Who broke the screen?

Melbourne 4.2, 9.3, 10.5, (93)
St Kilda 0.3, 3.4, 5.7, 8.7 (55)
Crowd: 35,767 at the MCG, Sunday, May 8th at 1.10pm

One of the most disappointing parts of the Port Adelaide loss – apart from losing the game itself – was that it deprived us of a huge build-up to Sunday. A chance for the players to test themselves on a big stage, at the front of footy consciousness. The undefeated Dees facing a surprise St Kilda team that had won six in a row. For all intents and purposes this should have had match-of-the-round billing, giving more positive vibes and exposure for the club than a short-term cash injection from playing a game in Cairns ever could.

The media hype probably would have made for the biggest build-up to a home and away season game since Round 16 in 2010 against Collingwood at the MCG on a Saturday afternoon, with the winner to take top spot; 81,386 showed up that day in a record home-and-away crowd for St Kilda, and in the days of delayed free-to-air broadcasts on Saturdays Channel 10 decided to show it live. Yes, last Sunday was still first versus fourth, and Mother’s Day fixturing didn’t help, but the air had been completely sucked out of it. All things said, all comparisons made, it would have just been an outright enjoyable week as a Saints fan. But the veil had been lifted just enough. We went from our best win of the season to a loss that brought up the ghosts of five years ago, one year ago, even six weeks ago.

The media hype dried up with every shanked Max King and Jack Higgins shot at goal and Seb Ross’s just-too-short pass to Snags with a minute left and Robbie Gray slipping away from Dougal in the final 40 seconds. Fox Footy’s power rankings declared a race of three – Melbourne, Brisbane and Fremantle, and the Bizarro Rivalry Cold War took another turn on Friday night as the Dockers temporarily reached the top of the ladder. There were no Max King or Snags features this week, no David King breaking down Brad Hill’s selfless running patterns. All we had was Gerard opening the week saying “St Kilda is counting the dollars and the cost”, and AFL.com.au telling us “It’s time for another meeting, Saints”.

A more under-the-radar build-up suited some. A lot of us thought we were a sneaky chance. It has to happen eventually to Melbourne; after all, VFL/AFL history suggests that at 15 wins in a row you’re closer to the end of the streak than the beginning. I was less convinced we’d lose this week than last week – not confident at all that we’d win, mind you, just not militantly sure we’d be losing. Josh Jenkins reckoned we were as good a chance as any, but he was also very confident GWS would knock us off. Maybe all of their guys who were out with COVID the week before would be underdone. Maybe five changes would unsettle them. Maybe Jake Bowey’s streak would end at the hands of his father’s club. Maybe we are the real deal and maybe we’d learned a lot from Cairns. Maybe that was just a blip in the conditions, and not the beginning of ingrained performance anxiety in front of goal (we’ve kicked 14.35 over two weeks), or even when it just came when it came to executing simple passes and completing simple marks across the ground.

***

We’d all been craving our chance to be tested against the best. Finally, it was here. At the opening bounce, both Paddy Ryder and Jade Gresham slipped over and Petracca took it away to Neal-Bullen on the wing. We left the corridor wide open and for the first of many occasions Brayshaw was the man waiting for the quick switch, Bowey streamed past, Kysaiah Pickett onto the entry and finished with an expert checkside. It took all of 27 seconds before Kosi’s kick was going over the goal umpire’s hat.

That’s ok, we’d been here before. We’d spent a month of footy giving up the first two goals of the game (including at the MCG) and that had turned out ok. We gained some territory – Max King kicked a point off the ground, taking his run to 3.10 – and Gresham missed a shot; a stalemate ensued for 11 minutes, but it wasn’t one of any real thunder. We’d apparently gone in with the game plan to possess the ball and deprive Steven May and Jake Lever the chance to pick off forward entries, but just like Port Adelaide had attempted to change their game style against the Dees, this wasn’t generating any decent looks and Melbourne were just happy to sit around and wait for us to do something silly. It was a lot of short kicks in the back-half, and then eventually a dump kick to no-one in particular. Steele had Max on the break at half-forward and absurdly his left-foot kick missed him completely and the ball…still went straight to May. The ball went up the line to Ben Brown and eventually found Spargo for the second. Punished instantly.

This was more like the stagnant, anxious ball movement of Round 1 and the worst of the pre-season. We tried bringing the ball wide and switching to find a hole in Melbourne’s structure, but we moved the ball too slowly as it was and the Dees just casually rolled across the field as uncontested marks piled up. That’s not to sell the Dees short, by the way – their defensive structures appeared bulletproof. But as far as what we were doing with ball in hand, we were too scared to make a mistake and even then couldn’t work hard enough or fast enough to provide anything that would allow a safe passage through via short easy kicks. We’d effectively let two players in the opposition dictate our game style. There was no chance for our forwards.

Gawn was running Marshall and Paddy across the ground and provided a tall target in the front half on multiple occasions, bringing the ball to ground that ended with stoppages that the Dees scored goals from through a long kick from Rivers and then another delightful snap from Pickett. They were taking their half-chances. We were barely making them.

Pickett’s second goal came from one of the lower moments of the day. Ryder (St Kilda player) committed bravely to a high ball coming off half-back and rushed the kick forward to Membrey leading on the wing. He handballed inside to Gresham, and a moment of class and composure was required on the break. He had more time and space than he thought, as well as the option for a handball forward to Jones, but instead of assessing what was ahead or waiting for something to present he banged the onto his boot. The high ball wobbled in the air towards centre half-forward, to no St Kilda player’s advantage, and fell into the arms of Langdon. From one of the most dangerous spots on the ground to turn over the footy, Melbourne went up the other end, forced a stoppage, and Pickett finished. Four goals to nothing.

The real low point came just a few moments later. Higgins should have been given a too-high free 25 metres from goal, but Steele marked the rebounding ball and steadied on the 50, and delivered an excellent kick to the reach of Membrey at the top of the square just seconds before the quarter-time siren. The vice-captain went back and kicked it into Harrison Petty’s fingertips. The review was inconclusive but Petty, the Dees players and the goal umpire all knew it immediately. Maybe it was the sunshine of the MCG at the Punt Road end against a top team, but this reminded me too much of Heath Shaw’s smother on Nick Riewoldt in the 2010 Grand Final Replay. We weren’t playing our way – both by choice and permittance – and a leader had just been done on the goal line.

***

Melbourne cranked things up in the second quarter, playing some of their most clinical footy of the year. Gawn provided the get-out on the wing with a mismatch on Battle after a disputed ball in our forward line; Oliver coasted past and hit McDonald on the lead, and found Ben Brown running into an open goal.

Changing the angles helped to finally deliver our first a few moments later – Battle provided a running option for the switch out of the middle and Rowan Marshall marked his long kick to the square – but from the centre bounce there was an irresistible Gawn hit out to Oliver, quick hands to Petracca, and the ball was flipped back to Gawn, back to Oliver, and then chipped to Petracca, who off a step launched a 45-metre entry that fell right into McDonald’s hands. It was the best passage of the day. Each player understood exactly what the next move was and the execution was perfect. It’s not a necessity, but I don’t think our players can do that.

On the occasion when we tried changing things up we came unstuck. Jones tried cutting in from the wing to Hill but was chopped off by Neal-Bullen, and the Dees switched across half-forward; Langdon drew the handball to Angus Brayshaw and he goaled on the run from 50. Ben Brown and McDonald then both pounced on loose balls from a marking contest and a throw-in respectively and kicked nearly identical snaps around the corner from 30 metres out. Just like that, the margin was 47 points.

A four-goal patch either side of half-time offered something. Saints players started running for each other. Forward handballs to guys on the move were attempted. Max King got into the game on the eve of half-time, providing the get-out contested mark from Hill’s kick off half-back (Hill was visibly yelling for someone to move as he looked for options) and getting the ball in quick to a Membrey one-on-one for the first. Paddy Ryder was playing Australian Rules football in a St Kilda jumper and caught Brayshaw holding the ball in front of goal for the second. Max then offered half a Max King quarter in the third. Hill, Sinclair and Long all moved for each other off half-back and cut through the middle in a manner that we got used to in the five-game streak, Long found Membrey who passed to Gresham wide inside 50; he had to work off Brayshaw, win the ball back and dance around him, and Max took a contested mark in the goal square on Hunt, with the mismatch created through the faster ball movement. We all deep down considered the prospect of him missing this (or kicking it into the man on the mark), but he managed to poke it through.

NWM offered what might have been the best moment from a St Kilda perspective. Howard’s high rushed kick out of defence fell to him on the boundary and he had to feign a kick around Langdon, turn him inside out, and then step around him again in next to no space. He then delivered a beautifully weighted pass over to Mason Wood; eventually, the ball found Membrey and as the ball went into 50 the free-kick was paid to Max for holding the man. Max went back and kicked the goal.

There was a fleeting few moments at this point at which you started to think about what could be. Max’s confidence might be back. Just one more and we’re within three goals. Just win the quarter from here. Membrey had a shot from just beyond 50 that was always a stretch; he missed, and all Melbourne needed to go up the other end and for Ben Brown to snap another goal – this time on his left – was a Jimmy Webster attempted forward 50 entry in traffic that ricocheted Melbourne’s way. This was basically going to be a Diet Caffeine Free version of the late 2017 meeting between these teams with finals potentially on the line, also at the MCG at 1.10pm on a Sunday afternoon, in which we came back from 39 points during the second quarter to get within four points early in the last before fading out.

Hill was back behind the ball in a bid to keep things moving and we were playing our way that little bit more, but Melbourne weren’t ever going to lose this one. We’d gone away from our game style far too much to accommodate the opposition – largely just two of their players – and we never recovered. Fritsch waltzed into goal for the first of the last and took it out to 34 points. Goals from Windhager, Marshall and Higgins to bring the margin back to within four goals at stages were purely for AFL Tables archival purposes.

AFL.com.au’s weekly “Nine Things We Learnt” took a positive approach, saying “St Kilda’s second half against Melbourne was the real deal”, noting that after trailing by nine goals to one, we restricted Melbourne to just five more goals for the game, while adding seven ourselves, and winning the hit-outs, clearances and stoppage clearances from that point. But the thing is, Melbourne turned it on when they had to and kicked nine of the first 10. Many would suggest that Melbourne’s only been going at about 80% so far this year (if that), and that’s all they had to do for the rest of the game. They have proper stars that played and gathered numbers like proper stars. They have Max Gawn, who is a bigger presence live, despite being kept accountable by two very good ruckmen. They have Christian Petracca and Clayton Oliver. We decided to not tag Ed Langdon even though it had just worked out quite well for Hawthorn earlier (he went from nine possessions to 39 in the space of a week). Angus Brayshaw isn’t in the same bracket as the above guys but he played like it on the other wing and across half-back. Of course, both Petracca and Brayshaw – the two guys we passed up in 2014 – were more influential than any of our players. Never mind that we kicked a couple more goals than they did after giving up a 47-point head start and deciding only around the halfway point to try and play the kind of footy that got us to 5-1. The moment had passed.

This was a day of no real highlights; next to no genuine positives. The kind of day when Dougal Howard wins the Sainter of the Round and Callum Wilkie is one of your best because the opposition is so dominant that defenders have to be on their guard at every second. The crowd on Sunday never really got the chance to become engaged because Melbourne blew it out and then just had keep things at arm’s length. Only when Jones cannoned into the back of Langdon and then Oliver took a dive from Jones’s brushing elbow in the last quarter did the crowd arc up a little. (Of course, Jones got fined for that. There’s no conspiracy, but it’s something that would happen to St Kilda. Jones, who showed good moments despite clearly looking like someone who’d missed a chunk of footy, got one back from May a few moments later.) As Harmes, then Viney, then May and then Petracca all went to Jones after the Oliver brush, Nathan Buckley in the commentary said, “Where are the Saints boys? Get there. Doesn’t need to be too much but just get there and support.” Ross and Webster did half-heartedly. A few moments later Windhager kicked his first to a dulled response; the players either didn’t know or didn’t care that it was the first in his career. Only Seb looked like he was trying to get something going.

***

There was reason to rage about the Port Adelaide loss. It stupidly cost us four points and an enjoyable week of anticipation. We’ve sunk to seventh just over a week after David King said we were simply improving our defence to attack transition numbers away from having the strongest Champion Data profile in the league. Now, we’ve posted two losses now that aren’t overly honourable. It’s not an honourable loss when you kick 4.18 and can’t control a Sherrin, it’s not an honourable loss when you give up nine of the first 10 goals and the opposition spends the rest of Mother’s Day in cruise control. We’ve gone from 5-1 to the brink of 5-4 via Robbie Gray (again) and a couple of guys we decided not to pick in the draft a few years ago. In 2019, when we went 4-1 and became The Age’s “story of the year”, we beat the Dees at the MCG 95 to 55. This was a 93 to 55 loss and I’m dreading the prospect of heading for a 2019 repeat.

The Age chose to run with a story about Luke Jackson probably staying put at Melbourne as the lead article for this one, using it more prominently on their site than the match report itself. That MCG Sunday game against Hawthorn just a month ago was a bright, sunny, warm afternoon made for a sexy, high-scoring St Kilda on the up; a team announcing itself to the competition. This was a much colder and ultimately overcast day set for a spluttering team. Many have fancied themselves; we just ended up as another piece of roadkill on Melbourne’s highway to another premiership. We can feel like we took it to them for moments, but in the wash-up Melbourne fans won’t be thinking too much about this one. For them, it was a comfortable four points won from an unmemorable opponent.