So, what did we see when the Crows visited the MCG and walked away with another loss, this time at the hands of the Demons?
We saw Melbourne solidify their claims on a top-four position, now two games clear of the Western Bulldogs with five weeks remaining. We saw two small forwards take the game on and establish themselves as the most dangerous aspects of the clash. We saw the Crows refuse to lie down on a couple of occasions. And we saw Melbourne able to hold off the challenge of a desperate Crows outfit to post win number 12 of the year.
Yes, there was a lot to like in this one, and a few to dislike, but I am a positive person. I like to concentrate on the good aspects of footy, and despite the poor-ish turnout, the Dees and Crows played a ripper that went down to the wire. There was plenty to love about this clash, and I intend to explore those aspects.
Here are the seven things I loved about the Dees’ win over the Crows.
1 – RANKINE TO THE LEFT OF ME, PICKETT TO THE RIGHT.
With Melbourne struggling to find reliable avenues to gal amongst its big men, and Bayley Fritsch out for an extended period, the work off Kysaiah Pickett was always going to be vital to their chances in this game. Despite the Crows’ poor record at the ‘G (and just about everywhere else except the Adelaide Oval), Melbourne’s perceived lack of potency in front of goal was a real concern.
At the other end, Izak Rankine has been having a great first year at the Crows, stepping up here and there to demonstrate his immense skill and craftiness, whilst able to rely on strong support from his fellow forwards (Walker, Fogarty, Rachele).
However, it soon became apparent that both teams were going to get precious little from their big men in this game. As such, it was going to come down to what the little blokes could provide.
The answer, for both teams, was PLENTY!
It wasn’t quite Ablett versus Salmon at different ends of the ground, but the impact these two players had on their teams was huge. And it wasn’t just the kicking of goals, but the way they worked for the betterment of others that stood out. Pickett’s defensive work in close, and Rankine’s creativity and ability to be in right at the fall of the ball made everything each player did feel as though you were watching something special.
Rankine finished with 3.3 to his name, before tearing a hamstring whilst feeding Fogarty late in the game, whilst Pickett finished with 2.3 and 11 score involvements.
If you sat back and tried to be as impartial as possible to select a winner between the two, who would you select?
For me, I go with Pickett… just. Some of his actions to break up the beginning of Crows’ handball chains created chaos in his attacking 50 and despite that freakish goal-of-the-year contender from Rankine in the second quarter, I just felt Pickett was willing to do a little more defensively.
Of course, others may disagree and that’s fine. I am not sure any of us can be too wrong when assessing these blokes, as they were both fantastic for their teams. Sadly for Rankine, it appears as though he’ll be out for at least a month with that hammy.
2 – JACK VINEY’S ATTACK ON THE CONTEST
The superlatives don’t stop for the way Jack Viney plays the game. With the Dees missing Clayton Oliver, and Christian Petracca playing more forward, a heap of responsibility has been placed on the former skipper’s shoulders.
And he is carrying that weight like he was born to.
For so many players, one big act in a game is almost enough to create a reputation as a tough player. They run with the flight once, or back into a pack, and suddenly, they’re the toughest bloke alive.
But Jack Viney does that sort of shit for fun! He may have had only 13 contested possessions in this game, but his ability to split a contest he had no right to be in, only to bounce to his feet, go again, and win the very next hard footy make him the heartbeat of this current Melbourne outfit.
You often hear the commentators speaking about players who go “low and hard” at the contest. That is Jack Viney’s wheelhouse. He lives in that area of the contest where courage and, frankly, some type of disregard for your own safety are required. You’ll hear a lot of names bandied about when people talk about the tough guys of the league, but when they get to Jack Viney’s name, there should be a pause both before, and after its utterance.
Why?
Because what he does on a weekly basis deserves to be set apart from the players who make one attack on the footy and call it a day.
3 – SHANE MCADAM V JAKE LEVER
There were moments in this contest where I thought Shane McAdam may have been the difference between a win and a loss for the Crows. Of course, we know there were multiple differences, but he played a role that no one else was willing or able to play in this game.
Without Josh Rachele, McAdam’s re-inclusion gave Adelaide a weapon that not only presented a problem inside 50, and warranted the attention of the moustachioed defender, but also gave the Crows an important marking link-man up through half-forward.
In the first quarter, Adelaide were wasteful with their shots due to shallow entries (see further down the article). In this quarter, McAdam had just one touch. However, during the second, he started working a little further away from goal, prompting Lever to follow him for the most part, which upset the structure of the Demons’ back six. Of, the cover was ample – he still had May and Tomlinson behind him, but there was more space to work in, and when McAdam got the footy, he wasn’t looking for a short chip to fifty – no, he wanted penetrating kicks to give his forwards a chance, and his small men the chance at capitalising on the spill.
He had seven touches in the second quarter and built a nice game where he had one goal f his own, and two direct goal assists.
Gotta put this out there – Jake Lever is a tremendous help defender, but in a one-on-one contest, he can be exposed and McAdam was able to give him the slip a few times in this one to prove that point.
4 JORDAN DAWSON WILLING HIS TEAM BACK INTO IT
It was a pretty quiet game for the Adelaide Skipper until the final quarter, and it was only then that he kind of kicked things up a notch (five points for the Futurama reference) and started making a big impact.
Dawson has put the Crows on his shoulders several times this season, and you could sense it happening in this game, as well. He attacked the footy in the middle with ferocity and had eight disposals, two clearances, and three tackles in the pulsating final quarter. There may have been times when he took a little too much on, but when you’re the leader of the team, you do whatever you can to lift the side and hope the rest come along with you.
It almost worked.
Dawson has been incredible for the Crows this season and should be front and centre when the All-Australian team is announced, but you’d like to see the Crows finish the year strong. AA selectors have memories like a goldfish and they channel a bit of Janet Jackson when they make their calls (what have you done for me lately). To secure his place in the side, I reckon Dawson needs one more big outing over the final month and a bit of footy…
… and a few Crows wins along the way.
5 – MAY CLOSING DOWN TEX, AND TEX FIGHTING BACK
I love a good tussle between a high-quality full back and a high-quality full forward, and we got it in this game, with May owning the first three quarters of the game before Tex burst to life in the last to almost get his team over the line.
May was dominant early, restricting Tex to just four disposals through the first three quarters, but as the game started to heat up in the last quarter, Walker (with a little bit of luck out the back on two occasions) fought his way back into the game, kicking three goals to set the Crows alight.
I have had someone state that May was the best player on the ground in this game. And yeah, had they stopped the game at three-quarter time, I may have been inclined to agree, but it takes four quarters of good footy to contain the Texan, and with three goals in the last (four for the game), Walker more than squared the ledger.
May was tough for Tex to move – hell, he is tough for anyone to move, particularly when he doesn’t want to be moved, but the longer the game progressed, the bigger the factor Walker became. As a result, it is difficult to give May the chocolates in their battle. Tex kicked four and nearly pinched it, but missing for three quarters prior to that.
How about we take the easy way out and say they played to a draw? Only Melbourne won, so I guess May won…
6 – ADAM TOMLINSON
This bloke has had a run of bad luck that makes the bloke who broke a mirror whilst tripping over a black cat look like he was having a good day.
Adam Tomlinson had found his calling in 2021 and slotted into the Melbourne back six to take the heat off Steven May and Jake Lever. The Dees had worked out how important their impact was, and was going to be, and built around them in defence. Tomlinson, after a pointless run at GWS where they didn’t know where to play him, became part of the plan when he bobbed up in defence and more than held his own.
But his ACL injury cost him the remainder of the season and a premiership. To make matters worse, the bloke who jumped into his grave, so to speak, Harrison Petty, usurped his position at the club and it is only with Petty sidelined that Tomlinson now gets a run.
So, he has to make the most of these opportunities, and he did in this one.
I like Darcy Fogarty. There is a brutish nature about the way he plays and whilst I enjoy it, I am sure opposition fans are itching to just hate the guy. The AFL have done their job and curbed his enthusiasm for knocking guys into next week, and whilst they have replaced that with a hunger for the footy, there are some weeks where the Fog cannot get near it.
Adam Tomlinson made sure this was one of those weeks.
Fog had nine touches of the footy for one goal, with most of those disposals coming in a little purple patch in the third quarter, but for the remainder of the game, Tomlinson owned their contest. He finished with 13 touches and 11 intercepts as he put a body on Fogarty to cause spills, and was able to run away from him a little too easily at ground level.
He may yet have to make way for Petty, but Adam Tomlinson as a backup defender is an absolute luxury for the Dees.
AND TWO THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE
1 – SOME HOME-COOKING
I know there will be some Demons fans who dislike this section, but you’ve gotta call it the way you see it. I thought the Crows got the short end of the stick in terms of umpiring in this game. There was nothing overly blatant about the decisions, but it genuinely felt as though the majority of the 50/50 decisions fell in the Dees’ favour.
The end result was 21-12 in favour of Melbourne, but even those numbers are deceiving, as it is often the ones that are let go that do the most damage.
To say a more even spread of free kicks would have changed the result is pretty wishful thinking. Hell, it may have changed the outcome in favour of the Dees with the dominoes falling a little differently, but I can definitely understand the frustration of the Adelaide supporters watching this. I am a neutral and I thought it was a little too lopsided, so I can only imagine how hard-done-by they must feel.
2 – SHALLOW ENTRIES
Come on fellas, no one likes a shallow entry, right?
Sadly, people will look at the Crows’ halftime scoreline of 3.9 and lament lost chances. And they’d be right, but further context is required. Their shots mostly came from long distance, as what was lacking was the lead-up mark at 60-65 metres out to allow for the next kick to hit someone a bit closer to goal.
Instead, the Crows’ mids were running through the middle and just dropping the ball at the fifty-metre line. A Crows player would make the ground to mark it, but was then faced with the task of slotting a goal from anywhere between 45-55 metres and as most who follow the game are aware, as soon as you start firing away from outside 35, the accuracy falls away quite a bit.
Given that, it wasn’t that Adelaide were lacking for inside fifty deliveries – not at all. It is more that the quality of them was nowhere near as good as that of the Dees. In the end, Adelaide actually had +2 on the night, but the Dees looked more dangerous for the majority of the game, save for the first five or six or seven minutes of the last quarter where the Crows were able to get the ball in fast and deep (like a night at Joe Ganino’s place).
A COUPLE OF QUICKIES
Max Gawn’s marking down the line and ability to push forward made hi the easy winner in his duel against Reilly O’Brien. ROB tried hard, but with two goals and three big ‘Get out of Jail’ marks to his name, Gawn carried a fair bit of his Round 18 form into this one. H is still the best ruck in the league.
Started to see a bit of dare from Wayne Milera in this game. He did run himself into trouble a couple of times, but that comes with the territory when you take the game on. Was good to see.
Jake Melksham looks like he has a new lease on life, playing deep forward. Only had the seven touches, but when you return two goals, there is not much people can criticise about your game.
Might have been the best Ed Langdon game I’ve seen in a while. Good to see some of the run that would usually be called “unrewarded” actually getting rewards. Also, was it just me, or was Lachie Hunter a little fiesty in this one?
I thought Ben Brown was pretty good without hitting the scoreboard in this one. Competed well, had a couple of nice moments setting others up – nowhere near the player he was four years ago, but better than he was when he first got to Melbourne, so that’s a win.
Anyway, this was supposed to be a quicker review… hence the freebie, so I am going to wrap it up. The Dees get the Tigers next week… wow – that is gonna be huge. And the Crows have the Showdown – they’d like nothing more than to ruin the Power’s 2023 party, as it looks like Adelaide’s finals chances may be just about done.
As always, massive thanks to those who have supported, and continue to support this work via buying me a coffee and/or memberships at our site. Seriously, you don’t know how much it helps. Thanks – HB.
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