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ROUND 4: COLLINGWOOD 11.11 (77), HAWTHORN 11.6 (72)
📝 Main recap:
Footy’s a bit like a box of chocolates for Hawks supporters these days. You just never know what you’re going to get.
After three consecutive losses and patches of games we’d rather forget, we ended up going down to the reigning Premiers by just five points, with multiple opportunities to actually win the game. Did anyone see that coming?
Well, the truth is it’s been building for weeks.
The Hawks have yet to put in a four quarter performance in 2024, but we’ve managed to stay in games and have never truly gone to water — even when we’ve looked on track for a hiding.
Plenty of opportunities but wayward kicking contributed to our round 1 loss against the Bombers. Result: 24-point loss.
We tried something different in the first quarter against Melbourne and could never claw that margin back. Result: 55-point loss.
They came within four points of the Cats on Easter Monday, but couldn’t quite stop the rot when it mattered and it didn’t help the Cats were dobbing them from everywhere. Result: 36-point loss.
That’s an extremely optimistic view of the start of the season, but it’s also a reflection of why we are where we are.
In-game consistency has plagued us so far in 2024, as has the form of key players, the integration of several new recruits, a Will Day-sized hole in the midfield, and the continual blooding of young players. From Mackenzie to Ramsden, we had 11 players with under 50 games experience against Collingwood.
That probably explains why we can be electric in certain periods of the game, and completely at sea at other times. During the second quarter, we saw the best and worst of Hawthorn. A debut goal to Ramsden from a centre clearance (yes, you read the correctly!) and a brilliant individual effort from a back-in-form Jai closed the first quarter gap, before Collingwood went on a five goal run.
A six goal lead to Collingwood at halftime looked completely insurmountable, but you just can’t count this Hawthorn team out. What they lack in slickness, they more than make up for in heart, dare and a never-say-die attitude that will serve us well when we properly come of age.
🧐 Things we like to see — Moore, Moore, Moore!
This passage of play late in the fourth quarter is the kind of exciting chaos footy we’ve been crying out for. Amon with a daring kick down the centre of the ground that finds Chol perfectly positioned between Moore and Frampton. Chol loses the footy but, in a sheer moment of desperation, paddles it along to Hardwick. With no less than three Pies on his hammer, Hardwick gets a toe on it and finds Dylan Moore. A clean pick up from Moore before nailing the open goal. Hawthorn closes the gap to five with just over four minutes left.
🍒 You never forget your first — Max Ramsden
Our promising ruck/forward got off the mark with a nice contested mark and goal that got us going in the second half.
🛫 Hanger of the day — Dylan Moore
Dylan Moore was one of the sparks that ignited our second half comeback and this mark in the third goes straight into the top 10 of his career highlight reel.
🕵🏻♂️ 9 Observations from Prinsy
1. The slow starts continue to haunt Hawthorn, even if took Collingwood just short of 10 mins to break the deadlock. These Hawks need to find a way to wrestle control early in games, so they don’t always have to fightback from a large deficit.
2. It was a second quarter run on from the Pies that broke the game open, with Collingwood kicking five goals in the last 15 mins of the term, extending their lead to 38 points at the half.
3. A spirited second half fightback showed what most Hawks fans know. This team has heart. Youthful, inexperienced and a little naïve at times, but so brave.
4. Sam Mitchell has been labelled many things by many people. Kane Cornes believes he’s a genius, others believe he’s far too stubborn. The truth is that most geniuses are stubborn to a fault. Mitchell’s move to throw Blake Hardwick forward paid dividends, with Hardwick rewarding his coach’s faith by kicking a career-high four goals.
5. Fans have called the move of Karl Amon to half back a disaster. It was looking there would be more fuel poured on that fire at half time, with Amon only touching the ball seven times, but a 21 disposal second half, with his hand in so much of the good Hawthorn passages, maybe we should have some patience and a little faith in Mitchell’s genius on this one too.
6. Jai Newcombe is back. The questions have been asked and the debate has raged as to how worried fans should be re Jai’s form but worry no more. Newcombe was massive, and his 10 clearances, 7 tackles, 28 disposals and a goal were proof of that. Welcome back Duke.
7. It was something of a resurgence for Jack Scrimshaw, who played his best game of 2024. 9 marks, with 3 of them contested, were the most of any Hawk. He used the ball well and outpointed his Collingwood opponents on most occasions.
8. The Hawks fought hard through the midfield, none more so than Conor Nash, but Nash’s inability to hit Hawthorn targets is a concern. A disposal efficiency of 39% and nine turnovers from 18 disposals is not what the Hawks are after from Nash. Nine tackles and six clearances were welcome though.
🕵🏻♂️ And a few more from Ash
1. Lloyd Meek’s work in the ruck was the best over four quarters we have seen from the Hawks for a couple of years, certainly since Big Boy McEvoy. Only Ned Reeves against the Cats in 2022 (before he got injured) comes close.
2. Connor MacDonald has been labelled as Hawthorn’s answer to Connor Rozee. He’s a long way from it, and of course, Rozee would have nailed that go-ahead goal in the final quarter. MacDonald might have in previous years as well, come to think of it.
3. The Pies were in self-preservation mode in the second half on Sunday and the feeling here is that had the Hawks hit the front they likely would have found a way to win the game. But the evidence is mounting that Finn as the tagger keeps the Hawks from the quick ball movement game they became adept at last year. They came back in the game when Mitchell dropped the tag. Time for the Hawks to back their midfielders against the opposition and see where the cards fall.
4. Is possible that despite having played just three games that the Hawks missed Nick Watson on Sunday? Reckon he would have thrived in that frenzied final quarter.
⭐️ Best on ground — Blake Hardwick
Blake Hardwick added a different dimension to a depleted forward line when he shifted forward after half time. With household names like Breust, Gunston, Lewis all not playing, Hardwick showed he is a legitimate option for Mitchell. First ever Brownlow votes incoming?
💫 Rising star — Josh Ward
It was great to see Josh Ward building some season form and career momentum. Ward finished with 17 disposals and was hard in the contest and used the ball well. All is not lost and calling him a bust is incredibly premature.
👼 Unsung hero — Lloyd Meek
Meek cemented himself as Hawthorn’s number one ruck for the foreseeable future with an impressive performance against Cameron and Cox. Meek’s nine hitouts to advantage from 30 overall hitouts were impressive, but his work around the ground (18 disposals) and how he asserted himself physically was what caught my eye. If he continues this form and starts marking the football, we’re on here.
🤯 Under pressure — Finn Maginness
If Finn Maginness isn’t going to hard tag an opposition midfielder and severely limit their output, it’s hard seeing a spot in the side for him. His inability to make a decision at AFL speed, and his incredibly poor kicking ability far outweighs any of his redeeming qualities.
📣 The big talking point — Gini (again)
As Sammy said in the press conference, it was a game in which Jack Ginnivan’s "maturity” would be challenged on a few fronts. Firstly, the narrative around the head high free kicks that weren’t paid against Geelong. Secondly, his comments around his Collingwood exit and his first reunion with his old club. But Gini being Gini, he took it all in his stride, slotting the first goal after Lipinski damn near took his head off. The second was a bit easier — a shot from the goal square after a 50m penalty. Absolutely loving life in the brown and gold.
😡 Angry Brad’s early call
🎤 Sammy said what!?
“If you look at the course of that game and the course of the year, they deserve that winning feeling and they didn’t get it.”
“I’m torn between being proud of the result and the resilience and the fight and staying all the way through to the end, but I’m also disappointed that we allowed five goals in a row and we lost control of the game.
“We changed a few things and I thought the players responded fantastically well.”
“[Hardwick’s] a frustratingly good player. I’m really nervous to move him out of the back half at any time because he’s so important for us back there, but we knew the contest in front of the game was an area where we struggled.”
“We lost a lot of team shape in the second quarter in particular so we made a few changes at half-time.”
“I think with Jack [Ginnivan], he’s had a fantastic start to his time in brown and gold. I’m loving the way he’s playing. He’s scoring goals, he’s creating pressure, he’s helping us lock it in the front half and he’s working really hard in the game.”
“We’ve had Will Day on the bench while he’s been injured and I think that influence on our midfield group with having Daysy on the bench has really helped solidify them.”
“It’s not really about which individual dominates the game, I know that’s what the media loves, but I was really pleased with the response from the midfield group last week and then into this week.”
“Newc’s been going okay and today was a big step in the right direction. He’s got that great ability to lead the group and when he’s good in key moments, he drags the team with him”
🗣️ Final words — Blake Hardwick
“I’m proud of the boys’ fightback mentality after halftime. We need to stop giving the opposition a head start and we’ll be right in games.”
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What was learnt:
(It’s always harder from the screen and I find particularly harder with FOX games who don’t often use ground wide shots.)
1. The “missing 12 minutes of the 2nd quarter” – When the Watergate investigators listened to the Nixon tapes, they came across blank spaces in the tapes of conversations that they were investigating. I’d suggest that when the coaches look at the last 12 minutes of the 2nd quarter, they will come across a similar quandary. After a 1st quarter, where the scoreboard was slightly deceiving, we had the momentum from a strong clearance by Meek to Ramsden, then a line breaking goal from Newcombe to get us within two goals of the lead. From then on, we were unable to steady the onslaught from the Pies. Our inability to take a pack mark in the back half (Ramsden was an exception on one occasion) or on the outlet kick meant that we couldn’t reset the forward half as Sam said in his half-time chat. Combined with this, we were unable to exert any influence on stoppages with De Goey having two clean clearances – one from the centre and the other from a boundary throw in on the broadcast wing. When we did have a clearance from the half back/wing area, we dump kicked to the Pies’ spares in our forward 50 which made Frampton look like Ross Glendinning with his running off from his intercept work.
2. The forward line set up – the starting forwards were Chol (65th game); Ramsden (3); Ginnivan (46); Butler (18); Moore (79) (& nominally Maginness (35)). With the level of inexperience would the hindsight call been to pick Gunston as the on-field coach? The lack of synergy was evident in a couple of ways – with Chol and Ramsden competing in the same pack on a couple of occasions and in the 1st quarter, where we had an “advantage” call which Chol sort of took without looking forward. As our forward line lacked structure, it would’ve been better to stop to take the free and reset. From memory, it is another game where we didn’t kick a crumbing goal from the base the pack.
3. ROI on the pre-season – the other option to the previous point was what played out in the 2nd half with Hardwick going forward. As he had shown throughout the pre-season, he provides a different option as a “hybrid” forward to the other small/medium forwards i.e. Moore, Butler and Ginnivan. The issue last year and this isn’t the inside 50 opportunities, but converting them into scoring opportunities which is what Hardwick provided. This may be a test of the “no limits” slogan in that if Hardwick goes forward, we may convert our opportunities rather than negating the opposition’s entries – where is the better return on investment?
4. “One sided” players will/can cost you – in the frantic last 30 seconds, it hit home again the need for players to be two-sided as exemplified when Scrimshaw took possession just outside the forward 50 as we were pressing. Being caught on his right side, he was forced to kick wide to the pocket which enabled to the Pies to use the line as their friend. There was a clear need for the ball to be kept in the corridor. To be really harsh, similar could be said of CMac’s last shot where he looked to straighten up and I suspect conscious of not running too far wasn’t perfectly balanced on his right foot. Would Ginnivan or Moore have used their left foot?
Issue of the week – is the tagger dead?
At his presser, Sam said that one of his pet peeves was along of lines of to assume that a previous strategy will be applied again wasn’t his preference. We did, however, have Maginness go to N. Daicos off the half forward line in the first half. In the meantime, it was J. Daicos off the wing who provided the Pies with the link opportunities in this half. It also meant that the Pies could play a free behind the ball which was effective in the 2nd quarter (see above). The other aspect of the tagger role is that they need to hurt the opposition when they have the ball and unfortunately, Maginness couldn’t inflict the pain on the Pies going inside 50, however the stats had him at 83% disposal efficiency. When the tag looked to be swapped in the 2nd half, our midfield looked to be more potent going head-to-head inside the centre square and J. Daicos was quieter.
With the Suns this week – Rowell, Miller, Anderson, Humphrey – who would he go to and how disruptive is it to our own structure?
Observations:
• Selection of the sub – looking at the selected team, the sub option appeared to be either Hustwaite/Mackenzie/Ward or Butler. Going with the inside midfield option, was this going to provide a “game changer” once the game started. Would it have been more beneficial to have Butler come on with his extra run late in the game?
• Options running from behind – a couple of times, we had static possession in the centre of the ground from frees or mark and both times, Impey came from behind the play as the option, but ran into congestion. This is a pattern that has occurred a couple of times this season. It does waste the opportunity to have a strong forward entry.
• Does CMac find it difficult to get into the game coming off the bench? This is just a “gut feel” suspicion that CMac may be one of those players who is better starting on the ground than coming on from the bench with the game in progress. He provided a couple of really attacking inside 50 entries in the 3rd quarter.
• What is the role for D’Ambrosio? This may be a work in progress, however he was dominated by JDaicos in the first half and it is not clear as to what his role is. The expectation was that he would complement Amon as a deliverer of the ball, however at this stage, he is averaging one inside 50 entry per game. He is certainly prepared to get inside and get his hands dirty, but with our midfield mix, it is the outside work that is the most important. Late in 2nd quarter, Amon went to the wing to take on Daicos.
• Returns of Moore and Newcombe – both displayed the return to form or reward for effort for their work thus this season. Their determination hasn’t been in question, however being able to convert their effort to a strong contribution to the team’s performance has been the missing link. (Credit to HI’s Ethan Weiss for being the one to inspire Jai’s return to form.)
Starting 4 (centre bounce attendances)
1st Qrt: Worpel (18), Newcombe (18), Mackenzie (9)
2nd Qrt: Worpel, Newcombe, Nash (18)
3rd Qrt: Newcombe, Nash, Mackenzie
4th Qrt: Worpel, Newcombe, Hustwaite (3)
(Meek 22, Ramsden 2 & Ward 6)
Coach Killer:
• What is it with forwards missing the entire scoring zone from less than 5 metres out?
• Equally, why do defenders marking on the goal line play on around the goal post, particularly when they are not manned up and even so, the man on the mark has to go back to “the nine”.
My main take away was that two players that hadn't performed to their usual high standards returned to those standards in my opinion namely Jai Newcombe and Dylan Moore.If a few others can do the same our future isn't all doom and gloom that some people in the media might suggest.