Essendon v. Hawthorn

It has been an unusual start to the 2015 AFL season for Essendon. The 34 current and former players who were serving provisional suspensions after being given infraction notices by ASADA last November over the 2012 supplements program were finally cleared by the AFL Anti-Doping Tribunal just days before the start of Round 1. While this meant our 13 current players could finally play in the team, they hadn't had any match preparation until our first game last week against Sydney. Although we started strong and had a 41 point lead into the third quarter against the Grand Finalists, we ended up fading in the fourth quarter and got overrun, losing to Sydney by 12 points.

For today's Round 2 match we faced the reigning Premiers Hawthorn. No one really had any hope that we could win, especially after Hawthorn's emphatic win over Geelong last week. I joined Tash and her mum and sister at the MCG, seated behind the Hawthorn goals for the game. Amazingly Essendon had another fantastic start and we were up by 22 points at half time (which should have been more but we allowed two late goals before the siren). In the third quarter Hawthorn started to come back, and we went into the fourth quarter with an 8 point lead and a sense of deja vu from last week.

Hawthorn kept coming and eventually went in front by 16 points midway through the fourth quarter. Although it looked like the game was over, the Essendon players did not give up and they cut Hawthorn's lead down to 10 points with 2 minutes left to play. We then somehow managed to kick two goals in a little over a minute, with defender Cale Hooker's goal putting Essendon back in front by 2 points with 57 seconds left on the clock. The ball was back in Hawthorn's 50 as time ran down, and they would have won the game had the siren not sounded a couple seconds before Luke Breust kicked the ball through the goal. The Essendon supporters erupted as we somehow managed to beat the best team in the competition, while the Hawthorn fans were in shock that they lost the game. As the Essendon club song played over the loud speakers former coach Kevin Sheedy walked around the boundary waving his scarf over his head and the crowd joined in.  It was a great moment and a fantastic win for the club.

Final Score
Essendon: 12.6 (78)
Hawthorn: 11.10 (76)

Essendon v. Hawthorn

Michelle and I joined Tash and her family and friends at the MCG this afternoon for the rematch between Essendon and Hawthorn. Just like last time we lost the game- this time by 63 points. It was a horrible and disappointing game full of errors and lackluster play by the Bombers. Our hopes of making the finals are pretty much shot and now all that's left in the season is to send off coach Kevin Sheedy and James Hird with some sense of dignity.

Final Score
Essendon: 7.14 (56)
Hawthorn: 17.17 (119)

Essendon v. Hawthorn

Michelle and I headed to the MCG for our first Essendon footy match of the season. We met up with Tash, her mom, sister Jessie and her boyfriend Heath, who are all big Hawthorn supporters. Thankfully the rain we experienced on our way to the MCG stopped an hour before the game began- although we would have been fine either way since we had seats undercover. The game started out well for Essendon and we had the lead at first quarter time. However, just like last week's game against Collingwood, we lost our lead and got soundly beaten by the Hawks. Lance "Buddy" Franklin kicked 9 goals for Hawthorn, which is just inexcusable. I don't know what has happened to the Bombers in the last few weeks, but they are playing like they did last year which is not a good thing. Hopefully they can turn it around and cut down on all the mistakes otherwise it will be a long season.

Final Score
Essendon: 15.6 (96)
Hawthorn: 20.11 (131)

Essendon vs. Hawthorn

Tonight's Essendon game was a tribute to James Hird, so Michelle and I headed to the Telstra Dome for this week's match against Hawthorn. I was hopeful that last week's win against Collingwood meant that Essendon were finally back on track and getting it together (it's been a bad season). However, the first half was a total nightmare, and Hawthorn dominated every aspect of the game. Their lead at halftime was 61 points!

Thankfully the second half was a bit better. Essendon finally found some defense and offence, although we had a lot of shots at goal that were behinds (1 point) instead of goals (6 points). It was a frustrating match, and if we had made more goals we could have won. However, even though we got close in the last quarter, we ended up losing by 18 points. It wasn't the best way to celebrate James Hird's career, but Hawthorn deserved the win.

Final Score:
Essendon- 15.16 (106)
Hawthorn- 19.10 (124)