St Kilda's disappointment more over performance
The Age
Monday August 17, 2009
NINE years ago, a powerhouse team lost the opportunity to go through the season undefeated when it was beaten in round 21 in a momentous upset at Docklands.Essendon of 2000 was conquered by a novel tactic €” the uber-flood, devised by Terry Wallace, who was coaching a handy Bulldogs team placed in the eight's lower reaches. It took a left foot snap from the boundary by Chris Grant to sink Kevin Sheedy's Almost Invincibles.Last night, it was a captain's miss after the siren, rather than a conversion, that prevented another team from matching the Essendon Football Club's 2000 record. The Bombers slew St Kilda before the Saints had an opportunity to match €” or better €” that 20-game streak.The Saints can only hope that they match the rest of Essendon's 2000. While they did not like their first taste of defeat in 2009, the impression given was that it was the way they had played €” "poorly" was Lenny Hayes' description €” that really hurt, rather than the loss of four points and perhaps a piece of history."It's probably more disappointed in the way we played," said vice-captain Hayes. "And then to sort of get pretty close, but not get over the line and, yeah look, probably, you know, at the moment it hasn't really sunk in. It's probably more just the disappointment at the way we played and the way we went about it."Nor was history €” the protection of a nine-year-old record €” the motivation for the Dons, who had only one player, champion defender Dustin Fletcher, remaining last night from that 2000 team.Essendon had only a finals berth on its mind. A place in the final eight, now Essendon's to lose, was the rabbit that the red and black greyhounds chased to victory last night.St Kilda's domination of 2009 had been built upon numerous factors, but two statistical facts stood out. One was that the Saints had used only 27 players until round 19, when they went to Tasmania and beat Hawthorn without arguably their seven best players.The team that lost to Essendon last night had eight changes from round 19, but Hayes would not blame this lack of continuity in personnel (the inclusions were most of the team's better players) for the defeat. "Is that the reason why we were a bit off today? If anything, we should have been a bit fresher and been able to run over the top of them. It's very difficult to say."The other astounding number from St Kilda's almost perfect season was that only once in the course of 19 rounds €” in the round 14 super blockbuster against Geelong €” had a team managed to get the ball into its forward 50-metre arc more than 50 times against the Saints. The St Kilda strangulation was often, wrongly, attributed to a "stingy defence" €” its backline €” when in truth, Ross Lyon's team stopped teams from getting the ball forward at all. The Saint backline was very tight, but it was seldom under bombardment, since it was protected by the Lyon Cage €” the full-court press and defensive smothering, which made it difficult for teams to get the ball forward.Essendon overcame this, not by any fancy or unforseen tactic. The Bombers won because they won the ball €” 124 contested possessions to St Kilda's 96. Jobe Watson contributed a stunning 15 of those balls that were loose or hard-won, and was the decisive influence in this match's formative period, the second quarter and the early part of the third term, when the Dons built that 43-point lead. The Lyon Cage is difficult to combat when a team relies heavily on moving the ball from defence. Essendon was able to escape from St Kilda's boa constrictions because, thanks to Watson and his midfield cohorts, it won decisive centre breaks that meant the Saint defence could be exploited, without help from midfielders pushing back.Hayes said Riewoldt should not be blamed for a loss. The Saints had not deserved to win, he said. "It was a great mark . . . it's a tough one for him. We probably shouldn't have been within a kick anyway. I thought they should have won by more. We were pretty poor. You know, Nick's a proud bloke, but you know, certainly don't put the loss down to him, at all. you know, it's just one of those things in footy . . . we learned a lot of lessons today.
© 2009 The Age
