Mark Robinson names his likes and dislikes from round 18 of the 2022 AFL season
Drop, act, dive, repeat. The ugly free kick issues plaguing the game spilt into the commentary box on the weekend. It’s all become unedifying, Mark Robinson writes. LIKES, DISLIKES
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Does anyone want to finish eighth?
In a round when the teams placed 8-12 all lost, except the Western Bulldogs, a big gap has opened up between the top seven and the rest.
And the most exciting footy came from teams in the bottom five on the ladder.
Essendon continued its late-season surge with a commanding win over Gold Coast while North Melbourne provided the feel-good story of the round.
Meanwhile, the coaching merry-go-round got even more interesting and the debate over Jack Ginnivan and high-contact free kicks got even messier.
Here are Mark Robinson’s likes and dislikes from round 18.
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LIKES
1. Ben Rutten’s a lock
That’s wins over St Kilda, Brisbane, Sydney and Gold Coast in four of their past five matches, all teams in the finals or competing for a finals spot. The change came against Carlton, even though the Bombers lost, and they haven’t looked back. One-on-one defence, explosion from the backline, ground ball hunger and personnel changes have resurrected a damaged season, and Essendon can hardly make a move for Alastair Clarkson after Rutten has met and exceeded the club’s ambitions in the second half of the season. From when Clarkson’s manager said seven or eight clubs had made contact, it now appears that only two senior coaching positions are available – at the Giants and at the Kangaroos. Then again, Clarkson might ignore overtures from both those clubs and wait for – and cast a shadow over – the next 12 months. It’s extraordinary when you consider that perhaps only two clubs will consider one of the great coaches of the modern era for next year.
2. Kozzie in the Alice
Perhaps only Eddie Betts has left a greater footprint in Alice Springs, but surely next is Kozzie Pickett. He kicked six goals on Sunday, four of them worthy of being nominated for goal of the year. They weren’t kicked when his Demons had the game by the throat, either. He kicked two in the second quarter, two in the third and two in the fourth. His first goal came via a left-foot snap after Port had kicked the first three goals of the game. His second was a right-foot snap and gave his team the lead just before halftime. His next two came after Port had kicked the first to two goals of the third quarter. He was so far best on ground it was a joke.
3. You can win with effort
They say a change of coach frees up the strategy, which really means it frees up the mind to try to play instinctive football. Of course, layers are needed to survive in football, yet it’s uncanny how often there’s an improved effort after a coach sacking. How to bottle instinct and layers, hey? And why don’t coaches alleviate some of the layers and promote more instinct anyway? That’s what North Melbourne did in what was the most exhilarating two hours of footy – not the best footy, mind you – this season. They beat Richmond in contested ball, clearance and scores from clearance on the back of effort and will. The scenes in the post match were glorious, but there’s always work to do. Like, convincing players to stay. They need Cam Zurhaar’s signature, and they need Ben McKay to commit to staying. Ben might be the pick of the brothers long-term. In the past two weeks he’s taken 14 intercept marks and won 22 intercept possessions. He had Jack Riewoldt on Saturday, who did kick 2.6, but you have to give that contest to McKay. Riewoldt would be flattened by his performance. There were other issues and plenty of players made mistakes, but 2.6 is game killing. Talking about frustration, who allowed Zurhaar to be free at that stoppage to kick the goal at the end? The boys on 3AW on Sunday were pointing the finger at Dylan Grimes.
4. That’s more like it, Jy Simpkin
Internally, the Kangaroos say Simpkin is a real leader, but externally we haven’t seen enough of it, and it doesn’t help when the team has won only five of its past 38 games. He was inspiring against the Tigers. He had 34 disposals, eight contested possessions, 10 clearances and seven inside-50s. They are the numbers, but they don’t sufficiently describe the enormity of his game on Saturday. When the game was swaying in the final quarter, he produced probably the kick of the round (if that’s an award). He found Zurhaar in between two opponents from 45m and then Zurhaar kicked the goal. It was the kind of performance from Simpkin which has him equal billing to be the Roos’ next skipper. The other is Luke McDonald. He took Shai Bolton when Bolton played forward, and although Bolton had 18 disposals, he didn’t kick a goal and he went at a woeful 38 per cent by foot.
5. What a day, what a week for the Hawks
Footy clubs are precious places – in good times and bad. For the Hawks, they lost Ray Gunston (the father of Jack) and premiership player Paul Dear, and on Sunday a bunch of former champs returned for an official send-off. It’s days like this where the Family Club revels in support and celebration. On the field, it was another champ, Luke Breust, who ensured the Hawks would leave with the four points. He kicked six goals in a blustery, dirty and wet day at the MCG, his silk in the conditions the standout. Still, he might not have been the best player. Tom Barrass took 18 marks, eight of them intercepts, and if there’s a find for West Coast this year, it’s that Barrass is now one of the most complete key defenders in the game. The only other player to take 18 marks or more this year is Angus Brayshaw, who took 20 in round 3.
6. And you can win with tactics
Sydney’s plan seemingly was to make Fremantle defend the whole ground and in doing so ensure the whole ground and the whole team was used. The Swans took 138 marks, which was their most of the season by a long way, and it was the most marks Fremantle has given up this year. They killed Fremantle with boredom at times and too often Fremantle sat forward of the ball and was not accountable for a player. Jake Lloyd took 13 uncontested marks, Robbie Fox 12 in a remarkable career swing, Ollie Florent 11, Dane Rampe 11 and Luke Parker 10. Four of that group of five were defenders and too often there were soft exits out of the Fremantle 50.
7. And you can win with effort and tactics
Geelong’s probably the best team in the competition, and probably has the best coach. We say probably because it doesn’t mean too much at this stage of the season, other than the Cats are putting themselves in a good spot to compete in September. The fact is Geelong has won eight matches in a row and if they beat Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval this weekend, it will be the first time since 2011, the Cats under Chis Scott will have won nine successive matches. You can’t beat winning form, but when so much work has gone into the team peaking at the end of the season, the query is: Are they peaking too early? Time will tell. In 2018, Richmond won 10 of 11 matches before losing badly to Collingwood in the preliminary final. They didn’t plan their end of season right. We’re not saying Geelong will fail under similar circumstances, but no team wants to be up for 15 weeks, do they? Will be intriguing to see how many guns – if any – get a rest over the coming weeks.
DISLIKES
1. Bye, bye Tigers
The once snarling, ferocious Tigers have lost their zest for the kill. Their past four defeats have come at a collective margin of 15 points – six, three, two and four points. In contrast, six of Collingwood’s past seven wins have come at a collective margin of 36 points – four, four, 11, five, seven and five points. Why can Collingwood eek out wins at the death and Richmond can’t? Luck plays a role and the overall numbers suggest the Pies’ profile has some holes in it, mainly centred around their contest numbers and they are ninth for scoring. Richmond’s profile offensively is better, but they’re really poor defensively. Like, 13th for conceding scores when the opposition brings the ball in. In a nutshell, the Tigers can’t win the flag because defensively they are just too poor – and it remains to be seen if they can even make the eight. What stands out for Collingwood is their ability to know how to win. Call it belief, confidence, will power but the fact is Collingwood over the past six week are the second best scoring team in final quarters behind Gold Coast.
2. Zak is flat as a tack
Of the two gun Port Adelaide recruits in the 2018 draft, Connor Rozee has spirited ahead of Zak Butters in performance and consistency. Butters has played as mid-forward this season and surprisingly has kicked just three goals. Plus he averages only four score involvements a game. Maybe the knee injury which sidelined him for three months in 2021 took more out of him than we imagined because the career trajectory for a player with his talent has stuttered. He’s brave, he’s smart, he’s quick and his average of 21 disposals a game is pretty solid for his position, but they are without considerable impact. He had 20 disposals for 74 ranking points against Melbourne, which has to be better.
3. What’s happened to Will Day?
When the 2021 season ended, Day was considered the best young player at the Hawks, better than even Changkuoth Jiath and Dylan Moore. Maybe we killed him with expectation, or maybe season three has just turned out to be too hard. He’s played wing, forward and defence this season, and while the all talk was about midfield exploration for Day at some stage, he hasn’t been able to secure a position. He kicked two goals in the second quarter on Sunday and had only four disposals outside of that quarter. Sunday’s game was game 28 for him, so he will grow with time and experience. But where he will make his name is still to be decided. It probably will be in defence, but coach Sam Mitchell is clearly experimenting at the present.
4. Drop, act, dive, repeat
Jack Ginnivan is the poster boy, but he’s far from alone. It’s just that Jack – and Collingwood – get all the attention. Ginnivan missed out on another high free kick at the weekend because the umpire ruled that he “dropped”, which sparked debate in the commentary box. Which led to a separate discussion between Nathan Buckley and Anthony Hudson after Hudson suggested Scott Pendlebury might’ve dropped/lifted his arm, which riled Buckley. Buckley fired back that Hudson was showing his Geelong bias and “what about Joel Selwood”. Later, Buckley tongue-in-cheek commented on how many AFL games Hudson had played. It’s getting unedifying, this whole scene. Plenty of players drop, act and dive, from the smallest players on the ground like Ginnivan and Michael Walters (final quarter, Saturday night), Liam Ryan (Sunday at the MCG) to the biggest players on the ground like Carlton’s Harry McKay. McKay’s so adept at it, he even told his St Kilda opponent the week before, Josh Battle, that Battle was unlucky because the umpire had fallen for his staging – or words to that effect. Acting for free kicks is a terrible scourge on our game.
5. Talk of unedifying
The national broadcaster, the ABC, didn’t miss Jack Ginnivan on Saturday, either. In a now deleted post on Facebook, ABC Sport, asked fans: If you get a chance to heckle Jack Ginnivan, what would you say? Let’s hope Mr and Mrs Ginnivan aren’t on social media because it was free hit after free hit on the character of their son. There’s enough hate in footy without making a point of inviting it even further.
6. What’s wrong, Joe?
Another substandard performance from Joe Daniher, having only 11 disposals and not hitting the scoreboard in the thrashing of Greater Western Sydney. In his past four games, the usually rollicking key forward has kicked four goals and averaged three marks a game, and only one inside 50m mark. One real issue is his accuracy. In the same four-week spall, he’s kicked 4.7 and had five complete misses. Overall, he’s kicked 26.17 and nine complete misses. Let’s be frank, Brisbane’s chances of winning the flag are more enhanced if Daniher is rolling around the forward line as if he owns it.
7. Thought we were past this
The euphoria of last week’s kick after the siren by Noah Anderson was replaced by a lethargy not previously seen this season from the Suns. Last week, it was death by one kick for the Suns. Against Essendon, it was death by 1000 missteps by the Suns. My God, the Suns were embarrassing, and if not for poor kicking at goal by the Bombers, the margin would’ve been 80 points. It felt like 80 points, anyway. It was such a disappointment after Stuart Dew’s appointment the week before and the win over Richmond at home. The Sun will miss finals again, but they are a much better team. Sunday’s night’s effort was more like yesteryear and not what we have come to expect in 2022.
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