A Dee day out - and the fans love it JAKE NIALL
April 19, 2010MELBOURNE was expected to win yesterday. This hadn't happened for at least three years, and it was this feeling that their club's history was on the turn that prompted so many of the surprising 42,594 attendance to turn up fashionably late to this unfashionable match.
Yesterday held a strong sense of occasion for those whose hearts beat true red and blue. They'd shown up in larger-than-usual numbers to see the rebirth of the game's oldest club, to see precocious talents Tom Scully and Jack Trengove, the reformed scallywag Colin Sylvia and the suddenly mature Jack Grimes.
They'd hoped that Colin Garland, recovering from a serious injury, would confirm that he was a real key defender - as James Frawley had already demonstrated. They wanted to watch Aaron Davey slicing through the middle of the MCG, to see Brad Green and James McDonald enjoying Indian summers of long and distinguished careers.
And they came to commune with Jimmy Stynes. It's the image of Stynes greeting the cheer squad and players at the Ponsford Stand end that will surely endure from this game.
Trengove called Stynes: ''The most inspirational bloke you'll ever meet.
''Everything he says you try and listen to and really take it into your own life.''
The presidency of Stynes has been about transforming a club, not just a team. Yesterday, though, was one of those games in which an emerging team pulls out the tape and measures its growth. ''Everybody's young, up and coming and learning every week and we seem to be getting better every week,'' said Trengove.
What the Melbourne faithful have recognised since the Dees were so unjustly deprived of victory against Collingwood is that the nuclear winter that began in 2007, in the last days of Neale Daniher, has ended. It's now safe to leave those bomb shelters and return to the footy, in the knowledge that Melbourne is a competent football team again.
This was not entirely evident in the first half yesterday, when Richmond, by dint of its youthful energy and willingness to contest everything, stuck with the Demons and remained within a kick.
To this point, the match had been quite entertaining, played with an abundance of space compared to the many defensive scrambles seen in these zone days. Damien Hardwick had chosen to place Richmond's main playmakers, Brett Deledio and Trent Cotchin, in defence - a move that ensured improved ball usage when the Tigers rebounded; the problem was that the delivery to forwards wasn't quite so flash.
The Tigers had perhaps gained some spirit, a galvanising effect, from their decision to dump four players, including two relatively good ones - Ben Cousins and Luke McGuane - for the late-night antics at a Sydney hotel.
They'd promoted three first gamers: David Astbury, Matt Dea and Troy Taylor. Most eyes were on Taylor, a springy indigenous forward whom the club had drafted, despite his well-known penchant for finding off-field trouble, in the hope that it now had an environment in which the kid's better angels would emerge. And Taylor duly provided one celestial moment, grabbing a second-quarter speccie. But of the debutants, Astbury was the most effective, booting three goals, two in the first quarter.
But, just as everyone suspected, the kids - and the Tigers were also without their skipper, Chris Newman - ran out of gas in the second half. The Demons seized control of the ball and the game. Scully played like a No. 1 draft pick, Moloney played like a bulldozer, Sylvia and Green feasted on rapid and clean delivery.
One of the principal reasons for Melbourne's abrupt discovery of competence is that, with Scully, Trengove and Grimes in tow, it now has a critical mass of players who can kick. It is no longer a team that has its hard work constantly foiled by sloppy ball use. That's Richmond's lot. Richmond now is Melbourne of two years ago. The Tigers face a tougher task, due to the new teams, but that should still be a consoling comparison.
MAIN MEN
MELBOURNE
James McDonald:
At 33, the skipper is arguably close to his career peak. He was the catalyst for Melbourne's eight-goal first quarter and gained a remarkable nine contested possessions in the first half. Although his influence waned in the second half, he was still among the most significant performers overall.
RICHMOND
Kelvin Moore:
The tall defender had one of his better games for the Tigers, judging the ball brilliantly in flight and timing his spoils expertly. At one stage he marked running with the flight moments after he was cleaned up. Moore also helped launch quite a number of counter-attacks.
WHERE THE GAME WAS WON
After a close and entertaining opening half, the more seasoned Demons booted seven goals to nil in the third quarter. Their stronger bodies, better decision-making and kicking skills were the difference.
BEST
Melbourne: Moloney, Scully, McDonald, Green, Sylvia, Jones.
Richmond: Moore, Riewoldt, Deledio, Cotchin, Tuck, Martin.
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/a-dee-day-out--and-the-fans-love-it-20100418-smk9.html
