All the scribes giving us an F were sucked in by where we were at the half way point of the season and got carried away in the emotion of it all, jumping on the Tiggy bandwagon. When we had (the inevitable) unexpected losses they took it badly and now can only see our season as a failure. If any of them were marking our season as 11-11 with 110% and most losses under 20 points at the start of the season then they would have given us C's or D's.
There was nothing inevitable about that loss to Gold Coast, or the loss to Carlton and North Melbourne. Or any of the other close losses.
What's it like living up there in Cloudland? As sure as God (if you believe in Him) made little green apples, we were at the VERY stage in our rebirth and development where we were going to win the unwinnable and lose the unloseable. Anything else meant we weren't really a young side improving who showed the signs of it's immaturity and lack of strength, it would have indicated deeper more problematic issues.
We had similar performances the year before.
Really? I would say we didn't get within a bull's roar of last year's performances, in performance, competitiveness, closeness or number of wins.
Poor coaching cost us all of those games. Our form when we beat Hawthorn and Sydney was much more reflective of our list than these losses when Hardwick coaches competitively. People who judge our list hard forget that every other club faces the same list management issues that we do. The mark of a great coach is the performances he can achieve with the list he has, not the list he wishes he had.
What a load of toss. Poor coaching was a contributer to our results this year but no more than age, experience, ability, depth, attitude, fitness and the multitude of other factors that combine to produce results in a football game. Some very average coaches have been fortunate to coach teams to premierships and some great coaches have never tasted that same success. Some of the greatest ever modern day coaches (Sheedy, Malthouse and Thompson for example) suffered serious lapses and lived under the real threat of the axe early in their coaching careers before proving their worth. Hardwick has not come close to the poor results of their early teams/years.
The year was a fail. Our playing list is capable of making the finals. We didn't make it. It doesn't get more simple than that. Our win ratio the last couple of years has gone up. But lets not forget the freeby with the introduction of GWS in the comp and the shocking form of Port, Essendon, WBulldogs, Brisbane etc. You can improve win/loss when the bottom teams are that bad and still not amount to anything.
Our list was not capable of making the finals otherwise we would have. It doesn't get more simple than that. Our win ratio for the last couple of years has gone up but not by enough yet, so all the football department - coaches, players and ancillary staff - have more work to do. I would have thought that was very obvious. The bottom teams are bottom for one reason and one reason only - they are not as good as those above them - so to use them as an excuse for your own perceived lack of improvement is a distracting folly. You win a premiership by beating more teams than the other clubs. It doesn't get more simple than that.
The only comfort is our list is as good as Carlton's and they were expecting top 4 and didn't make it. Ratten is a coach that has failed on a massive level. If we don't make the finals next year, Hardwick's head will roll. Personally I would rather we grabbed Malthouse before someone else does and make a certainty of it and avoid the inevitable excuses for failure that have come from another year in the wildnerness.
Realists to the left, messiah believers to the right.
