Round 2 – Essendon v St Kilda: High Hopes
They sell Hope at the start of the season.
A boom new recruit. A fast finishing 2018, just one game and percentage from finals.
This year will be different.
You can hope your players have improved from last year.
You can hope they have developed an effective forward system.
You can hope they remember to keep contesting a live ball rather than keep to the scheduled rotation and running to the interchange.
You can hope their radars and voices work, and they don’t run into each other.
You can hope they are not 22 points down at halftime.
As Bruce Springsteen once sung, you’ve got “High Hopes”.
“Give me help, give me strength,
…
Give me love, give me peace”.
Help arrives with swarming pressure in the third quarter as Dylan Shiel starts to shine. And the margin drops to 10 points.
Give me strength when from the opening bounce of the last quarter Orazio runs into an open goal and sprays the ball wide.
Love emerges with the Bombers’ continued intent and effort to get back into the game.
But there was no peace despite two late goals to narrow the loss.
And to the Dons supporters booing their players as they trudged off the ground at the end of the game, hang onto your High Hopes, but remember your purchase of Hope when Donning the Sash came with a warranty for 22 games of commitment.
On Friday night get to the G, for the battle to avoid going zero and three!
ESSENDON 0.2 4.5 7.8 9.11 (65)
ST KILDA 2.7 7.9 8.12 10.16 (76)
GOALS
Essendon: Heppell 2, Baguley, Bellchambers, Myers, Brown, Smith, Stringer, McKernan
St Kilda: Membrey 2, Bruce 2, Gresham 2, Dunstan, Kent, Parker, Sinclair
BEST
Essendon: Stringer, McGrath, Hurley, Francis, Heppell
St Kilda: Gresham, Steele, Bruce, Ross, Sinclair, Newnes
INJURIES
Essendon: Nil
St Kilda: Nil
Reports: Nil
Umpires: Rosebury, Stephens, Hosking
Official crowd: 44,252 at Marvel Stadium
About Michael Symons
Followed Essendon down family lines since the days of Coleman. Music lover with a theory that most conversations have already been previously captured in song lyrics.
Yes, it was disappointing our supporters had to revert to booing to express their frustrations. Supporters can quickly forget the good times, things are cyclical, they go round, sometimes you’re up, sometimes down, Hopefully there will be an upturn starting with next week’s game and poor performances can be forgotten.
Just like that old Frank Sinatra song “High Hopes”, the Bombers must keep on butting that dam. Many people complain about “fickle supporters” but I have long believed “fickle players” should also take some of the blame. Be that as it may, it’s too early to write off the Dons – who knows what next week will bring. Meanwhile, those Melbourne fans must be tearing their hair out after that “DEESTRUCTION”. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT THAT?
You can’t write off anybody after this roller coaster season. I am hoping that Essendon’s poor form will continue, so people will hand in their tickets and I will get a ticket for ANZAC Day.
But they have the talent to make something of this season, after all if you are not rebuilding or contending, you should be getting a taste for finals or at least getting close. This is why the final 8 is so important. if you finish 5 to 8 you are testing yourself against the best. You can’t beat finals experience.
I have had hopes to rise the Saints up in 2015 to 2018, but we finished at the bottom four last year.
I understand your pain. But only I can say is hang in there.
This year I hope Saints are doing much better. Having Brett Ratten as the assistant coach is good and picking Matty Parker is great.
All the best
Yoshi