Opportunity Missing

The Restump Podcast

It can’t have gotten far, it was just with us! Geez, you can’t take your eyes of opportunity for a second! It’s time to Restump Podcast Sunday’s demoralising top 4 departure.
Sunday at the MCG felt very historically Fremantle-ish. Destroying pivotal moments and golden opportunities! Just when we had the chance to almost lock down some valuable top four real estate, the Essendon Bomber Bank said, “sorry, we’re not financing that” and the deal fell over.
It really hurt because it was another game that we’ve let slip. The two games in South Australia were slightly different bags, but the early West Coast loss and the Collingwood draw had filled our allowable debacle quota. Letting Essendon run us down from four goals behind… is a step too far and could have horrifically dire consequences in relation to September participation.
The game was quite deceiving. Our rare accuracy and efficiency were clouding the reality. The fact is, we weren’t travelling that well early in the game. Just 10 inside fifties in the first quarter to Essendon’s 18 was disguised because we kicked 4 goals 1. We were scoring every second entry, but so were the Bombers who kicked 5 goals 4. Did the 9-point quarter time margin not set the alarm bells off?
Was there a sense of complacency? Were we out there thinking a mirrored performance from the previous week against the West Coast Eagles would unfold? At half time we’d gone inside 50 two less times than we did in the first quarter, but again we were accurate and efficient kicking 5 goals neat. Compounding our potential complacency was Essendon kicking 1 goal 2… but they went inside 50 fifteen times. If Essendon started scoring, we were in strife.
The penny seemed to drop in the third quarter as we got our game going and got it on our terms. Clearances, contested possession, inside fifties all turned in our favour. But for all our dominance we didn’t necessarily make the most of it.
The final quarter was a disaster. They steam rolled us and, disappointingly, we showed little to no fight. We reverted to the first half form, getting beaten in contested and uncontested possession and they took 16 more marks than us in the final term alone. We made just one centre clearance and that was where the game was lost.
It was a game we should have won with the personnel we had but the experienced and steadying hands of Alex Pearce and Sonny Walters at either end of the ground, were noticeably missing. And if those ‘numbers on a page’ readers think we don’t miss Nat Fyfe… maybe now they’ll change their tune.
It’s a devastating loss and one that may prove fatal in terms of September this year but, bigger picture-wise, let’s not forget where we are and where we were this time last year. (15th for those playing at home) We’re an exceptionally young side of substantial talent. As far as premiership windows go, ours is only just starting to open.
We’ve got the Cats, Giants and Port to come in the run to the finals. Those three teams in their current form probably pose the toughest test any side has to endure in these final three weeks. We’re only a win and % out of 9th…. we probably need to win two of our last three.
Anyway, lets get into it on the pod and break it all down further. So, if you’re looking to make sense of it all…. point us in the right direction because so are we! Problems shared are problems halved and you can’t solve them without talking about them. Let’s start the chit chat.

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