Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin reviews his team’s 46-point loss to the Crows at TIO Stadium on Saturday.
On what Adelaide did well…
“I thought they were very good around the contest for most of the night. They were desperate (at the ball). There were things about our game that we liked... I think in the first quarter we had 19 inside 50ms to 14, but we only kicked the one goal and they kicked seven. So clearly, they were a lot more efficient going forward. I thought they executed the fundamentals a lot better than us tonight and that’s probably why they’re top of the ladder.”
On the impact of Melbourne’s forward line...
“It’s a work in progress. It’s got nothing to do with Jessie (Hogan), it’s just our method of play going inside 50. We generated more (of the) footy in our forward half which was pleasing, it’s the first time in a little while, but we just weren’t executing once going inside 50. We’ll look at that on the tape, assess it and look at our method of play going inside - but clearly the Crows were a lot better at that than we were.”
On their strong third quarter…
“We had some opportunities to close the gap in that third quarter, but to the Crows' credit they were very good around the footy. I thought they were more desperate than us and certainly more efficient than us. We had some opportunities to work our way back into the game, but we didn’t take them… we weren’t good enough to get back into that position.”
On Melbourne’s growing injury list…
“We’ve had a fair few (injuries). It would be nice to have less, but that’s footy. Every club goes though that cycle at some point. We’re going through that now with injuries and we’ve got (a few) personnel out, but we had some positives tonight with some young kids playing. I think we had 11 guys with under 50 games who we saw some real improvement in. So, where there are injuries, there’s opportunity. I thought our younger guys continued to develop and evolve, we just played a very good footy team tonight.
“We’ve got a few guys coming back into the mix, which is fantastic, but we’re more concerned with what we can control right now and that’s the level of how we play.”
On Bernie Vince’s tag on Rory Sloane…
“He was really good tonight, Bern’. His job on Rory (Sloane) was terrific. I think they had a lot of midfielders step up and replace Rory, and that’s probably down to the development of the Crows... They’ve got some really good midfielders and they probably beat us in that area tonight.”
