Opinion
Heeney didn’t mean to hit Saint high. It should still be graded intentional
Michael Gleeson
Sports columnistWhen a loss is an upset … and when it is not
There are upset losses that are not that upsetting. They are the losses that mean more to the winner than they hurt the loser.
Sydney had one against Fremantle in round 16. They lost by a point, but did they lose much more than the four points in the grand scheme of things? Not really, not unless they followed it up with another loss to St Kilda. Which they did. Now their loss that wasn’t that upsetting has been followed by another upset that makes the whole last week very upsetting. The excusable one-off loss has become an inexcusable trend that challenges the growing belief that it was Sydney and daylight in the flag race.
Double trouble: Josh Battle consoles Sydney’s Logan McDonald after St Kilda’s upset win.Credit: AFL Photos via Getty Images
And for the Saints, even more than the Dockers, there can be no copping the idea of their victory on Sunday being a result of the Swans being due for a loss. This was a win conjured by St Kilda, not a loss fumbled by Sydney. The Saints have deserved criticism for how they have played in many games this year. There is no criticism for Sunday. The style of game they played all day was watchable, attacking and gritty, Liam Henry was tremendous.
Carlton losing to the Giants was an upset, but not overly upsetting. At the start of the year you wouldn’t have said that, but the Giants had lost six of their last eight games and then the Blues got 39 points up and were humming.
But, unlike the Swans, they were probably due for a loss after winning five in a row. They will not be as upset by this result as the Giants will be encouraged by it. There was more to take out of it in victory than to despair in defeat.
Carlton will know the Giants were, and are, a very good team that had endured a bad month or so but were always likely to find form again. That they did so after being 39 points down to Carlton speaks more to the Giants and Adam Kingsley challenging them at quarter-time than the Blues. Yes, it’s unsettling to witness a 75-point turnaround within a game, but until that becomes a trend it can be contained as a quirk.
Blues ruckman Tom De Koning was beaten by his opponent on Saturday night.Credit: via Getty Images
As the Giants surged back to level terms in the second quarter, Blues defender Jacob Weitering spent a large period getting treatment for a corked leg. He was plainly not 100 per cent when he was brought back on, or he would have been moved onto Jesse Hogan, who finished the night with six contested marks inside-50 and five goals. Hogan might have done that on Weitering anyway, but it’s doubtful.
Carlton’s pressure fell away in the second term as they relaxed, feeling the game was in hand. This is like the result itself: upsetting, but not troubling until it becomes a trend. Effort is the biggest controllable in the game.
What will disconcert the Blues most was the thorough job Kieren Briggs did on Tom De Koning in the ruck. This was as astonishing a turnaround in one contest as the 75 points on the scoreboard for the match.
Only a fortnight ago De Koning was merciless against his younger brother. He pushed him around with imperious superiority of … an older brother. He was aggressive and unsparing, bullying his “little” brother and asserting the pecking order.
On Saturday night Tom De Koning started very well and was part of the impetus for the Blues’ dominant first term. But then he was given the big brother treatment by Briggs, whose muscular influence in the ruck from quarter-time was the most critical change in turning momentum in the game.
Briggs stepped into De Koning at centre bounces and ball-ups to deny him a jump at the ball, held him at arm’s length at other contests, put his body between De Koning and the ball at others and De Koning was bereft. Keeping De Koning out of the contest brought the Giants’ mids into the frame and helped keep the ball out of Patrick Cripps’ damaging hands.
At one boundary throw-in Briggs bumped De Koning sideways and so thoroughly physically dominated him that at one ball-up in the last quarter, De Koning stood back and got Patrick Cripps to take the ruck instead. Maybe a rolled ankle for De Koning was the reason for this decision, because it was a weird moment.
The Blues will be annoyed but not upset with the loss. They will be upset, however, if De Koning can’t find a way to overcome a tactic that all rucks with the strength and nous of Briggs will now apply to him.
Heeney Brownlow done
Sydney’s Isaac Heeney didn’t mean to hit St Kilda’s Jimmy Webster in the face when he flung his arm back on Sunday afternoon. But it should still be called intentional.
The rule change about high contact when pushing off and getting separation, which came in during the off-season, could not have been more explicitly written to address Heeney’s case.
There is no doubt Heeney swung his arm back to shake off Webster and get separation. There is no doubt he got Webster high after the Saints defender slipped and dropped a bit. But Heeney clearly got Webster in the face and drew blood.
The AFL rule says hits to the head in this instance should “usually” be graded as intentional rather than careless. And that should mean a two-match suspension and Heeney not needing to wear a black tie the Monday night before the grand final that he and his side should be playing in.
Even a careless determination would result in a one-match suspension if the impact is graded as high, but a grading of intentional, as the rule change says it should be, would make certain of a suspension.
Kangaroos turn roadkillers
The irony of Gold Coast losing to the Kangaroos in Melbourne is that normally the national emblem is the roadkill, not the perpetrator.
Yet again the Suns died on the road. But this loss should have had nothing to do with the venue. When you win inside-50s by the margin they did (62-46), you should win a game of football whether you are wearing the white shorts or not.
Suns coach Damien Hardwick was not happy after his side’s loss to North.Credit: Getty Images
Coach Damien Hardwick’s expletive-laden, exasperated post-match comments were driven by this very fact: no one wanted to own the responsibility to win. Save for Noah Anderson, whose fault was only in trying to do too much, no one was able to put the team on their back and own the moment.
One of the key forwards that had looks at 16 more inside-50 entries than the opposition was Jack Lukosius, who had Jackson Archer as his opponent. Lukosius is a No.2 draft pick who stands 195 centimetres tall and was playing his 111th game. Archer was playing his 16th game and stands eight centimetres shorter than Lukosius. In all ways, this should have been a mismatch.
Archer showed his dad Glenn’s ability to play taller than his height and stronger than his size, out-bodying and out-positioning the rangy Suns player. Archer beat him.
Lukosius is one of the most beautiful kicks of the football in the league. But against outsized Archer, he couldn’t get near a kick that mattered in a crucial match.
When Hardwick vented at his team after the game, and no doubt said to them what he did in the press conference – that they needed to grow the f--- up – he must surely have been looking directly at Lukosius.
Seriously, Jack. Six disposals, one goal and two marks for the game. Spare me the lack of opportunity argument, your team had 16 more inside-50s, you had plenty of opportunities in this game to do something and didn’t, while playing on a kid who showed more maturity and desire in just his 16th game.
Tigers’ first pick
The North win means that they have lifted from the bottom of the ladder. It means Richmond now sit last and if this ranking is to remain for the rest of the season the Tigers will have first pick in the national draft – four years after the third of their three flags in four years.
This is the system. Four years after their flag win in 2018, West Coast finished 17th. The next year, last year, they were bottom and got Harley Reid.
The only criticism or disappointment you would have if you were Richmond is that this drop-off didn’t happen last year when Reid was available. Recruiters agree there is no one quite of Reid’s calibre who stands out as the first pick in this year’s draft.
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