Tease or top four? Mick Malthouse on the Melbourne Football Club conundrum
MELBOURNE looked every bit the top four chance in dismantling the reigning premier yesterday, but MICK MALTHOUSE says you never know what you’re going to get with the Demons.
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MELBOURNE has jumped into the eight.
At their best the Demons could push for a top four finish from here.
But at their worst, I see them missing finals all together.
And this is the biggest issue with Melbourne: each week, even quarter by quarter, you don’t know what you are going to get. The very good, or the wishy-washy.
When you look at its list, it’s young but very talented.
Jack Viney, Clayton Oliver, Christian Petracca, Christian Salem, Jayden Hunt, Sam Weideman and Angus Brayshaw are hard working and skilled footballers.
Captain Viney and Oliver set high standards in the middle. Hunt has pace and provides excellent run.
Jack Watts has matured. He is a neat player who rarely gives the ball away and finishes the job on goal.
When Jesse Hogan is fit he becomes a target and allows Watts to get a better look at the ball as a floating tall.
Nathan Jones, with experience and a penetrating long kick, is fearless and brutally honest.
Cameron Pedersen has covered well enough for the injured Max Gawn with a vastly different rucking style, causing damage around the ground.
Against Collingwood the ruck discrepancies were astounding; Brodie Grundy alone got 53 hit outs compared to Pedersen and Tom McDonald (for a half a game stint) who got 14 between them. And yet Melbourne still won a significant number of the clearances.
*Good Dees, bad Dees
The Dees are a well-balanced team with quality across the ground, but frustratingly they have two distinct game styles — one that works for them, and one that doesn’t.
When they play like millionaires and overpossess the footy, they lose it.
When they apply pressure and open up and run the ball, they are as good as any side.
When their game structure fluctuates during a game, as it often has, it only leads to trouble and that trouble is a blowout quarter.
Take these for examples: the Dockers outscored them 7.4 to 0.3 in the third quarter, Richmond 5.5 to 0.2 in the last term, Hawthorn 5.4 to 1.1 in the first, North Melbourne won their opening quarter 6.7 to 2.5, and Collingwood dominated last week’s second term 7.3 to 2.3.
Melbourne won just one of those games, beating the Magpies by 4 points. Yet, it lost two of those matches by less than a kick, and the other two by just over two goals.
In contrast, they destroyed the Crows in Adelaide in a full four-quarter blitz.
This is the tape they should watch again, to see how their run is their biggest weapon.
It’s no coincidence that when Hawthorn was up and flying, the Demons were one of the teams to trouble them the most because they ran the ball at them.
*Good man in charge
I am a fan of Simon Goodwin as a coach. I think he’s honest and enthusiastic and as he gains more experience he’ll only get better.
So it’s hard to assess where the game structure breakdown is coming from.
No coach would ever say, “overuse the ball”, but is he giving them carte blanche to play with all of their talent?
I’ve watched a lot of the Demons this year and it’s like there’s an eagerness to involve the whole team — with cavalier use of the handpass and just expecting a teammate to be there.
The fiddling around seems to come early and the resurrection comes late. Quite often it’s too late.
Maybe it’s a loss of concentration, or perhaps a lack of on-field leadership when it’s needed the most.
Viney, at such a young age, is still learning the caper of captaincy. Jones never lacks endeavour, but can he bring the team into tune quickly when things are starting to spiral out of control?
The backline, with Tom McDonald the key, has good nerve but can be outlandish with its disposal and prone to giving the ball up too easily.
The forward line is efficient and smart. Jeff Garlett is highly valuable, but he has patches out of the game for too long. There needs to be more tackling pressure in the forward 50.
Forwards want space or at the very least, a one-on-one contest. What they don’t want is a zigzag ball that throws them out of position and gives the opposition a chance to get back and fill the holes.
Unfortunately, this is what we are seeing when Melbourne gets flashy and overuses the ball.
It must be highly frustrating for the forwards.
When there is a hard attack on the ball, run, and a direct kick to clear the line, there are more options forward and more opportunities to score.
This is the Melbourne that is almost unstoppable.
Two such distinctly different game structures.
*Own destiny
The Demons have this season in their own hands. They don’t need to rely on other clubs failing to make the eight.
When in full flight, for four quarters, a top four spot is theirs for the taking.
When they stray from their best they become mediocre, and will be highly vulnerable to missing finals.
The choice is Melbourne’s.
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