By Michael Gleeson
Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera is St Kilda’s best player and certainly the one they need to re-sign before they even contemplate throwing cash at “TDK” (Tom De Koning) and others. His ability is well-known to all, it seems, except Melbourne, who decided to leave him alone to run unchecked as he pleased. Why he didn’t have someone tying up his run on Sunday was inexplicable.
The Saints should look after Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera before setting their sights elsewhere.Credit: AFL Photos
But then it was equally inexplicable how Melbourne managed to turn a winnable game into a training run, not tackling anyone.
Almost as inexplicable was the manner in which the Demons fed Callum Wilkie with their forward entries – the star defender finishing with 15 marks and 11 intercept possessions. Just as big a head scratcher was Melbourne’s kicking for goal: 1.12 for the second half.
Mitchell’s men have fallen away from what set them apart
Hokball isn’t dead, but it is missing. Where has the edgy, brave Hawthorn gone? Did Hokball fall to its own hubris? What’s happened to it?
The thrilling style of footy – and it was outstanding football – that catapulted Hawthorn to finals last year has faltered. Results are one thing, for even in a loss you can play a certain way, but it is the way the Hawks are playing that has changed. This is not a comment after losing to the top side – it is a comment after the losses to all of the top sides they have lost to.
Sam Mitchell’s Hawks need to rediscover their mojo, and fast.Credit: AFL Photos
Perhaps the competition got to work on how to break Hawthorn down, but the fact is the Hawks have fallen away from what distinguished them; the waves of run through the corridor, the lightning speed of ball movement that was just overwhelming, the accuracy by foot, and the pressure.
The tackle number from Friday night – 82 to 38 Collingwood’s way – Sam Mitchell partly consigned to the way the coaches structured the team, and how the players positioned themselves. There is also still a bit of intent involved.
They’re missing Will Day, James Sicily has been down, and Calsher Dear is also missing. These are big contributors to unwinding the game, but more than that – the Hawks have lost the vibe of how they want to play.
An opponent called the Swans a ‘rabble’. He was being kind
Wayne Milera called them a “rabble”. Listening to the way the Swans players spoke, watching how they played and behaved, it was just a mess, the Adelaide man said.
Ordinarily this sort of comment from an opponent would be considered inflammatory and ungracious. It wasn’t. Milera was, in fact, being kind. It wasn’t schadenfreude, it was an understatement.
The Swans ponder their poor showing against Adelaide on Saturday night.Credit: via Getty Images
Adelaide on Sunday apologised to Sydney for his remarks. The Swans should have been the ones to apologise – Milera was just being honest. The Swans were, not for the first time this year but possibly for the worst time, just awful.
Dean Cox was bereft and disinclined to sugar-coat it when he spoke afterwards. It would have been unwise to do so, for everyone – especially those many disheartened Swans who left the SCG after half-time – knew what they had seen.
The grand final loss last year was horrendous and demanded the Swans forensically address what went wrong.
A slide after last season seemed to be coming, but not of this magnitude. Sure the magnitude of the drop might be explained by personnel, but the Swans shouldn’t kid themselves that this is all down to that.
Injuries have helped peel the wallpaper off cracks that were already there. What’s been found underneath is a team that relies too heavily on its stars and whose role players are dead ordinary.
Fifteen players from the grand final played on Saturday night. One of those missing, Luke Parker, has since moved on to North Melbourne, so he won’t be coming back into the line-up. Taylor Adams missed the grand final only because of injury, and he was in Saturday night’s team.
Other top teams win without key players, or at the very worst, they find a way to compete. Sydney simply were not competitive after about 10 minutes of the first quarter on Saturday night.
The way the Swans were structured to defend, the way they failed to apply pressure, the way they turgidly moved the ball and the way they were haphazard in offering it to their impotent attack all point to issues beyond personnel.
In round 21 last year, Port Adelaide belted the Swans by 112 points. In hindsight, that was the Swan song more than the grand final embarrassment. In that round 21 game, they conceded 90 points from turnovers – one of their worst ever results – and things haven’t picked up much since. On Saturday night it was 88 points conceded from turnovers.
That is the sign of a side succumbing to pressure, a side hesitant and uncertain in how to move the ball and scrubby with their disposal when they do.
It does bear repeating that the Swans finished top of the ladder at the end of the last year’s home and away season.
But, for the sake of illustrating the magnitude of their slide, if you ran a ladder from that loss to Port Adelaide to now – and that includes winning the finals and the grand final drubbing – the Swans would be sitting fourth-bottom with a percentage of 86.8. That is the same number of wins as Essendon from more games – because they played finals and Essendon didn’t, or don’t depending on your age. And they have about the same percentage as the Bombers over that period.
Sydney can no longer halt momentum once sides get on a roll.
A stat to reinforce the meekness that has infected the Swans this year is that twice in a row now they have given up 10-goal runs to an opposition. That didn’t happen at all between from 2010 to 2024.
The Swans have been living their frustrations, giving away 21 50-metre penalties this year – the most in the league. Put another way, last year they gave away 17 in all 23 home and away games. We are only just half-way through the season.
Crows players surround Wayne Milera after he kicked a goal in his team’s 90-point thumping of Sydney.Credit: via Getty Images
They have dropped away everywhere statistically, so numbers are only helpful up to a point, but their attack and forward efficiency has been dreadful.
OK, Tom Papley – and to a far lesser extent Logan McDonald – account for a bit of that, but it doesn’t account for everything, for they were the league’s heaviest-scoring team last year.
Their stoppage game has fallen away almost as badly as the turnover game.
In both of their past two games, they have given up precisely 131 points, from 64 and 70 inside-50s respectively. Those two games sit among the worst defensive performances since 1999.
Nick Blakey’s numbers are almost identical to last year, but in a team that is struggling, his output feels poorer than it is. Saturday night was his worst game for more than a year. He had just 11 touches and no marks … playing in defence for a team that gave up 70 inside-50s. It’s fair to say he and his fellow backs had a fair look at the ball.
This is all Dean Cox’s problem, but not his fault.
Swans coach Dean Cox implores his players to lift against Adelaide.Credit: via Getty Images
Though revealingly, or at least candidly, he admitted in his post-match press conference that maybe they hadn’t been doing enough at training, and suggested they would be getting to work after their latest lamentable showing.
This column called for the Swans to be unsparing in their forensic review of last year’s grand final disaster.
If they were, they did not heed all the lessons. Cox warned the post-mortem to this match would be ruthless. It needs to be.
The 90-point loss was the fifth-biggest defeat at the SCG in the club’s history.
This on a night they were supposed to be celebrating their famed “Bloods culture” and drought-breaking 2005 premiership. It was enough to drain the blood from their faces.
Adelaide crowing
The unfortunate effect of stressing how poor Sydney was is that it undersells Adelaide when Sydney were not the only architects of their misery – the Crows played their part.
Adelaide climbed at least temporarily to third on the ladder. It is not an unfitting place for them, the way they are playing. At the start of the season it seemed optimistic for the Crows to consider a place in the eight, given the teams they needed to leapfrog that finished last year above them and also missed the finals.
The Crows they have an ability to destroy an opposition. Their forward line is the most complete in the AFL, balanced between contested marking, dynamic smalls and hard-running high half-forwards. They have actually looked better when veteran Tex Walker is not in the mix.
Mark Keane has emerged as an important key defender because he is so aggressive in his attack on the ball in the air and leaving his man. The run from the Crows off half-back is as strong as any team’s.
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