Effort there...skill not..where to from here?

[Con Gorozidis]

Many of those players were good enough to take us to consecutive GFs and only luck away from a flag, so I'm not sure our skills are as deplorable as were on show tonight.

IMO our problem is mostly between the ears and we need a string of confidence-building wins at Etihad to get a bit of momentum up.

That said, I'm all for bringing the kids through if they warrant selection.

I would have played Johnson or Walsh tonight, but Kosi came in. He actually did okay and was far from our worst.

The frustrating thing to me was the contrast between Geelong's quick and direct movement of the ball (often by foot) and our hesitant and uncertain efforts.

They really back their forwards to win one on one contests and, with the ball coming in quickly, often they do.


Anyway, the season isn't over and hopefully we can beat up a few teams at Etihad, get some mojo up, and get on a bit or a roll. I'd love to see us sneak into the finals and take a scalp or two, but that may be just a daydream.

People still think we are going to "flick a mental switch" and just go back to 09 game winning. It just doesnt work like that.

We need to look fwd and not be waiting for "those guys that got us to two gf's" to re-ignite the form of yesteryear. 09 is GONE.

[perfectionist]

...I don't think our skills have ever looked good.

Looked pretty good in 2004/05. That was easily the best kicking Saints team ever - but they never managed to get on the park at the same time. This would have been the premiership team for a couple of years.

Hudghton Penny Peckett
L Fisher Maguire Jones
Goddard Ball Dal Santo
Black Riewoldt Hamill
Milne Gehrig Harvey

Blake
Koschitzke
Hayes

Interchange
Baker
X Clarke
Powell
Thompson


Also on the list that year S Fisher, Montagna (both first year), Guerra, Gram, B Voss plus a couple more. Generally we played Knobel in the ruck, so he might have got a game too, but I would have left him out.

Of the starting 18, 14 could kick both sides, there was no real turn over merchant in the team with Max and Stephen Powell being the worst kicks but both could get distance and had the grunt factor. If you want to see what might have been, take a look at Round 1 2004 when we played Geelong with all their rising stars in too. Ten goal win.