As Hawthorn found out last year against us in the final game when they played the 2nd and 3rd matches back to back, it's hard to run out the final game if you've played the middle one. It's no surprise that we beat Melbourne comfortably afresh while North kicked 5 of their 7 goals in the last 5 minutes of each half against us. We clearly started to fatigue in the final game.
We pretty much did as we pleased against Melbourne. Except for some umpire charity
, the Dees never looked like scoring for most of that game. Newy and Houli totally sliced them open.
North however was more even given we changed to a more inexperienced side. They beat us comfortably in the clearances which can be blamed on not having big Ivan in the ruck and Dimma trying lesser and newer names in the centre.
All up the standard was fairly decent for February and our transition play from defence and through the middle was very good most of the time (when we didn't overuse the handball). Best of all no one got injured
. Vlastuin, Ellis and Petterd will add a fair bit to the side if they keep up that sort of form in the real stuff. Jackson and Nahas will find themselves pushed out and down to Coburg along with McGuane, Whitey and Derickx.
