Port Adelaide’s readiness for AFL finals was exposed by Dockers’ intense pressure - and the Power’s poor kicking
PORT Adelaide suffered a costly reminder against Fremantle in Perth of how the Power players need finer kicking skills if they are to succeed under finals pressure in September.
PORT Adelaide will not see Fremantle in September’s AFL finals. But the Power can expect the same close attention Dockers coach Ross Lyon engineered to test the Port Adelaide players’ patience and ability to adapt.
The Power did play into Lyon’s trap with the most-wasteful first term at Perth Stadium before the rain set in to make the chase for a top-two ranking even more difficult. And it just kept tripping over its own feet with some pitiful kicking while the pressure valve was burst with the loss by injury of key players, lead ruckman Patrick Ryder and forward Robbie Gray.
Lyon regards Port Adelaide as most dangerous when it puts speed on the game. Denying the Power players time and space - a common theme in finals - was a masterstroke that revealed just how much work Ken Hinkley’s crew must do on basic skills, in particular kicking. Under finals-like pressure,the Power’s weakest links were exposed.
This game was comical - or “tragic” - for how first Port Adelaide and then Fremantle found the six winning numbers to a X-lotto draw but failed to lodge their tickets. The Power had a 20-4 advantage at clearances in the first quarter, but no ability to convert this advantage to the scoreboard as its players highlighted their difficulty with kicking (less than 50 per cent efficiency) and their foolish way of handpassing to team-mates’ feet.
MATCH CENTRE: ALL THE STATS AND SUPERCOACH SCORES
The Dockers dominated forward play in the second term while suffocating the Power defenders - who were working without their group leader Tom Jonas (knee) - in moving the ball from the back half. But the real choke (and joke) was Fremantle’s goalkicking, in particular with set shots, that put 0.7 on the scorecard while Port Adelaide was on mute at the goalfront.
Port Adelaide vice-captain Ollie Wines noted the big difference that overcame the Power at quarter-time was from their hands - rather than Lyon’s - with a shift from showing eagerness for the contested ball to opt for “conditional” football. This did not cut it for 30 minutes in the second term at Perth Stadium yesterday - and it won’t cut it for one minute anywhere in September’s finals.
As ugly - and as frustrating - as this game appeared, it gives Port Adelaide (that has played just one final in the past three years) a timely sampler of what is coming.
FIVE THINGS WE LEARNED
1. NO Tom Jonas (knee injury) to command the Port Adelaide defence. No Hamish Hartlett (knee injury) to offer the benefit of his experience to the young guns in the back half. So the inevitable move of 228-game Brad Ebert was on from the start.
2. NOT for the first time, Port Adelaide has made the game more difficult than it needs to be by poor disposal efficiency. Despite dominating at the contest with a 20-4 lead in clearances in the first term, the Power could not open up the field at the new Perth Stadium with its 68 kicks as the kicking efficiency was at a disappointing 42 per cent.
3. FREMANTLE coach Ross Lyon marvelled at Port Adelaide’s speed on getting the first look at the refitted Power line-up in the season-opener at Adelaide Oval in March - and four months later he set up his Dockers to keep the Port Adelaide players most accountable with a strong emphasis on one-on-one football. It is a good insight on what the Power faces in September’s final series.
4. PORT Adelaide ruckman Patrick Ryder has a new problem. The All-Australian limped to the bench late in the second term with concern for pain to his left hip flexor - after starting the year with a sore left Achilles tendon. The back-up plan remains with Justin Westhoff.
5. FULL-TIME professional football certainly has not answered the need for greater goalkicking accuracy in the AFL, as highlighted with 10 consecutive behinds in the scoring rundown in this game.