Agree on Goodes. We don't have enough class in the guts without him there.My own view is that this game was a wasted opportunity. I don't think st kilda are anywhere near as good as they were last season and we match up on them really well. LRT plays Kosi as well as he plays anyone - he is perhaps the slowest tall forward in the comp other than resting ruckmen. Grundy is reasonably well suited to Riewoldt and our midfield can blanket the saints because they aren't particularly quick.
We were better than st kilda in most aspects of the game other than our singular inability to actually defend 10-15 metres out from goal - the situations which led repeatedly to st kilda having a player get the ball with all of the swans otherwise lying on the ground around them were just killers. I am sure I am not the only one who panics when i see reg and LRT trying to handball to each other and I would prefer if reg is going to try to outmark riewoldt that he does that near the 50 instead of metres from goal.
I have said repeatedly (although only occasionally here) that moving goodes to the forward line will be two losses for us. I don't think he is anywhere near as good a forward as he is a midfielder and we desperately need someone who can break from packs with the ball. I am not saying he didn't play well but my view is that it is a mistake to put him in the forward line when other teams can then play a negating player on him and he can't use his general fitness as well as height to beat them.
I think the umpiring was absymal - but then i think that every week and it really wasn't the reason we lost.
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