Hearts to Hearts, we showed Heart

[66MunsterT]

Nothing but praise for the Boys.
We may have lost, but we've shown the Critics that we are not finished yet.
Well played North.

 

[Chris_23]

I'll second that, well played North, they never bloody lie down!

 

[Carey_is_King]

What's the next cliche ? "Honourable defeat"? Freo use that one all the time.

 

[Michele]

CiK,


That is a STUPID response! If OUR team had 'stopped', you would be the first one to complain. The fact is they didn't and played the game out to the end.

If some of the umpiring decisions had gone our way the result would have been different.

- the shove in the back to Roccabyebaby
- the head-high tackle on Colby
- the deliberate out-of bounds on the full by the Hawthorn player in the last few minutes when the ball was in North's 50

I hate the umpires and the umpiring. The game against Adelaide was a farce and the umpires should have benn demoted.

Michele

NMFC 1869

BTW My son went top the game and he was very proud of the wasy the boys fought to the end. A supporter cannot ask more than that.

 

[SoggyBoy]

CIK is spot on!

At this stage of the season, having the poor start that we did, a loss cannot be seen as anything else but tragiedy.

No "good effort", no "we were gallant". The fact is, 3 points or 33 points, our finals chances are severely dented now.

I thought CIK was rather restrained. Not one mention of the McKernan of old eg. taking stuff all marks, running under the ball heaps. (I'm not bagging McKernan, cos I think he's been great of late, but his game today adds merit to CIK's argument that his good performances have been against poor oposition.)

Not one mention of Clayton's unforgivable softness directly costing us 3 goals. In a game where many players showed heart, he showed his usual none!

Umpiring was bad in the last quarter, yes, but at the end of the day...as CIK implies....there are no "good" losses for our club for the remainder of this season.

 

[hotham]

The umpires were pathetic. The bouncing of the ball was shocking. Their decision making was equally as poor. I was devastated when we lost the 98 GF. However the umpiring during the 98 GF was of an excellent standard. I have been going to the footy for 26 years and for the first time I was compelled to boo the umpires from the ground.

 

[Leia]

Although our last quarter was particularly good, and we played with passion and heart, our loss comes from our poor start to the game. We allowed Hawthorn to take control in the first 15-20 minutes and we played catch-up footy for the remainder of the game.
Yes, the umpiring was disgraceful, but we dug our own hole in the initial stages of the game. The signs from the last quarter are positive, and i am proud of the way the boys played, but it still wasn't the complete 4 quarters needed for the win, and that is what's most disappointing.

 

[Shinboners]

I was very surprised about how much praise was heaped upon the Roos on the radio on the way home. It seemed that the commentators felt that the Hawks were lucky to win.

However, to my mind, if we had won it, we would have stolen it. It was just one of those frustrating days when the team played with no fluency and the ball didn't bounce our way.....how many times did the damn thing bounce straight into the arms of a Hawthorn player whereas for us, it'd bounce over our player's head or suddenly take a slight change in angle and slip past the player? It was just frustrating. There were plenty of handpasses that missed their targets.

Credit to the Hawks....they got on top of us in the first and then held us off when we came back at them during the 2nd and 3rd quarters. They also lost two of their better first half players in Barker and Woods. I reckon if the game had gone on for an extra minute, then we would have won. By the way, and I don't allow them the excuse of their returning players not being match fit, and thus fading out to let us back into the match.....they took the risk, they cop the consequences.

Still, we fought it out and I'm proud of them for that. Don't forget that in the same situation at the start of the second half, we would have played for ten minutes before falling in a heap and losing by 10 goals plus.

Everyone has had their say about Stevens in another thread. I thought Grant had an excellent game, I liked Diggers attitude....we noticed his enthusiasm up forward, he added plenty of spark up forward, not only with his goals but also by him talking up his teammates, Motlop (hope his injury isn't a bad one, although it was reported in the Hun as a knee injury) is showing more good signs but still needs to improve his disposal. I'd like to see Motlop get a good 4 to 6 week run in the seniors to get him really set as a defender. Rawlings got plenty of the ball, hopefully he'll also get 4 to 6 weeks to get set as a senior player. Burton was solid in the ruck again.

Onto the negatives, and our forward line was always going to be the key to this match. McKernan was poor and Rocca missed a pressure goal. However, of more concern to me was a lack of crumbing goals.....where were the crumbers? McCartney had an unusually poor game in defence.....the backline seemed to miss Mick's organising skills.

Lastly, onto Carey. He played, he was unfit, and it was always going to be a risk playing him.....but if you're going to run him into match fitness, it was always going to be in the senior side. Still, it was a risk worth taking....it just didn't come off. I would prefer it if Pagan would start him in defence as our forward line was worked well. He has presence and he would keep things organised up back. If you play him forward, he should be used as a decoy...the opposition would have to use their best defender on him, and if he can drag them out of the play, it could give McKernan and Rocca the room to work.

We'll probably end up winning next week and we'll start thinking about finals again. However, as a personal thing, I think that making the finals would be a bonus to us. If we make it, we make it. If we don't, we don't......just look for the rest of the season as a testing ground for next season.

 

[smokey]

The umpiring did cost us the game
Rocca's push and that last bounce when North were on a roll went straight to O'Farrell

I think Spider played well but we needed Petrie to cover o'Farrell b/c i reckon he took about 5 uncontested marks on the wing with Spider trailing him by 15m

The key was their loose men. Why did no-one man up.

At the end of the game i had a decision whether to walk into the North rooms or whether to walk into the umpires rooms and beat the crap out of the bastards.
Lucky for Umpire #30 i went into the North ones

Smokey

 

[Daphne]

Zoo who?

 

[True_Roo]

I thought the best thing to come out of the game were the performances of Rawlings and Motlop.

Motlop was great in the backline (probably our best backman until he was injured), he gave us a lot of run - which is something the rest of our defenders failed to do (Macca was strangely off-key for the afternoon ).

Rawlings was great, up until now we've only seen glimpses of his ability, yesterday I thought he was great for 4 quarters. The best thing is , however, is that he's only just turned 20 so he should keep improving.

Digby was great too, let's hope he can keep improving.

It was good to see us fight back - we looked flat for most of the day, so to only lose by 3 points was , for me, a pleasant surprise.
Stevo was awesome.

 

[35eye]

Originally posted by Shinboners
I was very surprised about how much praise was heaped upon the Roos on the radio on the way home.

Funny you say that, did anyone see the report on the game on Sports Tonight on Saturday night? It was so biased in The Roos' favour. Among the very few parts of Hawthorn's play shown was that failed attempt at a hangar (drop by the Lindsay Smith school of speccies on your way home, mate) and the stolen goal when the ball was knocked back into play from behind the post. The rest was just a North highlights package with the journo doing the voice over sounding disappointed with the result.

There must be someone in Sydney who loves us. I wish I'd taken down his name!

 

[mick]

Enjoyable game, I was well and truly impressed by North's fighting spirit. Digby Morrell will be a cult hero, but I was surprised to hear he sees himself as a flanker(drivel M after match interview). I have only seen him play one game but he did look to have the tools to hold a key position.

I can understand why supporters would feel that umpiring cost you the game but that is always going to happen in close games. I thought the hawks were slightly hard done by in the first 3 qtrs but got the best of it in the last quarter. All in all I thought it worked out fairly even.

Given that the roos can lose 3 more games and still make the finals, I think you are still a rough chance. If you play like you did in the last quarter against Hawthorn for the remainder of the season you are dead set certainties.

Best of luck for the rest of the year, I love watching the Roos play and hope you are thereabouts come September.

 

[hotham]

Originally posted by smokey
The umpiring did cost us the game
Rocca's push and that last bounce when North were on a roll went straight to O'Farrell

I think Spider played well but we needed Petrie to cover o'Farrell b/c i reckon he took about 5 uncontested marks on the wing with Spider trailing him by 15m

The key was their loose men. Why did no-one man up.

At the end of the game i had a decision whether to walk into the North rooms or whether to walk into the umpires rooms and beat the crap out of the bastards.
Lucky for Umpire #30 i went into the North ones

Smokey

That umpire NO 30 was Shane Mc Inerney. If my memeory serves me correct he is the one that used his discretion to report Brett Harvey for ' a tap on the shoulder'. I believe there is a perception of bias on his behalf. He should not be allowed to umpire North games. Heaven knows we do not get John Harvey after the free he paid against Rehn in 98.

Next time you are thinking of what rooms to go to, come and tap me on the shoulder !!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Shinboners]

For some reason, I kept on thinking about CIK's sentiments this afternoon. I also remembered something from the documentary, "Year Of the Dogs". It was when the Doggies had sufferred an "honourable loss", and the players headed back into the rooms with various people around the club giving them a pat on the back for "making such a good effort". The thing is that Terry Wallace told his players that he "would spew if he heard anymore sh*t like a good effort". His point that the only effort worth celebrating was a win, and that close enough was not good enough. Only WINS will get us into finals and give us the chance to challenge for the premiership again....you don't get premiership points for a good effort.

Personally, I hope that those within the club's football department take on the attitude of CIK and Terry Wallace, that Pagan let's the players know that a "good effort" is not good enough. The players have to learn that close enough is not good enough, and that the only effort that is worth congratulating is a win. The fact that they should not expect to win football matches on a consistent basis by dominating in short patches. But that's for the internal mechanisms of the club. The players may hate the opposition, the umpires, the attitude of the fans, but the thing that they must hate above all else is losing. Judging from the dirty look on Pagan's face as he walked to the players race after the game, I'm sure that the players will know that a 1% increase in effort from every player across the whole game would have resulted in us finishing ahead and with the four points.

However, as fans, it's up to us (and here I am in tree hugging mode, and being slightly contradictory to the attitude that I reckon the club should take) to get behind them. Let them know that we do appreciate their efforts, that we will give them support during the lean times. It's a sports equivalent of the good cop-bad cop approach....and we get to play the good cops.

 

[Daphne]

I think that the attitude of the club/supporters has been the right attitude in years gone by Shinners. Interestingly enough I heard a mother of a Kanga player saying that her son had been out with another team after they had won a game, and he was amazed at their over the top attitude, he told her that you certainly would not see that with our boys. I think that this year with the new players we have, we, the supporters have every right to be excited about how our team fought back on Saturday. Unfortunate for some that they couldnt come in here and do the big spew about how we were useless, and how right that they had been earlier on in the year. As for Terry Wallace and the Bulldogs, well they certainly have nothing at this stage, or back when that was said, to be patting themselves on the back for, hopefully for their sakes that will happen soon. I get the feeling that Pagan would not allow that to happen after a game. I remember the earlier posts by some this year, and the picture they painted was nowhere near as bright as what we are seeing so far. As far as comparing us to Fremantle that is an absolute joke.

 

[Briedis]

This was the game that got away.

We should have thrashed the Hawks. We controlled the whole game except for a couple of five-minute bursts in the first and second quarters.

They won the game for the following reasons:

Umpiring was woeful. Worst I have ever seen. 7 bad decisions in the last quarter cost us the game. It might be time to go back to one umpire - at least the decisions would be consistent. They could try a comms system between the bopundary umps and the field ump to allow the boundary guys to help out if the field ump was unsighted ala Rugby Murdoch. It works well in league, worth trying in AFL.

Micky With Mick out the defence took a quarter to get organised. They scored 8 goals of their goals from 30 meters or less. We were very disorganised in the first quarter - no marking up and they took advantage (as they should).

Carey Should not have played this game. Obviously he was not even close to playing but he rushed himself back in. His lack of mobility caused tremendous problems in the forwards. Sav struggled to get space and Corey was also a little unsure. We went into our forward line a lot more than they did throughout the match, but we kept turning it over too easily, especially in that first quarter. This allowed the Hawks to rebound the ball easily into their forwards and score easy goals. Denis needs to really assess Careys role in the team at the moment. The forward set up has been working really well with Corey and Sav up there. I say put Carey across the centre and let him get back some match fitness and swing him into attack when Sav or Corey can't perform.


I thought Sav, Grant, Spider, Digby and Rawlings were terrific for us when the pressure was on. And Stevo was sensational....the best 1 percenter the game has ever seen.

Even though there is no such thing as a good loss, I think we can at least take into the next game some momentum. We were all over the Hawks in the second half and I hope we carry that into the game against Port. Port look to be finished as a side this year, but will probably still limp into the finals. I saw them three weeks ago up here against the Swans and they lost that game more than the Swans won it and up against a spirited team like Carlton yesterday they were never in it. We will pound them into submission and then beat the Demons and the Eagles to set up a crucial game against the bombers. If we can win that one our season will be back on track....just hoping to beat Port at the moment though.....

 

[hotham]

If we were to model ourselves on a club culture I would hope it would be Carlton. I can remember David Parkin stating that losing is not acceptable at Carlton. I would hope that medicority is just as unacceptable at the Kangaroos. After the Rd 22 game of 98 when we beat the scraggers for the top of the ladder I can remember Terry Wallace stating " [his] team lost no admirers". The win for the scraggers was crucial. It seems that most objective observers do believe that the Hawks were as lucky as we were unlucky. I just feel for our players because the umpires ignored certain free kicks. Therefore they contributed to the outcome of the game. I am also very mindful that our players have four home grounds unlike most other teams.

 

[Aussie_Roo]

I can't believe that nobody has mentioned Sav Rocca's game on the weekend. I'm not suggesting that he cost us the game, however I struggle to understand for a guy that has been a full forward for 10 years or so how poor his kicking for goal is within 50m. He kicked two magnificent goals on Saturday from 60m+ out, yet he struggles from 30m out dead straight in front.

I know he is kicking his 2 or 3 goals a game, but with the amount of shots he is having he should be kicking at least 3 or 4. With the amount of money league footballers are getting paid these days, it is an absolute disgrace the amount of easy shots they are missing.

Besides his kicking for goal, I believe he has been of value to us this year.

 

[SoggyBoy]

Sav made one mistake. He missed a goal he should have kicked.

He wasn't the only one. Just happens his happened to be at a more noticable time.

Just cos the other misses didn't happen in the last quarter, doesn't make them any more acceptable, or Sav's any worse.

Sav was a major factor in us getting in a winning position in the first place.

Bar that missed shot at goal, his last half (last quarter in particular) was great. Strong marking. Long kicking into the forward line.

He was CLEARLY the best of our tall forwards. (Morrell played more of a flankers role)

 

[Yianni]

Rocca was not the problem

A few things.

I can't believe noone else noticed this. The reason we lost is that for the first half, we played our old style "bomb long to noone" style of game, and in the second half we played possession football. There was a noticeable change after halftime. Even my girlfriend who has seen one game of AFL in her life, commented at halftime that Hawthorn "seemed to kick it to each other more" whereas North just "kicked it in a general direction" (her words).

North has the list to be in at least the top 6. We are not any worse than last year. It is just the way they play. All through the first half Hawthorn ran North wide and killed them. It was easy for them to do cos North never had the ball. When North retained the ball in the second half, they were doing it to Hawthorn.

As for Rocca, it's right that it wasn't his fault that we lost, but he SHOULD kick those goals. Harvey missed that snap shot in the third quarter that he should have kicked as well. I just think that they should play Rocca around the 50m arc as a "flood breaker". He's shown himself to be a liability inside 50 (and he was at Collingwood as well), so don't play him there. Put him on the arc around half forward and let him bomb from there. When Hawthorn flooded, it was VERY hard to get marks inside 50. If Rocca was kicking them from outside (as he did) Hawthorn would quit flooding very quickly.

As for Carey, I personally think that we would get best value out of him playing him as a "link-man" through the middle, like he was doing at the start of the third quarter. He can get a lot more easy touches (uncontested marks) without being triple teamed as he is when he plays in a key position. The added bonus is that he has almost the best disposal in the team, so he can find players. When he is forward, everyone goes to him, and he's unable to beat two or three players anymore. If he was creating, it would benefit everyone.

That's my two cents anyway!

 

[kymhodgemansmo]

Losing has always been unacceptable under Pagan, hence the fact he has never, ever missed finals in his entire coaching career.

The second tier players, Motlop and Rawlings accepted, should be lambasted because they simply did not step up in the white hot heat of the first half.

Winning should not, and in our situation CAN not be tolerated.

There a re three games already this year we have let slip - Hawthorn, Carlton & Adelaide, and last year's side, despite its inadequacies, would not have lost any of these.

A culture of success is a culture of SUCCESS, not near misses.

Look at Collingwood, whose honourable losses over the last five years have been lauded with praise. They still can't beat us.

We have the cattle, the ability, and the matchwinners to win games like this.

If we didn't then I would concede it was a good effort.

But in reality our list is still in the top four, and losing should not be tolerated.

They threw away an opportunity to put things on an even keel, and I for one am not about to praise them for that.

Besided, it was a costly costly excercise with so many Hawk supporters as friends, not to mention the lazy punt I had on us making the eight.



Anyway, time is running out and we must win this week - simple. Anything less against a depleted Port Adelaide will be unacceptable.

 

[Shinboners]

Originally posted by kymhodgemansmo
Winning should not, and in our situation CAN not be tolerated.

Um.....don't you mean losing should not, and in our situation CAN not be tolerated?

 

[35eye]

Originally posted by SoggyBoy
Sav made one mistake. He missed a goal he should have kicked.

True Soggy.

While drowing our sorrows back at Arden Street on Saturday night we came up with about half a dozen players we could have pointed the finger at for having lost the game for us.

But that's not really my style which goes a long way to explain how disappointed I was immediately after the game. An hour later and I was over it.

 

[DOC]

As Ive stated about 100 times since the final siren " It is not to hard to find another goal"


There ya go 35eye just for you.

Go the Skull !!!
J.I.T.C
THE DOC..