At the halfway mark of the season Richmond are the biggest disappointment, but the Western Bulldogs can’t be that far behind.
The Tigers were expected to make the eight, many thought the top four, but with three wins and eight losses neither is going to happen.
The Bulldogs were not predicted to reach those lofty heights, but after winning four of their last six in 2013, they were expected to improve and maybe scrape into the eight.
Like Richmond, they also only have three victories, but have suffered three defeats by less than two goals, including last Saturday’s poor effort against the Brisbane Lions.
The Dogs are producing good patches and are competitive, but they are into the third year of this rebuild under Brendan McCartney and if there was genuine improvement and they were on an upward curve, they would have beaten the Lions, Essendon and Adelaide – all games they led for long periods.
Since taking over at the end of the 2011 season, McCartney has maintained his rebuild will take time, but there are signs they will become further worse before getting better.
Many of their better players, such as Robert Murphy, Daniel Giansiracusa and Matthew Boyd, are near the end of their careers and won’t be replaced straight away. Some of their youngsters look promising, such as Jack McCrae and Marcus Bottompelli, but they have too many inside young midfielders and lack outside run, which Brisbane exposed badly on the weekend.
They have always struggled to develop their own key position players and although the club says these players are inexperienced and take time, Jordan Roughead, Liam Jones and Jarad Grant have all played more than 50 games and, with the exception of Roughead, haven’t established themselves.
If you do a list and age profile of the Bulldogs, they are not as young overall as first thought.
In the team that lost to the Lions, six had played more than 150 games, eight over 100, and six between 50 and 100 – so less than half had played under 50. At times last year and in 2012 they had at least half a team or more who had yet to reach the 50-game milestone.
The defeat by Brisbane was the first time in 39 losses from 55 encounters I have seen much emotion from McCartney publicly.
Whether they win or lose, it’s always been about making them better people and helping the coaches. His coaching style has been like secondary school, with the former teacher breaking the game up into different parts.
He has started with contested ball, which they got an A for last year, but only a C this year. Becoming a better defensive unit has been next – a grade ranging between B and D. Then there’s scoring from forward 50 entries, playing with flair and polish and outside run – areas the club is failing in.
There doesn’t appear to be enough time given to these aspects. Like all clubs they have an abundance of assistant coaches and have increased the budget in their football development area, so there should be no excuses why some areas of their game are clearly better than others.
The lack of tall forwards doesn’t help the scoring, but the use of the ball inside their attacking 50 continues to be poor.
At the halfway mark of his coaching tenure, the honeymoon is over for Brendan McCartney and the clock has started ticking.
As he said in his press conference after the Brisbane loss, this is a winning business. The days of honourable losses are over!
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Last, year in the second showdown, Adelaide destroyed Port by 47 points with a staggering 20 marks inside 50 with Tex Walker the main star.
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Round 5 of the AFL provided plenty of action, from big scorelines to upset wins and pressure starting to build on some clubs and coaches already.
