Match thread: Swans v Hawks.

[Merdo5555]

Florent has been a liability for some time, not quick or skillful, play the kids instead.

[Daisi]

I was never confident about this game. We have too many important outs.....and some of the frees to the Hawks have been soft, leading to goals. Nothing has changed with the umpiring and I think the Hawks might be this years AFL darlings.

I have to agree with this, the Melbourne media have been big on the Hawks pre season. Losing Errol is such a terrible blow, I don't think we can go far without him, he's always been an important play maker for us. Good to hear that Wicks is doing well and Corey Warner. Good to see them taking their chances. Unfortunate that the new coach has some major injuries to worry about, but hey- that's football. Let's hope we have enough to keep us all interested this year. I have my membership, I'm ready to turn up. Unfortunately Friday nights are not good for me, but I'll be there any other night for sure.

[Dow]

Things going to be a very long season lol ? some very ordinary players on the list and missing some big names - and lacking intensity for long enough games still a massive problem.

[Foreign Legion]

Too many players that look injured. Papley, Hayward, Grundy (although his 2nd half was better), Adams.

Not really sure what we saw in Paton. Mid size, not fast, average disposal - just cant see improvement. Hanily was ok for the time he was on. Heeney looked down but probably heavily tagged - hard to tell on TV.

Day would have enjoyed his 6 free kicks. Good effort considering his TOG was only 73%. Gee they have some stagers in the forward line.

[Foreign Legion]

We cant have McInerney taking multiple boundary throw ins - might need to get Ladhams in and rest him up forward. Very good game from Wicks.

[mcs]

Well that was a damn squib of a last quarter. Some real moments of brain fart football didn't help - Melican (who in general I thought was terrific), Florent's kick across goal. Real momentum shifters. But we probably weren't good enough for a fair chunk of that game to be honest.

Some good signs in spots though - and thought Hanily didn't at all look out of place. If I was coach (and glad I'm not ha!) I'd be sticking him in one forward pocker/half forward flank and leaving him there. Let him learn on the run and from Papley and go from there. I actually thought our forward line structure with 2 talls instead of 3 looked okay - something to work with.

[mcs]

Florent …. Gamecosting capitulation

He wasn't alone. We lost all composure in that last quarter from a decision making perspective.

Too many players that look injured. Papley, Hayward, Grundy (although his 2nd half was better), Adams.

Not really sure what we saw in Paton. Mid size, not fast, average disposal - just cant see improvement. Hanily was ok for the time he was on. Heeney looked down but probably heavily tagged - hard to tell on TV.

Day would have enjoyed his 6 free kicks. Good effort considering his TOG was only 73%. Gee they have some stagers in the forward line.

Wouldn't be a Hawks team without trying to be the umpire's darlings.

[Auntie.Gerald]

very very very well coached team the Hawks

The recruitment and indv development with his players has been quite amazing by Sam Mitchell. Hi team reminds me of our Swans teams and they are on the way up.........again.

Time for us to re group and find our contested footy again.......as no1 DNA quality.

[mcs]

very very very well coached team the Hawks

The recruitment and indv development with his players has been quite amazing by Sam Mitchell. Hi team reminds me of our Swans teams and they are on the way up.........again.

Time for us to re group and find our contested footy again.......as no1 DNA quality.

Helped by yet again being able to pillage the Free Agency pile too. No club has managed that side better than the Hawks over the years sadly.

[UUaswan]

Ladhams in is a no brainer, leaves Amartey fwd.
Grundy ruckwork us deplorable, hits it to Hawks all night, fumbles, goes to ground, I'm hoping with a lighter workload in tandem with Ladhams he would be better. Not worth half the money atm.

Lizard very good. playing tall maybe gives him more freedom to run off ???
Been no bigger critic of Wicks than me but he has certainly found his spot in the team.

Our method in the middle is terrible, no one even looks like getting or even going for a ground ball.

Tom Mc was ok, can't see how he is fwd if Mclean or Logan are in the side or if we play against a tall fwd line.

Sheldrick just started to get into it then got hurt.
A few others came alive after the half.

Very fumbly as expected, @@@@ty free kicks as expected.

In summary. we didn't look good when we weren't in possession, alot of that is setup

[Velour&Ruffles]

We'll get better.....but my love for this game is waning.

Exactly how I feel. The inconsistency of the umpiring was agonising. That said, it really isn’t their fault. The AFL has made it impossible to adjudicate this game with any general credibility. Tonight was horrible and if there’s much more of this @@@@ I’m out for good.

[Nico]

The umpires? How did they miss that blatant in the back free to Papley in the forward pocket in the 3rd quarter? A genuine piledriver tackle. And that "high" free to Sicily in the last quarter was laughable.

I thought we were 5 or 6 players short of our best but we had some notable howlers.

Observations:

Campbell is wing or midfield or nothing else. A hard nut who needs to be running a straight line. Very dangerous when he gets a handle on it.
Adams - No.
Sheldrick kicks as bad as Adams.
Grundy had 40 hit outs that came to nought.
Good old Will had a good 15 minutes in the 3rd quarter on Siciliy. Other than that same old same old.
Florent had a howler.
Why do we bother having MCCartin forward? We completely lost structure in the back half.
Paton and Corey! Not in our top 22.

I thought Hanily was most impressive and looks a genuine midfielder to me. Hard at it, finds the footy, and keeps his feet.
Wicks was darn good.

It appears we learned little from the GF review when it comes to clearances. The stats show that they had 16/12 centre clearances. Problem was I reckon we had 2 clean clearances against them almost clean every time. They had a free man on the defensive side at the bounce every time, and when the got their hands on it that players was the go to man. We get it it's "oh shoot" what do I do now. Very frustrating.

We had some really good players so all is not lost. Chad and Blakey are stars. We just have to improve our bottom line.

[crackedactor 01]

I thought Wicks, Blakey and Melican play a great game down back.Warner was good, but Heeney was average. Not sure why they recruited Paton? You can always count on Ollie Florent to made a mistake at the wrong time. We missed Errol big time, especially when Hawthorn got on top 2nd quarter. Grundy was ordinary and so was Jordan. Not sure if we will be good enough to play finals this year. Umpiring was bizarre and spoiled the game some what.

[Dow]

Wicks way on top of Watson so far - our only obvious winner however down the back.

Yes apologies he had a very good game, along with Blakey the only defenders who really did, looks like a really good move

[neilfws]

A pretty disappointing night. The team looked to be struggling to cover all the outs. Definitely some way off the best 23. Gulden is such a big loss, very little run along the wings without him.

Positives: big crowd. Chad Warner, Blakey, Wicks, Rowbottom, Roberts. Jordon worked hard. Not at all convinced by McCartin forward but we'll see how it develops in the coming weeks. I did enjoy the end-to-end play leading to Blakey's goal, a glimpse of what could be.

Hawks handled the conditions better, were cleaner and quicker and had quite a few inside 50s where they seemed to be doing as they pleased, which is never a good look.

A shaky and unconvincing start, but it's early days.