I don't believe it's 'revisionist spendor' to say games were more enjoyable under Harvs opposed to RL. There were bad times under Harvs but the overwhelming style of play was positive and attacking, where players were able to run free and show off their skills more. It was exciting and fun to watch even when the result didn't go our way though most of the time it did despite a very young side combined with some superstars.
Every Freo supporter had high hopes watching what we were capable of and knowing the improvement in almost every player. The end of 2010 had many injuries and a number of sore players continuing on through the pain as can be seen in Pav's book. They managed to ruin our 2011 despite our exciting finals campaign the previous year and resulted in Harv's sacking as we were never able to get everyone back or allow them enough time to heal properly (or we wouldn't have 22 on the field).
Even through that injury filled year I enjoyed the football despite it not being high scoring in our favour because the players were still able to go out and show off their talent even though it was not up to par with a lot of younger and inexperienced players cast into the coalface. That was the standard under Harvey and not playing that style of football was the exception. Under RL that free flowing football was the exception, not the norm.
It's the first time I've heard the argument/idea Harvs copied RL's tactics from St Kilda or anyone else for that matter. I don't think too many commentators or journalists equated St Kilda with the invention of high pressure football let alone using it too much, they were more inclined to guard space. In 2009/10 Harvs oversaw a number of attacking young players introduction to the side like Ballas, Mayne, Fyfe, Morabito, Palmer, Suban, Deboer, Walters and even SCOS who loved to tackle and approach their opponent with the ball. They shut down their opponents quickly and pressured the disposal forcing each possession to come under more and more pressure.
Harvs embraced these qualities and the whole squad applied the same attitude. It worked well and most journalists were speaking of the tactic as original and new, something specific to Freo's style of play at the time.
