Review Semi Final, 2024 - GWS vs. Brisbane Lions

[morsie]

I tried to get tickets late last week and there was nothing but singles available. So I was very surprised to see the stadium so empty. I would have gone otherwise.

A few people on the Giants board were complaining about the process.Stands were closed then open.Maybe the agency screwed up as is not uncommon.

 

[M Malice]

BTW dlanod and a one other who I can not recall who recommended Ribs & Rumps thanks heaps, loved it and it was a huge serving, great for Carnivores like myself.

 

[Grasshopper17]

Clutch goal from Fletcher as well. Ice in his veins in that moment

Yes he had Joe (I think) unmarked in the right pocket calling for it but I thought he made the right call in the moment. Imagine the carry on if he'd missed tho...

 

[LongLion]

Yes he had Joe (I think) unmarked in the right pocket calling for it but I thought he made the right call in the moment. Imagine the carry on if he'd missed tho...

Made the early call, ran straight at goal and backed himself in.

 

[Dom PC]

That Sam Taylor

15

Sam Taylor

Age

26

Ht

198cm

Wt

95kg

Pos.

Def

Career

Season

Last 5

D

10.0

3star

K

4.6

2star

HB

5.4

4star

M

3.3

3star

T

2.1

4star

MG

130.5

2star

D

8.0

2star

K

2.5

1star

HB

5.5

3star

M

2.8

3star

T

2.5

3star

MG

60.8

1star

D

8.6

3star

K

3.0

1star

HB

5.6

4star

M

1.2

2star

T

2.8

5star

MG

110.8

2star

deliberate/insufficient intent free kick which Joe kicked a goal from was clearly there... surprised that there seems to be around a 50/50 perspective on it. If that was a true attempt at a tap to his team mate, even with the contact he got, then the ball wouldn't have gone directly towards the boundary.

It's funny how there has been a decent amount of talk about that free kick call and yet no one talks about the missed blatant throw that happened to give Taylor the ball.

 

[Grasshopper17]

View attachment 2111280

Depending on who you get your stats from there's another 45 point one which puts us equal 3rd. Not quite sure why that one is missed above. Maybe it has something to do with historical games where only quarter-by-quarter scores are recorded as opposed to the full timeline of scoring.

 

[Big Sauce 21]

Zorko got done for one earlier in the game from a massive shank

 

[Grasshopper17]

That Sam Taylor deliberate/insufficient intent free kick which Joe kicked a goal from was clearly there... surprised that there seems to be around a 50/50 perspective on it. If that was a true attempt at a tap to his team mate, even with the contact he got, then the ball wouldn't have gone directly towards the boundary.

It's funny how there has been a decent amount of talk about that free kick call and yet no one talks about the missed blatant throw that happened to give Taylor the ball.

I think the debate is around the fact that the ball seemed to come off the back of Taylor's hand. Whilst I think the call was correct through maroon, blue and gold glasses, it was certainly an interesting way of trying to find the boundary. Who knows, maybe he'd been practicing it at training in an attempt to avoid getting pinged. If so it backfired spectacularly!

 

[Elixuh]

I think the debate is around the fact that the ball seemed to come off the back of Taylor's hand. Whilst I think the call was correct through maroon, blue and gold glasses, it was certainly an interesting way of trying to find the boundary. Who knows, maybe he'd been practicing it at training in an attempt to avoid getting pinged. If so it backfired spectacularly!

The problem is they don’t care about your actual intent only what happens. He didn’t intend to punch it directly out but he did.

I think it was similar to earlier in the game when one of our players tried to kick it to big O down the wing but shanked it and got done for insufficient intent. Our player didn’t intend to kick it out but that’s what happened. I thought that was a controversial one but you can’t pay that and then not pay the Taylor one which was much clearer, I thought.

 

[KissKiss]

The problem is they don’t care about your actual intent only what happens. He didn’t intend to punch it directly out but he did.

I think it was similar to earlier in the game when one of our players tried to kick it to big O down the wing but shanked it and got done for insufficient intent. Our player didn’t intend to kick it out but that’s what happened. I thought that was a controversial one but you can’t pay that and then not pay the Taylor one which was much clearer, I thought.

Yeah Zorko trying to go down the wing and put it wide of Oscar. In the context of the moment he was clearly trying to attack down the wing and had open space. There is zero chance he would want the ball to go out and slow the game down. But thats not how the game is adjudicated

 

[Grasshopper17]

Oh we were done. Seriously.

They're getting form for coughing it up and once we got a sniff they remembered how tired they were.

We had a cruise last week and a gut buster tonight . We were able to kick clutch goals when we needed them. I just hope we can get the boys on ice and refresh for next week.

It's really interesting when you look at the Giants' "habit" of coughing up big leads.

But you only have to go back a month and they reel in a 5 goal deficit against Hawthorn in Canberra, before running all over us in the last quarter.

It all makes the quarter-by quarter stats I've been keeping seem quite transient, as Nathan Barley alluded to in the game day thread.

But how much differently would we be thinking about the game if all the quarters had been reversed? Consider the following:

GWS 1-2 (8) 7-3 (45) 10-7 (67) 15-10 (100)
Brisbane 6-2 (38) 11-5 (71) 12-10 (82) 15-15 (105)

Imagine if that game had broken out. We'd have been absolutely crapping ourselves. Probably as early as quarter time!

This is why it's always better to be a team that finishes strongly, rather than one that starts strongly (altho both is preferable). A team that is never dead has the opposition always looking back over its shoulder, and often force panic simply by reputation, as we've seen with Collingwood under McRae.

 

[braddsey]

Yes he had Joe (I think) unmarked in the right pocket calling for it but I thought he made the right call in the moment. Imagine the carry on if he'd missed tho...

Absolutely, and goals on the run lift teams. Jasper had space and a straight line at goals - midfielders should be kicking those goals. Terribly deflating when they miss! Taking the shot takes out 2 further possible points of failure.

 

[Grasshopper17]

Joey D took the scalp of Sam Taylor, I can't remember the last time Taylor was beaten. He is the ultimate enigma

See this is the weird thing. I really thought Taylor beat Joe for most of the night and it was pretty comprehensive too. But then Joe nails his lines at the end, finishes with 4 and you have to say he's had a good night on the whole.

That's the lot of the forward in the modern game I guess: being able to make the most of your chances.

 

[Elixuh]

Joey D took the scalp of Sam Taylor, I can't remember the last time Taylor was beaten. He is the ultimate enigma

Taylor has apparently lost 2 one on ones this season (I don’t really know how that works but ok). One of those was the last mark and goal to Joe at the end.

 

[Pride of lions]

King sounding the fool again on SEN knocking Fagan for not switching Payne off Hogan. Supposedly, "not every losing coach has failed and every winning coach has succeeded" were his exact words. He admitted that Kingsley "brained" Fagan in the coaches box which he said he said at half and three quarter time.

I'm surprised media people just can't admit they were wrong at times.

King won’t ever give Fagan any credit,he has had a set against him for years. The look on his face after the game said it all, found it so hard to say anything good about us at all. And he always has to drag up negatives about Joe,so tiresome listening to his drivel.

 

[Dare2beatthebear]

Did the 24 hour hit run flights, up 7am Saturday and back 7am Sunday with my 9yo son. Just an amazing experience. Thinking back to 2022 and his first 'real' game when he understood what was happening was Richmond at the MCG (aka the Cumberland game), when we coughed up a big lead and he was in tears afterwards.
And of the last 3 times we've been to the MCG (I was in hospital for the Melbourne win this year) were 1) get run down in last 5 minutes by Melbourne in 2023, 2) the GF and 3) Collingwood in round 23, so to be on the other end of it, in circumstances like this just magnifies the feeling.

Some other thoughts on the game:

• despite being 44 points down and almost gone, there was for me just a slightly different feel to normally being in that situation. We werent being burnt over the back like GWS normally do to us, some indiviidual errors i.e Harris kick inside, Bailey keeping it in at the end of 2nd were just killing us at bad times;
• I didn't feel like we'd burnt multiple easy chances like we have so often, so I wasn't raging that we had thrown it away as opposed to just running into a really good team;
• but in saying that, I had come to peace with the season being done and at least it wasn't Collingwood and I wasn't stuck in a rabid frenzy of their supporters around me;
• when they weathered that initial storm again we looked gone, but the Daniels and Keefe misses noticeably tightened them up;
• I really started to believe when I could see Fletcher in motion from when Hipwood picked up the ball, we were directly in the line of sight from him to the goals and thought back to that Melbourne MCG game when he drilled one on the run from a similar position, couldn't have wanted a better player in that spot;
• my son said to me on Joe's boundary shot 'don't be nervous, you always say this is his best spot';
• from there it just felt like a wave and I was actually confident on the one that put us in front;
• Payne while obviously not 100% and beaten on the night, got a crucial fist in on a contest in the last when it looked like Hogan had him done again. Just one of many little things that you need to come together for a result like this.

Also despite the small crowd I thought the atmosphere was great, slightly biased sitting amongst Lions people for once, but the ground itself is great I think. The seats even at ground level are elevated a little so you get a great view.

Finally apologies/thanks to all the random people I hugged/hugged me in section 201 when the siren went.

 

[Dare2beatthebear]

King won’t ever give Fagan any credit,he has had a set against him for years. The look on his face after the game said it all, found it so hard to say anything good about us at all. And he always has to drag up negatives about Joe,so tiresome listening to his drivel.

He's set it up as a no lose scenario for himself.
Lions win it all - 'oh they had the best list, it's what they should have done anyway'.
Lions don't win it - 'they were outcoached, it's Fagan's fault'.

 

[Grasshopper17]

…and credit to our boys - we shut it down for 2 1/2 minutes at the end. Talk about learnings!

Yeah that was really well done. No silly handballs or knock ons into space except where absolutely necessary. And even more importantly there were no hack kicks to where an unmarked Giants player may have been lurking, ready to mark and in range to kick at goal.

One moment in particular that stood out to me was where Bez probably had enough time to whack it on the boot, but instead he handballed forwards, towards the boundary but not over it, and then our pressure was good effort to bundle the ball out of bounds. Thought it was really well done.

Also, after the initial flurry of the centre bounce, which we actually won and had numbers forward of the ball, we quickly reverted and only Joe was ahead of the ball for the remainder of the game. The Giants marked all our guys up which then made it relatively easy to block up the game.

There was only 2:26 remaining when we hit the front, whereas Collingwood hit the front with just under 3 to play. To my mind it was still the correct decision to hold our forward line in that game, trying to seal the win while there was still more than 3-4 minutes left. Equally, it was the right call here to shut the game down with only 2 minutes to go.

I was worried we might have hit the front too early, but we executed superbly. Very happy to be wrong on that front.

 

[Grasshopper17]

I have so much man-love for Joe. He cares so much and tries so hard. They get stuck into him because he can sometimes get it wrong, but you can’t do the miraculous without the occasional mistake!
We hear so little from him, but i reckon he’s got a massive heart and he wants to win as much as anyone.

He looked like he gave a stuff on Saturday night and played accordingly. This transition in his overall demeanour this season is something I think we've all noticed, and not surprisingly it's coincided with an incredible uplift in his defensive intent, which I had simply assumed we'd never see. It's been remarkable.

Hopefully the best is yet to come.

 

[dlanod]

Zorko got done for one earlier in the game from a massive shank

There was one by someone that Oscar gave up running towards - if he'd continued, it would've been a throw-in because he probably would've been close enough to muddy the intent, but he pulled up, it kept dribbling along before going out so the whistle went.

 

[DERRINALPHIL]

I've kept receipts on those who wish for my boi Ah Chee to be out of the 22 next season. Let this be a warning to you. Never doubt my boi.

But he and McCarthy will be fighting for the same position. Lohman and bailey are also small forwards. Don't forget Charlie.

It will be dog eat lion

 

[Nuggo]

But he and McCarthy will be fighting for the same position. Lohman and bailey are also small forwards. Don't forget Charlie.

It will be dog eat lion

For me Ah Chee is 26 and really starting to hit his straps as an AFL player. He is currently outperforming Charlie (not a knock on Charlie as he is contributing). We are not sure how McCarthy will come back though is kicking accuracy would be a welcome addition. A lot water to go under the bridge before we need to go into this in great detail. In the mean time enjoy the Ah Chee ride!

 

[greendiesel]

I walked into a random shop in the middle of nowhere on Saturday morning, Korumburra for those of you that may know it, to check out some records, and the song playing as I walked in was country road, i just knew it was a sign

Make sure you don't sample any local mushrooms.

 

[DERRINALPHIL]

I was stunned that the game wasn't a sell out, what is going on with Giants fans not showing up dlanod ?

They have 30,000+ members and can't sell out a 24,000 seat stadium for a knockout final, there were a large number of seats vacant in the upper tier.

This was very disappointing. Gold Coast and the Giants seem years away from financial security. The best Brissie news this year was sixty odd thousand members.

 

[DERRINALPHIL]

That Sam Taylor deliberate/insufficient intent free kick which Joe kicked a goal from was clearly there... surprised that there seems to be around a 50/50 perspective on it. If that was a true attempt at a tap to his team mate, even with the contact he got, then the ball wouldn't have gone directly towards the boundary.

It's funny how there has been a decent amount of talk about that free kick call and yet no one talks about the missed blatant throw that happened to give Taylor the ball.

If you look at the contest before that Charlie (i think) had tackled and locked down one arm of that curly headed Giants defender who just tossed the ball over his shoulder. Go and replay the incident and see it was a free kick nearly just in front. I was out of my seat yelling how it wasn't paid. He made no attempt to hand ball it because it was impossible for him to do it.