Bankers and Anchors - Elimination Final, 2020 vs St Kilda

[Scorlibo]

Bankers:

1. Caleb
Deserves to win our best and fairest tonight. He's been unbelievably good all year and rose to the occasion in the last quarter with trademark clean skills and footy IQ.

2. Roarke Smith
He's copped a fair bit from supporters and even more from the injury gods. I thought it was the best game of his short career - certainly his first half was influential when many others were struggling. I'm excited to see if he can maintain that form into next year, because we could really use a player of his athletic capability running the wings.

3. Williams
Capped off a breakout year with a big performance on Saturday. The highlight was in the last two minutes winning that ball at half back, then coolly selling candy and pumping it back the other way to give us one last chance. Unfortunately Bruce completed misjudged it in the air and Membrey took it uncontested.

Anchors - Bambi hunting edition:

1. The midfield: Bontempelli, Macrae, B.Smith, Hunter
It's hard for me to pot these guys, it really is, but I just can't accept their output.
Bontempelli outside of a penetrating kick inside fifty to setup our first goal, what did he bring? Overran the ball constantly to finish with just 4 contested touches, missed 2x opportunities to kick goals on the run, led our clanger count with 5. Arguably his worst game for the year. Macrae received a horrible hit to the head early and never got back into the game, struggled at the coalface. Smith's disposal efficiency has plummeted in the back half of this year, after being one of our most reliable distributors. Hunter was conservative with his involvement when we needed to be brave. Collectively they were our 1-iron and they failed, even accounting for the hitouts (they knew that was coming).

2. The talls: Keath, Bruce, English, Gardner, Wood
Galling performance in the air. Membrey had a field day against Wood, who was a non-factor in the air. Keath fought back against King but the damage was done. We knew English would struggle in the ruck but we didn't account for him getting outmarked so often, and at crucial moments. Some of Gardner's efforts must be questioned. Missed tackle on Membrey, allowing Butler to run past him, kick out of defence through the corridor straight to St Kilda, that's three goals right there. Bruce... enough has been said already really. He's got to go hard this pre-season to get his fitness up to scratch.

3. The MIAs: Richards, Lipinski, Naughton
I've been a fan of Richards but his inability to find the ball is a huge worry. Lipinski 10 touches and one of the great hospital handpasses. Naughton unsighted in the first three quarters hurts the most, we needed his physicality at ground level in the forwardline yet he finished the game with 0 tackles.

[bornadog]

Honestly - I don’t think that stat means much. Lots of tackles at the coal face essentially killing an already dead ball.

Very very few tackles stopping a fast turnover or transition. The higher tackle count can also mean they just had the ball more rather than a sign of intensity. We looked so slow and ineffective when at kilda got their run.

I was trying to make the point, the contested marking is where we lost the game not the tackling. Yeah we missed a couple of tackles, big deal, but they beat us in the air. As far as ground ball play we outpointed them with stoppages and clearances, but in the air, they were dominant.

[The bulldog tragician]

Bankers:

1. Caleb
Deserves to win our best and fairest tonight. He's been unbelievably good all year and rose to the occasion in the last quarter with trademark clean skills and footy IQ.

2. Roarke Smith
He's copped a fair bit from supporters and even more from the injury gods. I thought it was the best game of his short career - certainly his first half was influential when many others were struggling. I'm excited to see if he can maintain that form into next year, because we could really use a player of his athletic capability running the wings.

3. Williams
Capped off a breakout year with a big performance on Saturday. The highlight was in the last two minutes winning that ball at half back, then coolly selling candy and pumping it back the other way to give us one last chance. Unfortunately Bruce completed misjudged it in the air and Membrey took it uncontested.

Anchors - Bambi hunting edition:

1. The midfield: Bontempelli, Macrae, B.Smith, Hunter
It's hard for me to pot these guys, it really is, but I just can't accept their output.
Bontempelli outside of a penetrating kick inside fifty to setup our first goal, what did he bring? Overran the ball constantly to finish with just 4 contested touches, missed 2x opportunities to kick goals on the run, led our clanger count with 5. Arguably his worst game for the year. Macrae received a horrible hit to the head early and never got back into the game, struggled at the coalface. Smith's disposal efficiency has plummeted in the back half of this year, after being one of our most reliable distributors. Hunter was conservative with his involvement when we needed to be brave. Collectively they were our 1-iron and they failed, even accounting for the hitouts (they knew that was coming).

2. The talls: Keath, Bruce, English, Gardner, Wood
Galling performance in the air. Membrey had a field day against Wood, who was a non-factor in the air. Keath fought back against King but the damage was done. We knew English would struggle in the ruck but we didn't account for him getting outmarked so often, and at crucial moments. Some of Gardner's efforts must be questioned. Missed tackle on Membrey, allowing Butler to run past him, kick out of defence through the corridor straight to St Kilda, that's three goals right there. Bruce... enough has been said already really. He's got to go hard this pre-season to get his fitness up to scratch.

3. The MIAs: Richards, Lipinski, Naughton
I've been a fan of Richards but his inability to find the ball is a huge worry. Lipinski 10 touches and one of the great hospital handpasses. Naughton unsighted in the first three quarters hurts the most, we needed his physicality at ground level in the forwardline yet he finished the game with 0 tackles.

Perfect summary.

[bornadog]

Keath fought back against King but the damage was done. .

King had one touch in the second half.

[The Bulldogs Bite]

Bankers:

1. Caleb
Deserves to win our best and fairest tonight. He's been unbelievably good all year and rose to the occasion in the last quarter with trademark clean skills and footy IQ.

2. Roarke Smith
He's copped a fair bit from supporters and even more from the injury gods. I thought it was the best game of his short career - certainly his first half was influential when many others were struggling. I'm excited to see if he can maintain that form into next year, because we could really use a player of his athletic capability running the wings.

3. Williams
Capped off a breakout year with a big performance on Saturday. The highlight was in the last two minutes winning that ball at half back, then coolly selling candy and pumping it back the other way to give us one last chance. Unfortunately Bruce completed misjudged it in the air and Membrey took it uncontested.

Anchors - Bambi hunting edition:

1. The midfield: Bontempelli, Macrae, B.Smith, Hunter
It's hard for me to pot these guys, it really is, but I just can't accept their output.
Bontempelli outside of a penetrating kick inside fifty to setup our first goal, what did he bring? Overran the ball constantly to finish with just 4 contested touches, missed 2x opportunities to kick goals on the run, led our clanger count with 5. Arguably his worst game for the year. Macrae received a horrible hit to the head early and never got back into the game, struggled at the coalface. Smith's disposal efficiency has plummeted in the back half of this year, after being one of our most reliable distributors. Hunter was conservative with his involvement when we needed to be brave. Collectively they were our 1-iron and they failed, even accounting for the hitouts (they knew that was coming).

2. The talls: Keath, Bruce, English, Gardner, Wood
Galling performance in the air. Membrey had a field day against Wood, who was a non-factor in the air. Keath fought back against King but the damage was done. We knew English would struggle in the ruck but we didn't account for him getting outmarked so often, and at crucial moments. Some of Gardner's efforts must be questioned. Missed tackle on Membrey, allowing Butler to run past him, kick out of defence through the corridor straight to St Kilda, that's three goals right there. Bruce... enough has been said already really. He's got to go hard this pre-season to get his fitness up to scratch.

3. The MIAs: Richards, Lipinski, Naughton
I've been a fan of Richards but his inability to find the ball is a huge worry. Lipinski 10 touches and one of the great hospital handpasses. Naughton unsighted in the first three quarters hurts the most, we needed his physicality at ground level in the forwardline yet he finished the game with 0 tackles.

Good post Scorlibo.

Naughton is a massive disappointment for mine - he was woeful v Giants in the EF 2019 and he was woeful v St Kilda, save for a couple of strong marks late.

I get he's young but when you see King clunking marks and having an impact, I expect a LOT more from Aaron. It was enough for me to believe he should go back.

[bornadog]

Good post Scorlibo.

Naughton is a massive disappointment for mine - he was woeful v Giants in the EF 2019 and he was woeful v St Kilda, save for a couple of strong marks late.

I get he's young but when you see King clunking marks and having an impact, I expect a LOT more from Aaron. It was enough for me to believe he should go back.

I think Naughton's confidence was down after his operation, he didn't look right to me.