit of #niggle to rub it in.
All that set up a “Grand Final” clash with Hawthorn, with Coach Jennings going back to his best line-up for the decider. Apparently Hawthorn had Gunston, Breust, Schoenmakers and Shiels in their squad, none of whom made an appearance, so it’s fair to say they took the game somewhat less seriously.
The game followed a familiar script for the night with the Dees conceding the first goal, before Bugg found a way to fix his shoddy goal kicking by converting from the goal line. Then Melksham converted a 10-pointer and we never relinquished the lead, though at least they were occasionally challenged.
Melksham’s ability to convert on either foot, off one step, from around the 50m arc is phenomenal. We saw it a number of times in the second half of 2017 and it was on full display on Friday night. He had a shaky start, but has become a sensational recruit. Since becoming a forward in round 12 last year kicked a goal in every remaining game, with a string of 11111332213 giving him 19 in 11 games. He’s surely one of the first picked each week now and could easily kick 35-40 goals this year.
I don’t know where Hawthorn find their recruits but they seem to have a few more unsociable types in their pipeline in Worpel and Campbell Brown doppelganger Blake Hardwick, which led to a few fantastic moments of #niggle, including a minor scuffle in which Sir Neville Jetta was clearly victorious over Campbell Br-, sorry, Hardwick.
With the Hawks challenging lateish in the second half, the Dees were, for once, aided by a novelty umpiring decision. McDonald was run down with prior opportunity, (and whilst he got a clear handball away, let’s not pretend as though the AFL won’t make that holding the ball shortly) allowing Anal-Bullet to collect and convert a 10-pointer for the Dees. The Hawks kept coming, peppering the goals in the final three minutes, although the Dees were able to hold on and win 56-46. It would be nice to see the regular team display that sort of composure in the season proper.
Stray Thoughts
- Preuss from North is a big unit. A legitimately massive man with cult hero potential. Interesting to hear that he is Maximum’s favourite opposition ruck. Maxy just loves the old school.
- Tom McDonald’s set shot kicking is still laser like. A good sign.
- Tom Bugg’s goal kicking is still, ummm, subpar. Not a good sign.
- Bayley Fritsch went alright. I imagine he’ll get a few games throughout the year, but I can’t see him being best 22 yet, particularly with the depth we have in the mid-sized forward department.
- Whilst fairly quiet tonight, Petracca is a super star. Will win the B&F this year and be all Australian. Bookmark it.
- BT was stunned to learn that Tom McDonald is Melbourne’s best time trial runner. Seriously? There’s a puff piece article on every media athlete each year with the results of our time trial, which Tom wins every time. Does he even try at his job?
2018 NBA Jam Medal - Votes awarded based on performance across all three matches.
3 - Jake Melksham
2 - Sir Neville Jetta
1 – Christian Petracca
Apologies to Alex Neal-Bullen
Off the back of his barnstorming #demonbracket victory I was going to honor Sir Neville Jetta with this award (because, in the spirit AFL HQ, why give a stuff about honesty and fairness). But then Melksham happened. The bloke put together without doubt the greatest performance in the history of AFLX. Congrats to the inaugural (and hopefully final) medal winner.
Banner Watch
I didn’t see banners on the TV feed. Were there banners? Did they have three for the three games? If so, does this mean the cheer squad had a reserve banner just in case? So many questions, for which I have absolutely zero answers.
Apologies for the failure of this segment, although let’s be honest it stopped being interesting a long time before this.
Final Thoughts (incorporating 'was it worth it?')
Despite beating North and claiming some bogus silverware, no, no it was not. Please kill this game with fire.
The number you have dialled is not connected
Oh what a weekend indeed. First one of our teams won an actual footballing competition (albeit one with about as much credibility as a pub trivia night in Leongatha), then the other fulfilled their obligations to section 1.1 of the Melbourne Football Club Style Guide and blew a golden chance to thump an inferior side.
Who says people don't feel passionate about women's footy? At the moment half the AFLW sides couldn't whip cream with an outboard motor so I'm absolutely desperate to win a flag ASAP and ensure our last memory of a championship winning Melbourne side is not Neville Jetta gingerly accepting a cheap looking 'X'.
Watching the Dockers struggle to put away a putrid Collingwood side last week, and with happy memories of steamrolling them in 2017 I was convinced that there was no conceivable way we could lose. Which, as any Melbourne supporter of recent years knows, is the worst thing to do. Expect the worst and hopefully be surprised.
I forget we played a pre-season game at Fremantle Oval in 2015 until I heard their siren that sounds like an incoming scud missile alert. Any concern that the disco blue jumper and You're The Voice playing before the bounce would usher in a repeat of our 80s lost years were seemingly dismissed when we went forward from the first bounce and stayed there. Not just for a couple of minutes, but the entire first quarter. In terms of controlling territory it was one of the all-time great stranglings. Which as we discovered against GWS, and to a lesser extent Adelaide, is not much bloody use if you don't do anything with it.
As discussed endlessly on this page, the idea that a team kicking a string of behinds should have just kicked goals instead is ludicrously simplistic. Obviously there's a higher statistical chance of following one point with another if the ball is coming back from the kick-in rather than it being sent back to neutral territory in the middle of the ground. I encourage you to hurl abuse at any commentator who runs with this line - except for me right now, because with the domination we were enjoying over the Dockers I firmly believe that goals would have begat goals via a short break for us to win another centre clearance.
It was good to see the Dockers inviting the AFL to stick the famous memo up the arse by setting up a flood of biblical proportions. It didn't do much for the game, unless you're the sort of person who gets their jollies watching a team blow chance after chance on goal, and for 15 minutes the game was effectively us going forward and botching chances, then Freo kicking it straight back to a Melbourne player to repeat the cycle. I'm a perverse individual so this is the sort of scenario that would have appealed to me even if the Dees weren't involved. You can do as you like with AFLX style scoring until it doesn't mean anything, the idea of goals attaining a soccer-esque rarity creates a wonderful tension. If the league can stop forwards from kicking set shots like Jamie Shanahan but avoid the temptation to mess about with the rules to artificially promote scoring they'll have it made.
If you just watched the first quarter, went out for a milkshake and came home to see the final score you'd be flummoxed. If you missed the game then a replay viewing of the opening term is essential, you will never see a Melbourne Demons team so comprehensively throttle somebody. The shots were coming from everywhere, and from a string of novelty players. Finally after several minutes of threatening, Tegan Cunningham kicked the first. It was a nice recovery from a few minutes earlier when she had a massive height advantage on her opponent, and should have just plucked the mark over the hapless Dockeresses head but showed her inexperience by clumsily giving away a free instead.
After seven inside 50s to nil - not to mention all the times we have repeat opportunities without them getting it outside 50 first - Fremantle's defenders were probably relieved to finally concede the goal and let the ball go back to the middle so it would be somebody else's problem. They got about 45 seconds to rest before we were down there almost kicking another one. With the trouble Freo was having getting the ball over halfway we may as well have just settled in to win it on points from there and kick 1.30.36 to nil.
Opportunities to kick goals were being served up on the silverest of platters, including a Freo defender trying to avoid a 13th straight inside 50 without reply by walking over the line at a kick-in. As we'd discover much to our detriment throughout the afternoon, even when the Dockers made ball movement look more difficult than colonising Mars we never looked likely to steal a quick goal out of nowhere from a stoppage. There was the problem, we packed one tall forward in about her fourth game of competitive footy to kick at and had nothing else at ground level.
Freo must have been ecstatic to get to quarter time only 11 points down. Considering some of the pus games I've seen us involved in over the years, that might be the only time a team has failed to register a single attack of any kind in the first quarter. Not even one hopeful roost forward straight to a defender, in fact I don't think they had a possession forward of the centre circle. All the while down the other end we were attacking like an out of control fire hose. As Jasmine Grierson missed on the siren - aided by the dickhead ground announcer starting to talk in the middle of her run-up - I wondered if they really were going to try win via the death by a thousand points method.
From the available evidence we should have belied whatever slight wind there was to the left of screen and carried on merrily attacking until somebody finally shambled a goal through. Instead, in a none-more-Melbourne series of events, the Dockers kicked a goal immediately from their first attack when in a Neville Jetta style scenario one defender was left to deal with three opponents and a high ball. The three opponents won, and other than the string of points that separated the teams all that effort in the first quarter was wasted. The Dockers nearly went ahead straight after, prompting me to deliver the same sort of foul "typical Melbourne" outburst as when I watch the men on TV.
You get what you deserve for not killing off a rattled opposition when you have the chance. The only saving grace was that while we wasted chances with points, they were wasting them with aimless bombs inside 50 for no score. There was no way too wacky for us to miss a goalscoring opportunity, a rare counter-attacking goal opportunity was lost when a mark was dropped in the squad. About 90 seconds later our slender lead disappeared, the Dockers botched one gilt edged chance from the square, then thumped one through from a set shot 40 metres out. Our domination was such that if we had players who could kick 40 metre set shots accurately we'd probably never lose a game. Now we were inexplicably a point behind at half time.
I'm open minded, so after a week where I assumed the last five weeks would be a series of ruthless slayings it was time to jump out of the bandwagon like a burning bus. Maybe the Adelaide game was the outlier, and our desperate struggles to kick goals in Round 1 were a more accurate indication of where we're at. Surely we'd have had more success from our persistent attacking if they'd picked Alyssa Mifsud. She didn't do all that much last week, but ask yourself which was the game out of the three where our forward line looked most deadly. Exactly. My membership card to the Tegan Cunningham Fan Club is in the mail, but it's a bit rich to expect her to carry the entire line on her own at this stage.
A commenter quite rightly pointed out that we need a Goal of the Week award for AFLW, which I will do along with a women's #demonbracket from next season, but we'll still make sure Aleisha Newman is recognised as the Goal of the Year winner for last week's effort unless somebody does something outrageous and tops it in the last four weeks. No such heroics this time, not only did we show up without crumb, but there was only two times all game where they tried to kick it to Newman's advantage and let her burn her opponent off.
To prove that the game was no longer the landslide of the first quarter, Freo had their first inside 50 to the right of screen within 25 seconds of the third quarter starting. They kicked a third goal not long after, then a fourth and a spectacular collapse was on. The 'do it with points' philosophy was in disarray due to the Dockers refusing to participate, and now they were crushing us in the midfield battle as well. This was starting to look like the 2017 GWS disaster in a more accessible timeslot.
Finally Cranston bustled through the midfield and launched a bomb over the top for Newman to run on to. It was still difficult to comprehend how we were forced to fight back from behind, but only if you ignored everything that happened after quarter time. The damage of the early part of the quarter was cancelled when Cunningham performed a better crumb than all her shorter teammates combined for a second. We were treated to a free inside 50 from the restart when a Freo midfielder unloaded a big clearance in the wrong direction. Our single pronged attack was nowhere to be seen and they got away with it. An attempt to return the favour by handballing directly to a Dockers player running towards the 50 was only held out by desperate defence and a killer smother from Laura Duryea.
Australia's hopes of winning Ultimate Frisbee gold at the Commonwealth Games went out the door when Cat Phillips did her ankle, but shortly afterwards Karen Paxman pulled down a mark at the back of a pack in the forward pocket and we were back to where we'd been after the dominant first quarter. Back to pondering whether the league would do something bonkers like play a Grand Final at Casey Fields, or even more bonkers and play it under mood lighting at Princes Park.
Now that any theories about a 'scoring end' had been discredited, it would have been best practice for a premiership favourite to blow the Dockers away in the opening minutes. After all, a loss would leave us in a five team melange on 2-1. Instead we missed an opportunity in front of goal and Freo went the other way to level the scores with the sort of arsey snap in the middle of a tackle that we were sorely lacking. Likewise as they kicked one out of nowhere in the pocket, while we were still trying to craft artisan goals for the AFL's 'Hey women, play the game our way or else' DVD.
The last several minutes were spent desperately trying to find a winner from a goal down. Our second attempt at launching Newman like a pinball was defused by a Dockers defender performing one of the great deliberately rush behinds to absolutely no reaction from players, umpires or commentators. It got a rise from me, jumping off my couch and yelling obscenities at the TV. I will accept that Newman was in the same area as her, but given that the ball hit the ground with the Melbourne player still in mid-air, and the Docker facing the goal just stuck her arm out and thumped it through there was no doubt it was deliberate. If I had my way we'd just bring back the rushed behind in all its glory, but if you're going to have a heavily interpretation driven rule at least pay the obvious ones. I can understand the umpire squibbing a tough call in a tight game, but at least give us the courtesy of some outrage in the commentary box.
At least that cut the margin to five points, opening the prospect of a sneaky one point win if we could find some way to stick ball to boot in a pack or get a corker of a bounce from a hopeful long shot. When Elise O'Dea realised she was too far out to score and ran around the opponent my eyes lit up like saucers at the prospect of a miracle finish. Until she kicked it out on the full. It left the Dockers having to desperately guard their goal for the last minute, but nothing we did looked like it could even accidentally sneak through for a goal.
In another example of how I'm getting into this competition the final siren gave me the same sort of searing anxiety back pains that I get watching the AFLM team losing a thriller.
2018 Daisy Pearce Medal
And for the first time ever Daisy does the double, picking up a maximum in her own award.
5 - Daisy Pearce
4 - Laura Duryea
3 - Tegan Cunningham
2 - Karen Paxman
1 - Katherine Smith
Apologies to Hickey, O'Dea, Cranston, Hore, Guest and Humphries.
Leaderboard
And it's on like the proverbial at the top of the leaderboard.
7 - Karen Paxman, Daisy Pearce
6 - Tegan Cunningham, Elise O'Dea
4 - Richelle Cranston, Laura Duryea, Bianca Jakobsson
3 - Shelley Scott
2 - Lily Mithen
1 - Erin Hoare, Katherine Smith
Banner Watch
Even I can't spin this one in our favour, the players ran out to find it had already fallen to bits. With the cheersquad taking a well-earned break, club officials tried to gamely stood there holding the side bits like nothing was wrong, leaving players to try and negotiate the wreckage without doing a knee. Freo's was nothing special, but at least it was didn't explode. For the first time in the history of this competition male or female, the Dees are behind the ledger. 1-2 for the season.
Uniform Watch
On a completely different type of jumper, Duryea's 1's were still ridiculously far apart. It must be deliberate.
Next Week
In the sort of fixturing nightmare that you've come to get used to at this club, the obvious next stop after a game in Perth is Alice Springs. I don't know how they've managed it considering the players are barely part time players, but they've taken the perfectly sensible decision to go straight to the Northern Territory. Either that or we're forcing them to spend a week performing promotional opportunities as part of the ever popular NT sponsorship deal.
The opposition will be the winless and not even remotely good Collingwood, which makes it the quintessential MFC danger game. You would expect they would be swept aside with the greatest of ease, but I don't think any of us have forgotten what happened the last time we started favourite against the Pies. Here's to the women getting close enough to an opponent to lay at least one tackle in the first 10 minutes.
As Cat Phillips becomes the latest player to drop out of the games record race (other changes pending, the survivors from game 1 are Duryea, Hickey, Humphries, Mithen, O'Dea, Paxman, D. Pearce, L. Pearce and K. Smith), it's not immediately clear who replaces her. As much as I'd like to get Mifsud in - if only to play decoy for Cunningham - they'll need somebody down the other end. Harriet Cordner has been an emergency all year so I suppose she's next cab off the rank, but based on last year it's not an option that fills me with confidence. Nothing fills me with confidence any more, I feel like a poon for being sucked in by the hype from last week and expect Mo Hope to turn up for the first time in two seasons and kick eight.
The real question is whether iSelect will pay up to print another banner and Express Post it to Traeger Park, if we'll just concede the banner race entirely or whether somebody will try to fix it with sticky tape and decapitate several players.
Administrative announcement
It will be out of sequence, but we've got a guest report on the AFLX wankfest to go live in the next couple of days. Curb your enthusiasm. Better get used to it, if the AFLW games don't turn into 180 point combined shootouts soon they'll force the women into playing that instead.
Final Thoughts
Let's not be fooled by the dominant first quarter - and is that the first time a team has come back from zero inside 50s in a first quarter to win any sort of AFL game? - it was all downhill from the moment the banner committed suicide rather than have the team run through it.
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