FFC: Established 1883
Premierships: AFL 1954, 2016 VFA - 1898,99,1900, 1908, 1913, 1919-20, 1923-24, VFL: 2014, 2016 . Champions of Victoria 1924. AFLW - 2018.
Been able to watch the first half on replay since the weekend, and that's it! Won't have a chance to watch the second half until Thursday or Friday.
What impressed me so far was our ability to sling from our back line and score quickly.
I will say though, Richmond looked a little bit "off" in the first half. Almost as if they thought the game was going to be a bit of a cake walk.
Impressive work by Crameri, Jong, Cooney and Higgins (the first two for their running, the second for their intent at the contest) stood out to me.
I've watched that last passage of play leading to our winning goal on countless occasions now....thrilling to watch.
One thing I noticed was Higgins key involvement. First he pushes over to provide Wood with support as he struggles to get the ball from the last line of defence and others have already mentioned his "fingertip" tackle. For a bloke who has copped a lot of criticism, I reckon those two examples of Higgin's improved intensity deserve recognition.
I thought I was wrong once but I was mistaken.
And no peripheral vision. But...I would not have been confident on Picken had Crammers passed it off on the outside. Still, his gut busting run put him in a good position and perhaps he deserved his chance.
Not many players would have stayed with Crameri when he took off like that from half back with 1 minute left in the game.
Yeah, I'll acknowledge Professor Higgins's chase and crucial figertips tackle. Wouldn't have seen him doing that a couple of years ago.
And I think it was JJ who laid the comprehensive tackle to turn the last shot at goal by Richmond into a fading kick into the pocket which Wood dealt with to the boundary.
If you have Foxtel, see the replay of 360. Or let my words illustrate your imagination. During the King/Maclure segment.
Behind the goal or commentators view of the ground from the weekend of the play leading up to Gia's free and goal. Gia was last line at about 10m goal side of centre, with two Tigers players, on to his front and laterally. As the play happens Gia's hard running, but also more importantly his running patterns, left, then right while constantly watching the play and leaving his opponent who temporarily ball watched in the middle allowed Gia to win the ball long before the kick. I hope all our young forwards got the vision, that's what having 250 odd games means.
Rocket Science: the epitaph for the Beveridge era - whenever it ends - reading 'Here lies a team that could beat anyone on its day, but seldom did when it mattered most'. 15/7/2023
Just watching the second quarter (after my last post in this thread I'd managed to get a run at watching the replay so the whole game has been covered) and Higgins efforts are just excellent.
His smart gather and use towards the player running towards the boundary with about 5m 30s to go in the second was outstanding and his follow up to allow us to get Jong in a good position was great as well.
Gun.