That look in the eyes!

[Missing Dog]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Meh.

We won by 4 points against a team full of kids that had better hand and foot skills in wet conditions, were better organised, played with a game plan, and our experienced midfield boasting a Brownlow medalist was towelled up by two first year players.

Nothing to be passionate about.

[Go_Dogs]

Re: That look in the eyes!

our experienced midfield boasting a Brownlow medalist was towelled up by two first year players.

Nothing to be passionate about.

Scully had a good night, Trengove was OK but certainly wasn't his best night.

We did win the clearances quite comfortably and the contested ball, so perhaps towelled up isn't the best way to describe the midfield performance.

Out of curiosity, what was so good about Melbourne's game plan? Or are you simply implying that we didn't have one?

[Ghost Dog]

Re: That look in the eyes!

I was watching the replay last night and was feeling sick. I could not resist the temptation to peep at the final score before continuing to watch as last week put me in a foul mood all weekend. Agreed, fire in the eyes is key and great to see the boys pumped.

[Missing Dog]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Scully had a good night, Trengove was OK but certainly wasn't his best night.

We did win the clearances quite comfortably and the contested ball, so perhaps towelled up isn't the best way to describe the midfield performance.

Out of curiosity, what was so good about Melbourne's game plan? Or are you simply implying that we didn't have one?

When a first year kid gets 35 possessions, your midfielders have been beaten

Melbourne went forward trying to kick to targets that presented themselves. They failed in their execution: a couple of passes going a couple of metres wide or short. Mistakes kids make.

OTOH we kicked to clear the ball hopefully, anywhere and to no-one in particular. So yeah for the life of me I could not see if we had a system.

[EasternWest]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Watch the goal again and see Gia's celebration in the goalsquare as it bounced through. Great to see.

Pure emotion. It was a great, genuine reaction.

[Scorlibo]

Re: That look in the eyes!

It was wonderful to see the players boom out the song, instead of whimper it as they have been doing lately. Griff's passion was sooo good!

[Go_Dogs]

Re: That look in the eyes!

When a first year kid gets 35 possessions, your midfielders have been beaten

Melbourne went forward trying to kick to targets that presented themselves. They failed in their execution: a couple of passes going a couple of metres wide or short. Mistakes kids make.

OTOH we kicked to clear the ball hopefully, anywhere and to no-one in particular. So yeah for the life of me I could not see if we had a system.

I'd rather Scully have 39 touches than Aaron Davey though. Scully was good, but he had at least 5 really bad clangers that I saw, and whilst he got a stack of the ball I wouldn't have had him as the most influential player on the ground. I guess we saw it differently.


To me, in the conditions, it seemed both sides played a similar style of game in trying to scrap the ball forwards. Bate was the only real difference as he was able to make good front position and get on the end of a few kicks, where as once again we seemed to fall down a bit around half forward if we didn't run and carry the ball to or over that area.

It was a scrappy contest, and whilst I think you're a little harsh on us, there were times when our ball movement was lacking thought and we'd kick long to no one. Working out our issues across half forward (ahem, Murphy) will go a long way to making these 'holes' in our game plan disappear, at least IMO.

[Sedat]

Re: That look in the eyes!

I'd rather Scully have 39 touches than Aaron Davey though. Scully was good, but he had at least 5 really bad clangers that I saw, and whilst he got a stack of the ball I wouldn't have had him as the most influential player on the ground. I guess we saw it differently.

Ended up with 8 clangers for the night. That's no knock on the kid because it was an amazing gut-running effort to rack up 39 possessions (18 in the last qtr alone). Scully, Trengove and Grimes represents a serious future to build a team around. Grimes in particular was outstanding off half back both mopping up and winning one-on-one contests - Melbourne have absolutely killed it with the pick 14/Travis Johnstone/Cameron Wood 3-way trade.

Davey's 20 odd possessions were all very damaging and had a hand in many of Melbourne's successful forward thrusts. He carves us up every single time, and we simply let him off the leash too often again last night.

[Flamethrower]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Meh.

We won by 4 points against a team full of kids that had better hand and foot skills in wet conditions, were better organised, played with a game plan, and our experienced midfield boasting a Brownlow medalist was towelled up by two first year players.

Nothing to be passionate about.

Don't underestimate how good Melbourne are. They crushed Brisbane (who crushed us), ran a red hot Collingwood to a point, and are a very real chance of playing in the finals this year.

[chef]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Don't underestimate how good Melbourne are. They crushed Brisbane (who crushed us), ran a red hot Collingwood to a point, and are a very real chance of playing in the finals this year.

Yep, they are going to trouble a lot of sides this year.

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

Re: That look in the eyes!

Meh.

We won by 4 points against a team full of kids that had better hand and foot skills in wet conditions, were better organised, played with a game plan, and our experienced midfield boasting a Brownlow medalist was towelled up by two first year players.

Nothing to be passionate about.

I don't think anyone is suggesting that what we dished up was in anyway a good performance.
However anyway you want to play it, there were two choices the team could have taken when 9 minutes down, with very little time left, and with all the momentum with Melbourne.

We could've submitted and taken absolutely nothing from the game, and in turn compounded the teams woes. Instead we found something, dug deep, and in return gained a very valuable 4 points, and perhaps just as significant going forward, steeled the group to take advantage of their good fortune.

The reaction of the players after Lake's and Griffen's goals, and then after the siren was a very passionate response.

Does is solve all of our problems? Does it ensure a good performance next week? Does it mean that the coaching staf and players can ignore the poor performance they turned up for much of the second half?

No.

But I think it would've made our problems and our chances next week infinitely worse had we not found a way to win, and that makes the win and the emotion shown in my book better than 'Meh'.