Titus O’Reily
Bob McMillan has kindly sent us this report from Titus. Bob notes, ‘I like it when Titus puts the boots into the Poos & Wees team.’ We all do Bob, we all do.
Sydney (60) v Hawthorn (53)
It’s lucky Alastair Clarkson has won a lot because he is a terrible loser. He’s either ruining the competition in his other role as director of umpiring or blaming opposition players, in this case Tom Papley.
Papley’s biggest crime it seemed was kicking goals against the Hawks, and the way Hawthorn are playing, you really don’t need the umpires’ help to beat them.
The real problem was Hawthorn’s lack of discipline, with James Frawley knocking over Papley when he taunted Tom Mitchell.
If you’re going to react like that every time someone taunts someone, you’re going to give away a lot of free kicks and soon everyone will do it to you.
It’s like being called a name in primary school, if you show everyone it gets to you that will end up your nickname; if you don’t react people give up.
I learnt that the hard way, when I was saddled with not so much a nickname, but a string of obscenities throughout school.
On reflection, it was less a nickname and more just something people said when they saw me. Especially my English teacher Mrs Jones and Principal Robbins.
Hawthorn have long been disinterested in winning contested ball but now they don’t kick accurately either in general play.
It’s resulted in them being so bad they made the Swans look good.
What’s most worrying about Hawthorn is all the players they’ve brought in from other clubs are not setting the world on fire, and because that’s how Hawthorn have rebuilt, there’s hardly a flood of young talent coming through.
You can tell it’s a difficult year when even Hawthorn’s struggles aren’t cheering me up.
Post Adelaide (44) v St Kilda (73)
Playing out of a hub seems to suit the Saints, who have made Adelaide Oval their fortress in the last week.
Beating the Crows wasn’t that impressive, Essendon’s VFL side did it on the weekend, but this win against Port was the real deal.
One thing stood out in the Saints game, kicking accurately for goal. They booted 12.1.
Accurate goal kicking is so important, yet it seems to be a skill most players are deeply unfamiliar with. The amount of times a player marks in the forward fifty and then appears mystified as to what to do next.
Their entire body language suggests this is an experience they’ve never been confronted with before, rather than a key component of their job.
They look at the goalposts like an explorer who has just stumbled on a lost city in the jungle.
But in this game, the Saints appeared to be a team of players who have seen goalposts before. They kicked goals even when they didn’t even realise they had, with Tim Membrey launching a flying kick, usually only seen on the field when Toby Greene is in the vicinity, that resulted in a goal.
Even Membrey thought it was touched but the score review confirmed it was a goal.
Perhaps the highlight of this match was having a crowd there.
Watching Power fans lose it at their underperforming side was a real highlight, but reminded me that crowds of people can be dangerous even outside of a global pandemic.
