Last week, Jack Gunston’s second best-ever toe-poke on the MCG won Hawthorn the game. Sort of. There is an argument Ned Reeves did more with his long-armed caress of the ball to Jai Newcombe at the last Easter Monday ball-up than Gunston did.
Looking for where improvement would come at Hawthorn this year, it was logical to assess what they were missing – Will Day at length and Zach Merrett at all – than what they had actually added.
Reeves has made them significantly better. Just as the first-ruck rule almost killed his career and ignited Lloyd Meek’s, this year’s rule change has resurrected Reeves and delivered Hawthorn an advantage that is not coincidental to the fact they are equal top of the ladder.
Reeves has a leap and soft hands to tap the ball. Meek is now the robust yang to the willowy Reeves’ yin.
Hawthorn have improved their midfield – without adding midfielders.
After five rounds they have had more hitouts to the advantage of their midfielders than any team.
They are the top-ranked side for giving their mids the chance to get the first use of the ball, which has helped them become the third-ranked side for getting the ball first.
Reeves wins almost two thirds (62.4 per cent) of the ball-ups he contests, which is more than any ruckman in the competition.
Of course, his ascendancy was magnified on Saturday night because Tim English was out for the Western Bulldogs and raw 19-year-old Louis Emmett was thrown in to make his debut. But Reeves had already helped establish a new edge for the Hawks.
This is a player who was doubtful to stay at Hawthorn six months ago after playing just one game last year and four the year before.
Greg Swann’s rule change saved Reeves’ career and delivered the Hawks a material tactical advantage on the competition at a time they wondered where the improvement would come from, to bridge the gap on the top four.
Scott’s reverse psychology
Essendon coach Brad Scott grabbed Isaac Kako before the game on Saturday and gave him some advice that, even to the player, sounded odd coming from his coach at first blush.
“‘Scotty’ told me before the game, ‘if you do not get caught you are not trying hard enough’. And I got caught by Kozzie [Pickett],” Kako said in the rooms with a laugh after his team’s win over Melbourne.
That Kako looked at Pickett, one of the quickest players in the game, and had the courage to at least try to get away from him was instructive of the change in Essendon’s mindset.
“I was like, ‘maybe I can shrug him here’,” he said. Which again, is probably not the risk many players should be encouraged to take against Pickett.
“Scotty tells me to take the game on, and he has heaps of belief on me, so I am really thankful for that,” he added.
“I was trying to challenge them [Melbourne] a bit more to get up and [hope I could] beat them on the way back. My role has changed a bit over the last few weeks, but today they told me, ‘this is your role today, stick to it and see what happens. Take them on.’
“If I am going to get run down by anyone, it can be Kozzie Pickett. But he got to the other end straight away and kicked a goal, and I was like ‘f—’. He is a super player.”
Not many coaches would urge their players to get tackled, but Kako needed to be told. He does not immediately present as a player lacking in confidence – his haircut suggests there’s a fair swagger about him – but after a doubtful first season, Kako needed to hear it.
At the start of the season, Kako and Nate Caddy were pushed to ignore their age and experience and become leaders of the Bombers’ forward line.
Saturday, in the win over Melbourne, was the day it connected. Peter Wright was playing ruck, Kyle Langford in defence and the younger players did take ownership.
Scott might have downplayed the significance of his team breaking its losing streak, but it was clear in the rooms after Saturday’s game what relief that victory delivered. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about.
A week earlier, the narrative after Essendon’s 17th straight loss was mostly about Zach Merrett’s wife and her TikTok post about preferring dinner at Gimlet over a night at the football and what that implied about the couple’s continued fractiousness with the club. But the contrast could not have been more stark this week when Merrett snapped a magnificent left-foot goal and jumped into teammates’ arms.
As media, we second-guess players’ thinking and plans and draw conclusions like bows, but the joy looked real, the affection for teammates unalloyed.
Pause for thought
Three players stood at the boundary on Friday night and looked over the ball as it teetered on the boundary line, waiting to see if it would go out. No one was prepared to lay a hand on it. Eventually the ball helped them out and did as it was browbeaten to do, and rolled over the line.
For every rule change that tells players they must keep the ball in play, there is no rule (yet) telling them that if the ball is near them, they are required to touch it.
Despite the AFL’s best intentions, an unexpected consequence of the league’s change to a last-disposal out of bounds rule has been that players are presently too uncertain, in particular circumstances, to touch a ball bobbling towards the boundary, lest they be penalised.
Largely, the new rule has been well received, but it has also created moments where it seems players do not want to get the ball, and that is inconsistent with the ethos of the game.
It also feels illogical when the game is held up for a video triple-check to see if the ball skimmed a toe in congestion before it tumbled out of bounds, so that a rule that was introduced to speed the game up and keep the ball in play can be applied.
Carlton defender Nick Haynes copped an especially harsh free kick on Thursday night for taking possession at the boundary line, rather than knocking the ball back in, which would have been to his team’s disadvantage.
And seeing two players stop and stand, too scared to move out of the five-metre protected zone because they didn’t know which one of them the umpire wanted to stand – as occurred on Friday night – also seemed like a moment where the cure was worse than the sickness.
A relaxation of the stand rule will inevitably come, as it does with many 50-metre penalty crackdowns. Two years ago, 50m penalties were given out by the dozen for dissent. Now players are flapping their arms again in dismay without penalty.
Previously, players who touched an opponent at all after they had taken a mark were given a 50m penalty. Those who did not throw the ball straight to an opponent who had been awarded a free kick and lobbed it in the air, also conceded 50m.
Eventually, the overcorrections are corrected. This one will be too.
Game of throws
These are matters of rules, not umpires, but while we are discussing officiating: the Crow throws were also back on Thursday night. Josh Rachele’s rugby throw was far from the only one, but it was the most glaring. He didn’t even try to disguise the fact he was tossing the ball around like he was at Twickenham.
And, not to rain on Essendon’s parade at all, but how Xavier Duursma could take six steps, be tackled in the goal square, throw the ball out and not be done for holding while his teammate toed through a goal remains as perplexing as North Melbourne choosing to wear some sort of black-and-blue Qantas ad for their jumper.
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Michael Gleeson is an award-winning senior sports writer specialising in AFL and athletics.Connect via X or email.
