The question, for mine, is how often not being able to put a score on the board efficiently has hurt us in terms of wins and losses?
So, let’s start with the four losses (ie, not counting Port)
In our losses to Richmond and West Coast really what cost us the game was letting the other team pump us in the first quarter. We scored 70 and 80 points in those losses, effectively in three quarters of play. That’s a reasonable rate of scoring. You could argue being able to score more quickly might have helped us claw back those games, but we just didn’t have the ball for the whole first quarter. That has nothing to do with scoring.
Hawks smashed us in every department. That had very little to do with our scoring efficiency.
North was the one game where not hitting the scoreboard hurt us in the end. But that’s really one game out of 22. Mayne slots one from 15m out, we win that game.
Over the last few years we’ve really struggled to score without Ballas. I can’t pin down the how / why, but he is really important to our scoring output. We also had a lot of rainy games this season. I reckon that has really hurt our ‘raw’ data. Also, our rebound scoring took a nosedive with Johnno out. He’s the only one in the backline who can aggressively pick out a bloke coming out of defence.
Perhaps I’m overly optimistic, but I saw some really great signs on Saturday. Ballas and Walters look in great nick. Mayne has started holding some marks, and looks busy. Pav had some trouble with the ball in flight on a windy day, but he moved well, and his hands with the bouncing ball were excellent.
Our midfield didn’t really hit the scoreboard against the Swans, but that’s the way they set up. Against teams that run hard forward, our mids will do some damage going the other way (especially with Johnno to get the ball rolling).
We’ll score enough if we’re good enough.
