Round 4 - West Coast v Hawthorn

Subiaco Oval - Saturday 21 April 2012

Raining points

When casting about for metaphors and pithy puns to describe football matches played in Perth, Melbourne based sub-editors often invoke the genre of great westerns with headings such as ‘How the West Was Won’ or ‘Wild Wild West’ to describe events. In TV coverage they play Morricone’s signature soundtrack to ‘The Good the Bad and the Ugly’ to underline the drama. The western is a film genre notable for gun battles between cowboys and Indians - or rival groups of cowboys - in which participants spend 90 minutes shooting wildly and indiscriminately at each other, and only occasioanlly hitting the target (as otherwise the plot comes to a sudden halt). As viewers of last night’s match between West Coast and Hawthorn will attest, never was this journalistic trope more appropriate, as both sides spent the evening shooting indiscriminately at goal but hitting the target at a rate only slightly better than one in every four attempts.

Critics of Australian football point out that it’s a game in which even when you miss you still score – but we don’t care what critics of Australian football say (what would they know?), and besides, in our game we like to acknowledge the effort, adopting the modern party ethic of every kid gets a prize. But looking at it mathematically, there are only two slots for goals and four slots for behinds: a ratio of one to two. As such you might forgive your team for kicking say 5 goals 10. Even using this generous measure, however, you have to wonder how the Eagles managed 5.21 and Hawthorn 5.16. Sure it had rained and was slippery, sure there was a lot of pressure, but players missed from everywhere: set-shots directly in front, on the run, grubber goals, round the corner kicks, off the ground, from tight to slight angles, close in or long distance. The ball simply would not go though.

West Coast had 12 behinds before they managed a goal, and they only got that because a Hawthorn player literally handed Josh Hill the ball in the goal square.  Likewise, of Hawthorn’s five goals, three came from miracle shots from deep in the pocket on the boundary, while the other two barely scraped through from 5-10 metres out. Honestly, you’d think the goal face was a narrow aperture in the space time continuum that appeared only fleetingly like a slim and wavering tear, just long enough for Dr Who to slip through in the Tardis, before quickly closing up. It was as if Lindsay Thomas was playing as a lone forward for both sides. The shooting for goal from both teams was like men aiming into a toilet bowl after 11pm at a party.  As Matthew (19:24) sayeth, quoting Jesus, “Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the Eagles and Hawks to slot one through the big sticks at Subi.”

Struck down by a sore throat and blocked nose, I was unable to make the trip to Perth. I took my position on the couch to let Chanel 7s chummy Saturday night crew relay the action to me. Sadly I missed their exclusive coverage of Hawthorn travelling across the continent. Speaking at the conclusion of the earlier Carlton Essendon game, Tom Harley promised that it would give viewers who don't normally get the chance to travel with a team ‘fascinating insights’. Not convinced of what sort of penetrative understanding I might gain from watching various people nod off with iPods in their ears, I watched ‘Before the Game’ instead, but tuned back into 7 for the match.

The commentary team were quick to highlight West Coast’s imposing record at Subiaco – where they haven’t lost since before the mining boom – and invoke the ‘House of Pain’ nomenclature for the stadium, making it sound like some sort of S&M dungeon. And indeed, footy fetishists would have found the analogy apt with tight, in-close action, hard bodies, lots of in-and-under, big fists, moist surfaces and behinds being kicked. The only problem was working out who the dominatrix was. (In the past it was always Dermie).

Rain started to fall as the match commenced and Brian Taylor kept insisting that it would have no impact on the game, even as payers slipped over, fumbled the wet ball, kicked on the full and missed every attempt at goal. But no; no impact apparently. No goals in the first quarter and only the Hawks registered any in the second, a round the corner kick from Osborne and the now trademark Lewis goal from 30 out tight on the left hand boundary.

Our boys were playing ok but there was too much possession, dinky little handballs and turnings back into traffic that resulted in turnovers. Without Birchall we struggled to know what to do with the ball coming out of defence. We lacked poise going forward and many of our disposals were just that, ‘disposing’ of the ball in a hurry rather than passing it to someone in a better position. Still, our supposed weak link, the back line, were playing well. The Eagles were goal less at half time, and while some of this was due to the conditions, part of it was also the pressure of the defenders. Schoenmakers even won a one-on-two contest saving a certain goal – though goals were anything but certain on the night.

Keeping the Eagles goal less for the first half brought some degree of satisfaction, but it was tinged with the dreaded certainty that there’d be a rush of goals at some point and a squall of noise from the parochial home crowd. Two came quickly, but then after Scott Selwood was given a free in front after a trademark Selwood dive (when are the umpires going to recognise this? Even Italian soccer players are subtle by comparison) the Hawks closed it up again. We even began to dominate – Buddy had a few shots, and even got one from the goal square, and then Shiels missed, Suckling missed and Buddy missed again.

With the free kick count at 21 to 12 in the Eagles favour, the home crowd continued to moan at the occasional morsel the umpires threw Hawthorn’s way, overlooking that Kennedy was paid a mark that Gibson had actually held – not just touched – during the contest. Then Sewell missed a set shot on the siren.

It was still Hawthorn narrowly at ¾ time when Jaimee Rogers’ from tabSportsbet teased us with her big teeth and chirpy exhortations to ‘get on’.

When Buddy missed again early in the final quarter I feared the worst. It soon came with string of Eagles goals seemingly sewing up the match. Brad Hill came on as our sub for his first match, and we’ll try not to hold it against him that his first touch was intercepted to set up the Eagles’ match winning goal. It all looked hopeless, until Cyril teased us first with a stunning dribbled goal from the boundary, and then a mark and goal from in front. Suddenly we were within a goal and Matt Suckling was storming forward with the ball...

This is where watching the match on TV is problematic. I’ll never know why he chose to put it out in front of Cyril in the pocket instead of trying to KICK THE FUCKING GOAL!  We know Cyril made as good a fist of it as was possible, just missing from the boundary, but equally, we know Suckling can easily kick the ball 50 metres, so why didn’t he try?

In the end, the Eagles kicked more behinds to get in front. So that’s our second loss of the season, both by less than a goal. And in both we had numerous chances to win. To say it’s disa–point –ing is to labour the point.  Hawthorn fans don’t need to visit adult houses of domination to enjoy a dose of discipline; we just tune in to any match against decent opposition and flagellate ourselves watching fluffed chances.

When the fixture for 2012 was released I thought a return of 2-2 after four rounds was realistic, but now that it’s occurred I’m less reconciled to it, especially as we could so easily be 4-0. And next week, for the third week running, we play an unbeaten side in Sydney. Not easy.  

Final scores: West Coast 5  21  51  d  Hawthorn 5  16  46

Buddy goal tally - 1 = 11 total

What we loved: Cyril's final quarter goals and the work of the backline: Goo, Gibbo, Schoenmakers, Suckling and Stratton.

What we want to know: What's up with Hodgey? the Poo? Birch? And what's with that jumper - it puts at risk our reputation as fashion leaders in footy.