Well – I tell you what I did not expect that result.
I expected this game to be pretty one-sided, and decided to follow a tested formula for the review of writing down some notes of things I expected to see throughout the game. As I am always willing to admit when I’m wrong (sort of) I’ve left the expectations in, but some of them will be given very little air-time, and I’ve included a couple of things I did not expect.
It was a great win for the Tiger cubs, who jumped the highly fancied Suns early, withstood a barrage of inside 50’s, and held on in the last for their 2nd win of the season. There were winners all over the park for the Tiges, and very few for the Suns who looked like Dimma’s comments about playing at Marvel all those years ago had extended the curse to his new team (as the commentary team scarcely mentioned every 20 minutes).
So let’s get stuck into what I expected versus what actually happened:
Suns to be top of the ladder at the end of the game
They had a very healthy percentage coming into this one and had posted some big scores in three of their four games to date. Conversely, Richmond have conceded some big scores so far this season. I honestly expected the Suns to post a big score, with Richmond putting up some early fight before fading as young teams do – and while they did fade, it was the Tiges who put up the scores early.
Lynch opened the scoring after being hit up on the lead, and immediately got stuck into a couple of Suns players – I’ll cover this and Lynch’s game a bit further on. Ben Long had a difficult shot that hit the post playing as a defensive forward on Vlastuin before the ball went up the other end and Jonty Faull got his first goal in AFL. Queue another skirmish and Mac Andrew gave away a free kick leading to a Campbell goal and all of a sudden the Tiges were three goals up!
Just a quick one on Mac Andrew, I think he needs to spend more time focusing on his own game and not trying to be so lippy and/or tough. Make sure your own house is in order before you start throwing stones in other people’s yards or whatever that saying is.
The scores were pretty even at quarter time, and the second quarter was basically an avalanche of inside 50’s in the Suns favour. It seemed a matter of time before the sheer weight of numbers would win out and the dam wall that was Richmond’s defence would break. I just kept waiting for the Suns to turn it on and prove that they were the real deal this year – and I am still waiting. Vlastuin and Balta owned their D50 (more on them both later), and eventually Richmond found a way to get the ball up their own end a few times and capitalize on their opportunities.
Eventually the Tiges would put on six unanswered goals from halfway through the second quarter, despite repeated forward 50 entries from the Suns, to go into three quarter time with a 43 point lead. Dimma finally accepted that his three tall forwards were just not working in this one and subbed out Read for Holman. Gold Coast came hard in the last quarter, but the 43 point buffer proved too hard to overcome despite the Tigers only posting two behinds themselves.
And on a side note, I’m a little pleased as it means my boys the Pies stay top of the ladder (for now anyway).
Tim Taranto to average less than 15 metres gained per possession, and go at under 65% efficiency
This might sound like a bit of a knock on Taranto, and I guess it is. I’ve seen him in a few games this season and noted that he seems to rush his possessions even when he has time. Unlike some other really good stoppage players who seem to be able to find space, Taranto regularly will fire out a handball or throw the ball on the boot without really looking.
He finished with 35 disposals (18 contested), six clearances and a goal, but from his 35 possessions he averaged 14 metres gained per possession. Now look I get it, in tight in the clinches sometimes all you can do is fire out a quick handball, what bugs me with Taranto is, he is on big money and a senior player at the Tigers and I expect better.
So many of his quick handballs do not put a teammate in a better position, and it is almost like he wants to rid himself of the ball and any responsibility as soon as possible. His kicks are literally thrown on the boot and more times than not are marked by an opposition player. He would finish this game at just 60% disposal efficiency which means that 14 of his disposals were deemed “inefficient” – and this is when an efficient kick can be deemed as any kick that goes to a 1v1 contest.
To put his performance into perspective, here are some other performances from stoppage midfielders so far this round:
Lachie Neale: 11 contested disposals at 72%
Nick Daicos: 10 contested disposals at 76.3%
George Hewett: 21 contested disposals at 82.4%
Zach Merrett: 15 contested disposals at 80.8%
Andrew Brayshaw: 18 contested disposals at 81.8%
You see my point here right? There are plenty of stoppage players out there who are far more efficient than Taranto, and while he finds the footy with relative ease, he doesn’t use it as well as he should. Let’s look at Matt Rowell in this one:
Kamdyn Mcintosh to tag Matt Rowell – but it won’t make a difference & Rowell to have double the clearances of the next best Richmond player:
Neither of these things happened but far out Rowell was like a lone warrior in the Suns midfield, particularly in the first half. He got a bit more help from Anderson and Miller as the game wore on, but when the heat was on early Rowell was the only one putting his hand up for the Suns.
I noticed something in him in this game that I haven’t noticed before – he does have a few quick steps, that sort of change of pace that helps him get space in the stoppage. There’s been a lot of talk about Nick Daicos and his turn of foot after the Brisbane game this week, but Rowell has similar traits.
He finished this game with 29 disposals and seven clearances at 79.3% efficiency. He is an absolute warrior in the clinches who just refuses to be beaten, even if he is crawling on his hands and knees to get to a ball at a stoppage. He was great to watch tonight, and it was a shame he didn’t have a few mates helping him out early.
Sam Collins to own Tom Lynch
Well I flat out got this wrong.
I haven’t liked the version of Tom Lynch we have seen over the last few years. Sure his body has let him down at times, and he may have played games being not fully fit. It is also hard to be basically the lone key forward in a struggling team. But over the last few seasons I feel like Lynch has become more interested in hitting blokes and being lippy than playing football – don’t get me wrong, we love a bit of mongrel here at The Mongrel Punt, but I felt like it was all misplaced as his footy was generally not good.
Lynch has been a great servant and was a huge part of the flags the Tigers won, but I felt like he has maybe played on a little too long – in a team that is rebuilding surely you would rather give opportunities to young talls?
I actually loved Lynch’s game tonight. He kicked the first goal of the game, and gave it to some of the Suns defenders, who in turn gave it back to him. But this didn’t feel like Lynch just being a thug, it felt like he was showing his young forward line that he is there for them – that he is the general and he won’t let them be pushed around. He didn’t cross the line into anything that could lead to suspension (which he has done before), and lived rent free in Collins’ and Andrew’s head early in the piece.
Lynch finished with two goals and 4 marks – by no means an amazing stat line. But what he did do was present hard at the footy, he protected his young teammates and made sure there was space for the likes of Seth Campbell to run into. It was a selfless game as Sam Collins had only the 4 intercept possessions – while I don’t recall too many one on one contests between Lynch and Collins, in terms of impact on the game and for their respective sides, the chocolates well and truly go to Lynch in this one.
Noah Balta to be booed
I mean, he was, but the cheers from the Richmond fans basically drowned out any boos from the Suns fans. If he was feeling any pressure, he certainly didn’t show it and was huge down back along with Vlastuin. Interestingly I think Mac Andrew got louder boos than Balta throughout the night!
Morally should he have been playing? I’ll leave that up to you to decide, but I’m not sure Richmond win this game if Balta doesn’t play.
Sam Lalor to be compared to Dusty atleast once by the commentary team (even more if David King is part of it)
Didn’t happen – very little love for Lalor from the commentators tonight.
Witts to win the hitouts, but Nank to have more of the footy
Witts did win the hitouts. He also had more of the footy and more score involvements, but in the end I call the overall contest a nil-all draw. Nank was good, and this was evidenced by how the Suns worked back into the game when Nank was stuck on the bench for 10 minutes in the last quarter.
And some things I didn’t expect:
The Richmond defence was superb tonight lead by Vlastuin who finished the game with 15 intercepts, 11 of which came in the first half. This was particularly important in the 2nd quarter where it was raining inside 50’s from the Suns. Balta also had the lazy 10 intercepts himself – I don’t know if Vlastuin has the confidence to play off his man as much as he did to get those intercepts if Balta is not playing. I thought it was rough on young Trainor to be dropped for Balta in this game considering the situation – but it proved to be the correct call from Richmond in a football sense.
Gold Coast tall forwards should take notes from Ben Long. I’ve written about him before, but he is one of the hardest working forwards in the game these days. He’ll lead and double back multiple times to give his teammates an option, and was really the focal point of the Suns attack tonight with 3.1. He is averaging a touch over 2 goals a game so far this season and I swear there are not too many forwards in the game who work harder than him.
Daniel Rioli was a bit off tonight – maybe memories of the Marvel curse and the pressure/nervousness of playing against his old team got to him. I’m not sure the boos from the Richmond faithful were necessary – he was a great servant and the overs in terms of draft picks that Suns paid for him are fast tracking the Richmond rebuild.
Speaking of Rioli’s, how good was Maurice. He is by no means at this level yet, but the way he can impact a game with minimal touches reminds of another famous Rioli who had quite the career for the Hawks – and 7 tackles for the match so he is willing to work hard on both sides of the ball. You’d be nervous as a defender with ball in hand knowing Maurice is sniffing around waiting to pounce!
So all in all, my expectations were a bit off tonight, but I take some solace in the fact that I doubt too many expected this game to play out the way it did. Congratulations to the Tiger cubs on a great win, but this game really just throws up more questions about the Suns – is this the year they play finals? Just when you think they are getting it all together, they go and stink up the joint like they did tonight. The next few weeks will be very interesting for them.
