AFL Football Round 1 – Doggies Do It for “Johnno” and the Demons Awful!
Who said milestone games are finished and don’t mean much? Somebody forgot to tell the Western Bulldogs in their Round 1 clash against the Adelaide Crows. It sure was a fantasy come true for Bulldog 300 gamer Brad Johnson as the Doggies got the biscuits by 3 points. Johnson kicked the last 3 goals to win the game and is something every little kid dreams of growing up aspiring to play AFL Football.
Johnson ended the game with 5 goals all of them coming in the second half. One can only imagine the emotional speech by best mate and former teammate Rohan Smith before the game and there is no doubt it had an impact on the playing group. Scott Welsh was eager to impress and showed the Bulldogs may have found a good avenue to goal with 4 goals against his former club. Jason Akermanis was very good after a slow start and lifted when it counted and was the standout skill wide in a game that was packed full of errors, as was Scott West playing his 321st game. I have spoken about Adam Cooney of late and how he needs to step up a bit more and learn how to break the hard tags he is receiving and he certainly did just that and was great for the entire game.
The Crows battled hard and their tackling display was great and forced the Bulldogs to make a lot of skill errors, but would have been extremely disappointed with the result after their great NAB Cup campaign. Their new onball brigade was OK and the best for me were Brent Reilly and Jason Porplyzia. Porplyzia continues to impress with every game he plays and is turning into one of the better mid fielders in the competition. Simon Goodwin and Tyson Edwards largely stayed forward but Goodwin didn’t have an impact on the scoreboard which hurt the Crows. Brett Burton was the pick of the forwards with 5 goals.
Melbourne Are In For A Very Very Long Year
Melbourne STINK!!. Melbourne supporters better brace themselves for a very long year and it will be interesting to see how the members and supporters react to their teams performance. Will they get behind them or disappear into the wilderness?. 104 points was the end margin and a 
shocking start to the year or new coach Dean Bailey. The Demons pressure on the opposition was no where to be seen and Bailey himself said “We allowed Hawthorn to play a free-running, open, uncontested game and we actually contributed to that,”.
This all happened with the Hawks missing Luke Hodge, Shane Crawford, Jordan Lewis and Campbell Brown and Mark Williams who was a late withdrawal. The Hawks put in an awesome display lead by “Buddy” with 6 goals. What was very impressive from the Hawks point of view was the pressure they continued to put on the Demons even when the game was won and it showed that they are hungry for success in 2008. The Hawks forward line is in fantastic shape with Franklin, Tim Boyle and Jarryd Roughead all looking dangerous and with recruit Stuart Dew chipping in with 2 goals and showing that his ability to hit targets by foot the forwards will be rubbing their hands together. What I would think to be the worst thing for the Demons was the fact that none of their leaders really gave a yelp and there is certainly worrying times ahead for the Demons in their 150th year.
Next Up, The Bombers Tackle the Kangaroos – don’t miss this one SUBSCRIBE to my RSS Feed to keep updated.
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