Melbourne ends winless run with hard-fought victory over finals contender Fremantle
With Jesse Hogan injured and Michael Walters on report, Melbourne compounded finals contender Fremantle’s woes by ending its winless run.
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Angela Lansbury would need a miniseries to solve the Melbourne mystery.
Not even the Murder She Wrote super sleuth could be expected to get to the bottom of footy’s Who Dunnit?
The Demons won their first game in six weeks against Fremantle on Saturday. It was relief rather than any sort of oil painting.
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They remain the enduring mystery of this season, Melbourne. Barnstorming preliminary finalists last season to 4-9 battlers the next.
Consider what it took for Melbourne to huff and puff its way to victory.
They won the inside 50s 68-44, clearances 46-37 and contested ball 162-150 and were playing an injury-hit Docker side who lost their key forward, a key runner and had their ruckman playing sore with rib damage.
Fremantle played with only two on the bench from half way through the third quarter.
The Demons had 24 inside 50s to 9 in the second term and only kicked one more goal — 3.3 to 2.3.
But they finally emerged with a 4.1 to 1.0 last quarter to win by 14 points.
Tom McDonald summed up the Demons on his own yesterday. With his confidence seemingly shot for much of the season and several more bad clangers committed in this game, he came to life in the last term with two goals — the first a bomb from outside 50m.
It was the McDonald of 2018. As a result the Dees’ four last quarter goals came from 14 entries.
It was efficient and it was what coach Simon Goodwin has been screaming for all season.
Now, is it the spark or an anomaly?
THE FREO BENCH
It was busier than Burke Street down there.
First, a disconsolate Jesse Hogan was ruled out of the game in the second term with what could be a recurrence of his navicular problem.
Then Stephen Hill did his left hamstring in the third quarter and also put the tracksuit on.
Meanwhile, Nathan Wilson (ankle) and Sean Darcy (ribs) played on in discomfort, the latter in obvious pain.
The Dockers played with two on the bench from half way through the third quarter.
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WALTERS IN THE BOOK
Enraged by a bit of lip in the third term from Jack Viney, Michael Walters attempted to square up and a melee ensued.
Walters was then reported for headbutting in the skirmish, although there doesn’t appear to be much in it.
Jack Viney had his jumper ripped off in the scuffle and Nathan Jones then flattened Walters to have the free kick reversed.
Gee, he was brilliant once again, Walters.
HILL’S LEFT FOOT
Or should we say non-existent left foot?
Fantastic player, Bradley Hill. Imagine how good he’d be if he had any ability on his opposite side.
It does boggle the mind a player can get this far without being able to kick on his opposite side?
And if they do, how can a full-time footballer not take the time to learn?
Hill’s skewed running banana’s cost Fremantle a couple of simple scoring opportunities yesterday when an easy left-foot kick would have done the job.
PETRACCA DIVE
You don’t see this too often, thankfully.
Corralled on the boundary line in front of the MCC members, Christian Petracca dribbled a handball and tried to run around his man.
When he realised that wasn’t going to work, he produced the sort of dive more commonly seen every four years in the penalty box at a FIFA World Cup.
GOODWIN PLEASED AS DEES GRIND OUT WIN
Sam Edmund
Simon Goodwin says he was heartened by seeing almost every teammate speak to Nathan Jones at three-quarter time after the co-captain gave away a costly free kick at a crucial time.
With the Melbourne-Fremantle game on a knife-edge, the Demons had a free-kick in scoring range reversed when Jones ran to clatter into Michael Walters.
The Dockers kicked a goal on the ensuing rebound and while they wouldn’t be able to hang on, took a five-point lead into the last change.
“I spoke to him at three-quarter time, as about 20 of his teammates did too, which is a good sign,” Goodwin said.
“He knows that’s not how we play and the importance of those things in a game.
“It doesn’t matter who you are, you need guys who keep each other accountable. Whether you’re the skipper or a younger player.
“He made a mistake, but what I did love about Nathan was his ability to respond in the last quarter. I thought he was instrumental … some of his work was really strong.”
Goodwin said the Demons “wore down” the Dockers in a grinding 14-point victory, with Max Gawn, Tom McDonald, Jack Viney and Clayton Oliver leading a strong team performance with outstanding final quarters.
“We’ve had a pretty torrid first half of the season and the bye came at a good time and enabled us to reset a few things internally,” Goodwin said.
“We all looked at the opportunities that were there to get better and not waste time. That’s a big thing in this industry. People say why don’t you reset for next year? Well, there’s still lots to play for.
“We’re continuing to find things. Marty Hore and Jay Lockhart, Steven May hasn’t played a lot of footy for us, Tim Smith (three goals) played an incredible role today.
“It wasn’t perfect, but they hung in there and in the end I thought we just wore them down.”
McDonald played his best game for the year, emerging to collect 28 disposals, seven marks and three goals — two coming in the last term.
“I was really proud of Tom. He’s been under a lot of pressure externally. Internally we’ve got a lot of faith in Tom,” Goodwin said.
“In the first half he was touching the ball, but it just wasn’t going his way. But he worked and the will to get himself into the game and he started marking the ball forward of centre and it makes a massive difference to our team.”
Goodwin also reserved special praise for his Gawn-led midfield and said maligned defender Sam Frost had been “exceptional”.
Asked if he would like Frost to show more composure, Goodwin laughed and said: “He turns our ball movement into Frost ball and no one knows what’s happening, but neither does the opposition.”
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