Brisbane Lions. Strengths: Playing football. The quality of progeny. Academy products. Procuring public money.
Weaknesses: closing the blinds. Using a whiteboard cleaner. Admitting fault.
Oh mercy, someone else wronged us. A member of the public no less, wandering around the Lions facility like he owned it, taking an interesting picture of something visible to the public and sharing it.
What were they thinking sharing that? I mean a scout from another team might walk into the facility every week tagging along with Auskick kids, but that’s just footy’s dark arts. But the public? What were they doing in there? Do they think they own the joint?
Well, yes. The federal, state and local governments contributed $33 million of the $81.2 million of the Springfield development of Brisbane’s sprawling home base. It was apparently an investment in the complex as a community facility, as well as the Lions’ home.
So when someone, a member of the tax-paying public that paid for nearly half the place you work, walks around the “community facility” and sees something interesting they photograph it. Don’t blame them, you left it there. Your people wrote it. Pull the blinds, turn the whiteboard around, wipe it off if it is that sensitive.
But in truth, it wasn’t. It was embarrassing, especially the stuff about Jaxon Prior, but there were no state secrets. Little of what was written on the whiteboard could not have been written by the Essendon players and coaches themselves. Or by the fans of either team, and certainly scrawled out in five minutes by an opposition scout. It is not as though the players don’t have exposed form. Other people watch the footy too.
The interesting thing about the whiteboard is how neatly it correlated with general shorthand observations about their players. There was not one surprising football observation there.
Ok, maybe the joke about Prior’s girlfriend being his greatest strength was a surprise. We assume it was a joke from Brisbane though interestingly, it was the only strength his former coaches and teammates could come up with about him, yet they managed to remember a couple of weaknesses.
The list of observations about the rest of his teammates? Tick. Tick. Yes, tick again. You missed a couple there. Selfish? Yep, tick. Tick.
A second whiteboard might have been handy for Chris Fagan if the Lions wanted to get really serious about listing weaknesses in any of their opponents.
The whiteboard for Carlton
The Lions whiteboard – no doubt now hidden in a windowless room – might not be needed this week. Just turn up at half-time, Carlton will be waiting to start packing up for home.
As was quickly pointed out on social media, this week’s whiteboard message should be fairly simple and brief. Carlton. Strengths: first halves. Weaknesses: second halves.
But if they want to open their shoulders and get expansive about the team it could run to:
Strengths: terrific on our terms. Front running. Celebrations. Offensive running.
Weaknesses: Handballing, kicking, marking, tackling when things aren’t on their terms. Defensive running. Insularity. Leadership. Speed. Depth of talent and class.
In fact, just print out the transcript of Michael Voss’s press conference from Saturday night and paste that on the whiteboard. He was as unsparing as anyone: Lack fight. Not defensively strong. Easy to play against. Don’t tackle. Lack workrate. Don’t dig in. And that was from the coach.
St Kilda on Saturday night was another perfect illustration of the Carlton year to date. They promise so much only to be thoroughly dismantled in 15-minute bursts that both teams know is coming. When the burst inevitably comes the Carlton players lose all appetite for competing and chasing. The idea of team-first becomes something other teams do.
Blues fans began the night heartily booing Jack Silvagni and Tom De Koning, but many will have finished the night sympathising with their decisions to leave (OK to be fair many sympathised with them beforehand given the size of the Saints’ chequebook).
But if they wanted to get a more granular snapshot of the Blues key players? Get out your white board marker.
Patrick Cripps. Strengths: was recently a very good player, won two Brownlows, might rediscover how to play that way again. Tall, strong, gets the ball.
Weaknesses: gets the ball. Speed. Ability to cover the ground, goal kicking, field kicking. Overhead marking, defensive running …
Sam Walsh. Strengths: Speed, class. Weaknesses: question the hurt to the opposition with disposals at times. Often injured. Defensiveness. Lack of support.
Adam Cerra. Strengths: gets the ball. Weaknesses: speed, defensive running, disposal.
Harry McKay. Strengths: good hands, has won a Coleman Medal. Weaknesses: Charlie Curnow is not there any more, prone to the yips, can run under the ball trying to mark, confidence, physicality and assertiveness.
Jacob Weitering. Strengths: tall, strong, can be good in the air. All-Australian two years ago. Weaknesses: can become insular and worry only about own man under heat. Leadership when challenged. Physicality. Presence. Intercept marking falls away. Forgets team first under pressure.
Marc Pittonet. Strengths: cheaper than TDK. Aggressive. Value for money. Weaknesses: Isn’t TDK. The midfield he’s palming to.
Jagga Smith: Strengths: Speed, light feet, agility, skill. Weaknesses: teammates.
It doesn’t need an Auskick dad to take a picture through the window of the Lions rooms to get a handle on what they will be thinking. This is on the whiteboard of every club. Other people watch the footy too.
Richmond snarl
The Tigers when they were fairly recently very good, won nearly every week. But it is doubtful they had a better win than this.
They had more consequential wins obviously, but in terms of grit this was significant. It won’t be a watershed because more losses are coming, but in terms of wins to create hope and belief in direction this was that.
Adem Yze thought it was the best of his coaching period at Richmond. Gerard Healy enthused it was one of the Tigers’ greatest ever wins. In the moment it felt like it.
Winless for the year, playing on the other side of the country in a difficult venue for opposition teams, already with 17 men (or boy-men as many of their post-pubescents still are) injured and lose an 18th in Dion Prestia early in the match. That is an entire team of players unavailable to play.
More immediately it meant that in a depleted team they played the game one short.
Who was out there was more important this night than who wasn’t.
Noah Balta, a maddening tease of a player, had one of those games that makes him so frustrating because you remember he can be this good. When he is like that, when he is so dominant, it makes his more regular down games so much less understandable. He was very good playing a forward ruck role on Saturday night. The temptation is to wonder if that is his position, but he has had games like this before in the role but then drifted away or been more urgently needed behind the ball.
Jonty Faull with three goals had his best game as a Tiger. Tom Brown off halfback has been threatening a game like this – 10 marks, 500 metres gained. Sam Cumming delivered the sort of game that will settle some nerves about the quality of the kids that form part of Richmond’s rebuild. The pick 7 with half a dozen tackles and 23 touches was in the game the whole match in the middle. Jack Ross has been good all year and this was no different.
Seth Campbell has had good games before and kicked match winning goals (which is significant for the number of wins he’s played in his short career) and enthusiastic goal celebrator. But he hasn’t played a game as good as this. Three goals, another couple he could have had, five tackles, he was wonderful.
What does it all mean? Daylight does not gap Richmond and the bottom of the ladder bracket of teams. It means West Coast get quickly ahead of themselves.
It means the Tigers have learned either from Yze or the legacy premiership players or both the spirit that drove that team and that drives the club. Easy to say after a win and not after one of the many big losses they have had, but there was something about a win like this against the odds against a list-rebuild peer that spoke to more than winning a game.
Showdown showcase
The interest in the Showdown doesn’t stop at Edenhope. This was among the best couple of games of the year. But the fact is it is often one of the matches of the year because it has what the AFL crave — a game where the spite isn’t manufactured (think Q-Clash, Battle of the Bridge), where the event transcends the match.
This is a match that could and should have been a standalone match. Thursday night would have worked.
Michael Gleeson is an award-winning senior sports writer specialising in AFL and athletics.Connect via X or email.