GWS V North Melbourne Review:
On an overcast afternoon in Canberra, GWS faced North Melbourne. A loss could see GWS potentially drop out of the 8, and they welcomed back their Captain, Toby Greene, while Max Gruzewski came in for the injured Jesse Hogan. North Melbourne, with little to play for, welcomed back Tristan Xerri from suspension, as well as Bailey Scott, and named two debutants in Cooper Trembath and Geordie Payne. Some big outs for North as well with Curtis suspended and Larkey injured.
Toby Greene started in the first centre bounce and for the first few minutes the ball lived inside GWS front half, with the Giants peppering the North defence with inside 50s and just missing a couple of targets before O’Halloran found Stringer in the pocket with a really well-placed kick. He went back and converted on his left for the first goal of the game. Five minutes into the game and North looked like getting their first inside 50 through LDU, but a great chase down from Callum Brown saw the ball bounce off of his foot tamely and sent the other way.
The ball movement was pretty laborious early, with both teams defending the ground really well and having a spare behind the ball, before Leek Aleer over committed in a contest with Darling on the wing, allowing North to go inside 50 for the first time and find a wide open Cooper Harvey who converted and leveled things up with one goal apiece. It took over halfway through the first quarter before the Giants were able to effectively transition from D50 resulting in their second goal of the game to Callum Brown.
North still had the spare number in D50 but the kick from Tom Green was so good that only Callum Brown could get near it. Pink and Comben then conspired to spoil each other rather than one of them taking an intercept mark and ball spilled to Stringer who kicked his second from the same pocket he kicked his first, and GWS were two goals ahead, the main difference being their ability to find space and targets inside 50.
GWS kicked their fourth goal, and Callum Brown’s second of the game, thanks to a well won contest from Toby Greene on the wing. He put his head over the ball and barged past three North players (and a teammate) before finding Cadman wide open inside 50 who handpassed to Brown in the square. A ball up in the middle 30 seconds after the goal saw Xerri pinged after a great tackle from Briggs and Stringer swooping on the loose ball and taking the advantage and finding Cadman. He took a strong contested mark against Comben and converted. All of a sudden after one goal apiece in the first ten minutes, GWS now had five straight on the board.
First gamer Cooper Trembath then got one back for North with his first kick in league footy after receiving a free against Taylor for chopping his arm in a marking contest. It was a great moment for North and Trembath, with vision of his family celebrating in the stands a real heartwarming moment. Matching up on one of the best defenders in the league in your first game is a tough ask, so North would have been rapt that Trembath was able to get on the board early and get some confidence. It would be the last goal of the quarter with GWS going in 15 points up.
The first goal of the second quarter went to Callum Brown after a trademark D50 transition from the Giants found him wide open in the pocket and that looked to be the difference in the game thus far – GWS’ forwards ability to find open space to receive inside forward 50. The next goal came again from Callum Brown who kicked a great goal from just outside 50 after again finding space on the lead and the game looked like getting away from North. The third of the quarter went to Callaghan after he was held without the ball inside 50, and GWS were now 6 goals to the good and it seemed a question of how much they would win by.
Goals to Beford and Stringer made the scoring in this quarter 5.3 to the Giants with North yet to hit the scoreboard, and while the commentators were blaming the lack of wins and/or pressure in the midfield from North, I felt like the bigger issue was the North defenders playing off their men. Time and again GWS forwards were wide open to receive, and while there may not have been pressure on the kicks coming in, the amount of space the GWS forwards were able to find meant the kicks didn’t even need to be that precise to result in an uncontested mark. North defenders needed to recognize what was happening and pay closer attention to their direct opponents.
Two-thirds of the way through the quarter and North got their first score via a goal from Darling after a great lead saw Powell find him from a centre clearance. Cooper Harvey then got his second goal of the game and North’s fourth. Both teams would go on to add a point each for the remainder of the quarter and GWS go into halftime with a healthy 38 point lead thanks largely to their transition from D50, and the North backline’s inability to man up on their direct opponents.
North started the third quarter with a bang, a great clearance saw LDU find McKercher and Trembath got on the end of a loose ball to jag his second goal. Normal service resumed not long after with GWS having repeat inside 50s before Greene found himself in some space and kicked his second of the game followed closely by Cadman’sthird goal of the game from the ensuing centre bounce, with another good contested mark infront of Comben. The North defenders playing infront of (or off of) their direct opponents was still not working, but still it appeared no changes had been made by North at the long break.
North managed to lock the ball inside their forward 50 for a minute or two, but got no reward on the scoreboard before GWS transitioned again resulting in another mark and goal to Cadman, this time on Duursma.
North’s other first gamer, Geordie Payne, then kicked their second goal of the quarter after he was found on the lead with a great kick from Wardlaw. North then won the following centre clearance and found Darling who converted to give North two goals in a minute and reduce the margin to 46 points. North then added a third quick goal after another clearance win giving Wardlaw another direct goal assist via a handball to Parker, who had probably been North’s best player to that point. It was a nice little period for North, but GWS won the next clearance which resulted in a roving goal to Angwin.
North were starting to hold their own in the clearance stakes, which was creating more opportunities for them. Unfortunately, Zurhaar, who had been well held to that point, was unable to convert two chances, and before you knew it the ball was up the other end being marked by a wide open Harvey Thomas (one of three GWS players who could have raffled the mark) and he showed Zurhaar how it’s supposed to be done to kick his first of the game and increased the margin to an even 50 points. A really good tackle from Bedford on Logue resulted in another shot on goal for Bedford, but unfortunately we has unable to get the goal the tackle deserved.
The quarter would finish almost as it started, with a goal to Trembath after a strong mark up forward – his match to that pont had been a real glimmer of hope for North Melbourne, with the likes of Zurhaar and Teakle up forward being largely unsighted.
North drew first blood to start the last quarter with Stephens slotting a goal from a very nice set shot on the boundary. Another clearance out of the middle for North provided a second goal in quick succession to Darling. North again won the clearance out of the middle, and it was looking like GWS had perhaps taken their foot of the pedal a little, something they could not really afford to do with percentage potentially becoming important in their bid to play finals this year.
There was a bit of a lull in scoring for the next ten minutes of the quarter before Callum Brown kicked his fifth of the game in an almost identical fashion to Darling’s earlier goal. Cadman should have registered his fourth of the game after he was found all alone at the top of the square, but he inexplicably played on and was all of sudden, was no longer alone, and was got caught holding the ball. McKercher got the next goal from North after finishing well on the run after a chain of handballs, before another little lull in the game. GWS then managed to extend the final margin to 54 points with goals to Green, Cadman and Greene to finish out the game.
So the Giants did what was necessary to keep their finals hopes alive, but I’m sure would have liked to have won by a bigger margin given their percentage is the second-lowest of the top nine teams. North are just playing out another season towards the bottom end of the table, and while there were some good performances from some of their players today, you wonder where this team improves to get more wins on the board next year?
No Hogan. No worries!
The GWS forwards had a day out with Cadman, Brown, Greene and Stringer kicking 15 of GWS’ 20 goals for the game, Stringer managing three goals in only 45% of time on the ground. Time and again, the GWS forwards found themselves in acres of space as North defenders tried to play aggressive and play infront of them. It didn’t work, and while there could have been more pressure from the North midfield on the kick coming into 50, often these forwards had 10 to 15 metres of space – the kick in didn’t need to be perfect such was North’s unwillingness to actually defend the forwards.
Greene showed again how important he is to this team with 3.3 from 23 disposals and 14 score involvements as he lead the way from the first bounce to the finish.
The ruck battle:
North would have loved to have Xerri back, and he got the chocolates today over a gallant Briggs. Briggs is one of the few ruckman who can match it with Xerri physically, and he did just that today. Xerri’s numbers were still what you expect from the big fella, particularly around tackles and clearances, but Briggs was not far away from him and competed really well all day. Both lads were exhausted come the last quarter and had every right to be!
Postiives for North?
The work up forward of Cooper Harvey and debutant Trembath was certainly exciting, Parker played one of his best games in North colors, and McKercher tried to take the game on a bit more forward of centre. They’d also be pleased that Wardlaw got through unscathed given his combative game style. One thing I thought while watching this game is that North really need to get the ball into the hands of guys like Wardlaw, McKercher and Sheezel when it comes to that final kick inside 50.
I sometimes wonder if Clarko is the right coach for this group anymore? Has he really taken this team forward in his time at the helm? I feel if his name was not Alistair Clarkson, he would be under far more pressure than he is. Melbourne sacked Goodwin this week and they have three more wins on the board, and won a flag only 4 years ago – what is the expectations for next season for North?
The finals race:
GWS got the win they needed, but they have a tough game coming up against Gold Coast in Gold Coast, with the Bulldogs breathing down their neck for that last spot in the 8. If they are able to win that, you would back them in to beat St Kilda the following week at home, but lose to Gold Coast and they are a chance to not be in the finals this season. They needed this win and they got it in pretty clinical fashion, but a sterner test awaits and their presence in finals is solely in their own hands.
