AFL 2023 Preliminary Final Carlton vs Brisbane Post Game Prognostications

[kruddler]

Marchbank was one of our better players on the day.  I was surprised that Kemp was omitted and Cincotta stayed in the side but not at all surprised by Marchy's selection.  Cincotta's form had really tapered off towards the end of the season and Kemp could have done his job while providing some extra marking/spoiling grunt.

As i said, i am a fan of Marchbank, but i would've played Kemp who has simply played better up to this point.
Cincotta and kemp play a different role IMO.
Whereas Marchbank and Kemp play the same role.

The two ruck combination worked really well and made life difficult for McDonald, and Daniher and Hipwood when they rucked.  Pitto might be a bit of a plodder but the King provides plenty of run and energy around the ball.  Harry was good but Charlie was well off the boil and allowed Andrews to do as he liked.  It wasn't lack of run that cost us, it was our inability to clunk marks and/or bring the ball to ground, and to make Brisbane's defence accountable.

It made life difficult, sure, but did it really work well?

Team A  vs Team B
38 vs 33 Hitouts
14 vs 7 Hitouts to advantage
14 vs 18 Disposals
2 vs 4 marks
1 vs 2 contested marks
6 vs 6 clearances
11 vs 13 pressure acts
3 vs 1 shots at goal
2 vs 0 goals
280 vs 306 meters gained
3 vs 3 tackles
104 vs 90 fantasy points
106 vs 169 Minutes played

Pretty consistent yeah?
Team A = McInerney
Team B = Pittonet + De Koning

An extra hour of game time from our 2 blokes matched McInerney on his own. They were well beaten, especially if you wanna throw in Joe Danihers efforts as backup ruck.
Take one of our rucks out and put Jack Silvagni in, and those numbers look a lot different and more in our favour IMO.

Owies and Cuningham both lost form towards the end of the season and didn't deserve a place in the team.  Yes, in form they could have made a difference, but they were both under-performing in terms of possessions, tackling, applying pressure and hitting the scoreboard.

We were too banged up and fired all of our bullets in the first quarter; hopefully a learning experience for the coaches, players and fitness staff.

Some of them were underperforming sure.
What form did Boyd have?
Kennedy?
Hollands?
Not everyone will deliver every week, but you pick a TEAM. The team who got us there was broken up for the prelim, and it showed.

Nobody will ever know if we won or not with some of the changes i suggested, but i voiced my concern the night we won against Melbourne that we didn't need Harry in the side and that Marchbank should go out too.

Ultimately, Lions were too good on the run and spread and we couldn't go with them. Had we been smaller.....