Both teams were playing this game for pride. Fremantle because they have nothing else left to play for this season, and Essendon in order to prove that the win that Fremantle stole in Round 4 at Waverley was just a fluke.
Right from the start Fremantle showed that they had learned a lot from last week's game, where they stole a four goal lead, and wound up losing. This week they decided to give their opponents the head start. Essendon started out on fire, winning the ball out of the centre square easily, and delivering to Hird, and others, in an open forward line. Hird was clearly stamping his authority on the game, and diving Clement the run around. Fremantle went in five goals down, despite a few promising forward moves of their own.
The second quarter didn't start out all that much better. By this stage Shane had taken over the job on Hird, effectively ending any impact that The Golden Boy had on the match. Whether that was due to Shane, or just because Jimmy gets a bit tired after a quarter of footy was a bit hard to tell. Despite that, Essendon were able to score the first two goals of the quarter, before Fremantle started to fight back. They put on a couple, which prompted Sheeds to move The Golden Boy into the centre. That left Shane free on half back, so he was able to run through the centre in traditional Freo style, scoring one himself, and setting up the debut kid, Walker, for another. By half time Fremantle were only 14 points down, and very much back in the game.
Both teams had opportunities in the third quarter, but Essendon made more of theirs. O'Reilly, having a go at Centre half forward starred in this quarter, taking plenty of strong grabs. Unfortunately his kicking for goals showed exactly why he is a full back. He managed about 3 points for the quarter. At the other end, the whole Essendon forward line was piling on the goals, and they had stretched out to a 6 goal lead by three quarter time.
The final quarter was simply a case of maintaining the status quo. Fremantle kept trying to attack. O'Reilly kept marking. O'Reilly kept missing, until it was too late to make any difference, when he finally slotted one through. He finished with 1.6 for the match, including two shots which hit the post. All in all, he showed a lot of potential in the forward line, but there won't be too many situations where Fremantle can afford to move him out of defense.
Final Score : Fremantle 12.12-84 lost to Essendon 18.11-119
timnfromoz
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