On a night where North Melbourne celebrated 100 years in the V/AFL, there was an admirable effort against a much stronger Bulldogs outfit until class ultimately prevailed in a 49-point game.
With five changes – four forced, one managed – and a five-day break, the writing was on the wall early, and especially when the Bulldogs kicked two goals within minutes to start.
The line-by-line changes
Defence: O’Sullivan for McDonald
Midfield: Scott (wing) and Phillips (on-ball) for O’Sullivan (wing), Parker (on-ball) and Wardlaw (on-ball)
Forward: Maley, Harvey, and Duursma (also third winger), for Sheezel (midfield after Davies-Uniacke’s concussion), Darling and Fisher
But for most of the first half, the game was played largely how North wanted it. A couple of tweaks around the contests helped in that regard, until a familiar problem reared its head to stop North from really taking advantage.
Then as the game wore on, the difference in level between both sides gradually became more apparent. North had just 19 inside 50s after half time as their decision making in the back half fell away even further.
A 10-day break until North faces Melbourne at the MCG allows a chance to reset and reflect before one of the most winnable games left this year.
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A constant refrain from North’s clashes with the Bulldogs has been their struggle to stop the ball from getting outside, and the flow on effects from there.
To start the game, the tweak from North was to push an extra player up to stoppages and contests, giving them a numerical advantage around the ball. The Bulldogs opted to have their extra behind the ball, setting the main tactical battle for the evening.
If North were able to use their extra to take charge at contests, then they’d be able to control the tempo and potentially have a territory advantage. But if the Bulldogs could thwart it, they’d go forward to a handful of juicy matchups and allow their extra defender to help stop any sort of offensive threat from North.
By and large, the process worked, especially in the first quarter. North were able to keep the ball out of Bulldog hands more often than not, having more time in possession in conjunction with the time in dispute being higher than normal as well.
Put the two together – more numbers around the ball, North winning clearances 16-9 for the term – and it allowed a way to neutralise the effect of the Bulldogs’ extra behind the ball, simply because that (rotating) player was asked to cover more ground than ideal.
It’s why we saw Nick Larkey get plenty of space on his way to kicking four goals for the term, uncharacteristically taking a string of contested marks as well. Although a knee issue curtailed his effectiveness after quarter time, he seems to be emerging from the form slump of previous weeks.
If it all sounds cheerier than it should given the final margin, it’s because for all North’s good work early, they were too often undone by dreaded turnovers.
The story of the game quickly became North’s inability to get out of their own way when trying to exit the defensive half.
When a team concedes a goal, it usually falls into one of three buckets:
1) Self-inflicted errors
2) Forced errors
3) System breakdowns
So many of the Bulldogs’ goals came from North falling into bucket number one: again, and again, and again. Some of the back half turnovers were diabolical, with the focus here on those that largely came from decision making instead of skill errors.
Of the Bulldogs’ 134 points, 98 came from North turnovers. 68 came from North turnovers in their defensive half/the Bulldogs’ front half. It’s an astronomical number.
Most of them were completely avoidable. Sometimes a possession gets turned over because the defender makes a great play. When that happens, it’s a simple thing to move on from. But the turnovers in the back half at various stages from North will likely lead to lost sleep, because most of them just shouldn’t have happened.
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For those who have missed it, the last five North Melbourne pieces on The Shinboner, plus…
2025’s Team Structures Page
North Melbourne’s Round 16 analysis v Hawthorn
North Melbourne’s Round 15 analysis v Carlton
North Melbourne’s Round 14 analysis v Fremantle
North Melbourne’s Round 13 analysis v West Coast
North Melbourne at the mid-season bye
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Different players have different levels of freedom when they get the ball. For example, Colby McKercher has a mandate to take on more than Toby Pink, to illustrate the obvious.
Nevertheless, as a collective, there was a repeated lack of ability to recognise the situation and toggle between an attacking choice and a safe option to a slightly more conservative position on the ground.
In time the mix will – or should – improve, allowing North to switch between different modes of ball movement. At the moment it’s a bit all over the shop though. To the tape, reiterating none of this is meant to highlight individuals, but rather highlighting the collective issue of decision making:
As mentioned, McKercher rightfully has the licence to be aggressive in possession. When the balance is right, he’s ultra damaging. When it tilts from aggressive to reckless, that’s when issues arise.
For instance, this situation calls for the simple one out wide where Tristan Xerri is waiting, instead of the low percentage kick into the middle:
Caleb Daniel was another who didn’t get the balance right on the night, making wrong decisions and contributing to the turnovers in dangerous positions.
Although on first glance this passage of play likely stands out for a missed tackle later in the chain, none of it would have happened if Daniel took either of the two simpler options out wide instead of trying to squeeze a low percentage handball past Marcus Bontempelli.
General rule: when there are errors later in a possession chain – in this case, something like Hansen’s missed tackle – they’re often a symptom of something earlier on.
While Dawson had a superb game on Sam Darcy before the latter filled his boots in junk time, his kicking decisions largely boiled down to, ‘if I kick this ball hard enough, reckon I can burst the bladder?’
With less than a minute to go in the first half, Dawson won possession after a free kick in the back 50. Nearly every time this situation presents, a team looks to wind down and minimise risk, because the risk-reward ratio just isn’t there.
Instead, Dawson opted to play on quickly and attempt an aggressive kick. The wind up allowed Darcy to come off the mark and smother, putting possession in dispute. Even though Ed Richards went much harder than Powell to win it in a moment that drew the eye, the contest wouldn’t have happened in the first place if a better decision was made by Dawson.
These sorts of decisions – not necessarily skill errors, but decision errors – are largely what cruelled any chance of North sticking around. The Bulldogs kicked 7.6 purely based off North turnovers from rebound 50, such a specific number that shows the struggle.
And after all that, here’s the kicker to this section: in the bigger picture these turnovers aren’t necessarily a bad thing. In his post-match interview with Channel 7, Nick Larkey devoted plenty of focus on the need to move aggressively, which indicates it’s been a key area of discussion internally. There were definitely times when it clicked, and it was easy to see the early stages of what’s been worked on.
It’s just that to get to a point where the ball use is consistently threatening as part of the greater system, there are teething problems to work through first. After scaling the ball movement back a little over the last couple months to attempt defensive improvements, which we covered after the Carlton game, now there’s a want to integrate both things at once. Which is all part of a natural team evolution.
Oh, and also, if ever again, anyone wonders why Harry Sheezel plays half back from time to time, just show tape of the back half turnovers from this game.
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For those who have missed it, the last five Notebook entries on The Shinboner, plus…
2025’s Team Structures Page
Brisbane, Essendon, Geelong, GWS health checks: Round 16’s Notebook
Adelaide, Hawthorn, Melbourne, West Coast health checks: Round 15’s Notebook
Collingwood, Gold Coast, Richmond, Sydney health checks: Round 14’s Notebook
St Kilda and Fremantle’s health checks: Round 13’s Notebook
Carlton, Port, and Bulldogs health checks: Round 12’s Notebook
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The intangible in all this, that I’m unsure how you measure, is opponents knowing North’s team defence is currently inconsistent at best, and … much less than that when it’s worse. It gives a team confidence to keep going with their base method, believing – or knowing, depending on your level of optimism/pessimism – they’ll eventually emerge on the winning side.
In any sport, whether team or individual, the top of the class has an aura about it that almost discourages their opposition from the outset. It’s the opposite for North’s opponents, because they believe if they keep going, the results will come.
It’s impossible to say how much of an effect it has exactly. But it’s a clear influence. While the Bulldogs are already one of the better drilled offensive teams in the competition and always want to try and take the game on, if they were playing other sides they would have made a few first half tweaks to try and change the general flow. It’s happened on a couple of occasions this year already.
There’s no other way to stop this apart from putting together a solid stretch of football to make sides reevaluate what they’re coming up against. Because if North can eventually earn a reputation of solidity on both sides of the ball, in many ways they can arrive at games with part of their job already complete.
That topic is a year or two away at the very, very least though. Until then it’s a matter of getting the basics down pat.
A word on the 100th V/AFL anniversary milestones
New strategy: ‘Get a short-term sugar hit by bringing in a past club great to tell players they’re no good on national television.’
In all seriousness, it was a well-done pre-game ceremony. The late change to make the most of a Thursday night offer had its pros and cons in terms of reach and eyeballs, but in isolation the ceremony was great.
The extracurriculars around joint events celebrating past premierships would have actually been a fair discussion point if the well wasn’t poisoned by culture wars. Every group had a more than reasonable side to argue.
Unfortunately there’s no room for nuance anymore and it all became a cheap point scoring exercise. It’s the world we live in nowadays.
And on that uplifting note, until next time.