1998 Premiership Season

Goals: Carey 4, Harvey, Sholl, M.Stevens 2, Welsh, Grant, Bell

North Melbourne went down to Geelong today in one of the worst performances I have ever seen them put in, its amazing we managed to stay so close to Geelong really, we can thank Wayne Carey for that who was once again a tower of strength at centre half forward while the rest of the team fell to pieces around him.

Without Martyn (who as suspected didn't take his place) and Pike North used Longmire and Sholl in key defensive positions, Just as Longmire was starting to show some form at Full Forward he had to go back to being a stop gap player again. North started as they were to finish pathetic, they gave the Cats chance after chance as the backmen kept making clearance errors. Geelong though did their best to keep North in the game missing countless opportunities to open the scoring. They got one eventually though through Colbert at the 15 min mark of the term. North were breaking down badly across half forward Carey was being triple teamed and Geelong were able to effortlessly run the ball out of defence. Peter Bell got North's first goal of the game after laying a super tackle on the wing and winning a 50 metre penalty. He popped though the goal from 35 meters out. Derek Hall got a lucky bounce to add Geelongs second a few minutes later.

Gary Hocking who without fail destroys us on every occasion was looking dangerous again early. North was to use four taggers on him during the day, none of them would have any success. Riccardi added another for the Cats and they were already stamping their authority on the match. North looked slow and were not tackling with the same intensity they usually do. The Geelong midfield, even though it was missing two of its key players were able to brush off their North opponents and find space without even trying, well that's how it seemed anyway. Geelong got the next goal from a goal square scramble as the North players stood on and watched wondering no doubt what was going wrong.

Just when things were starting to look desperate however Wayne Carey stepped in and dragged North back into the contest, he kicked two booming goals in two minutes after marking strongly to keep North in touch at the first change. Corey McKernan hurt his hand and was taken to the rooms late in the first term. Geelong lead by 8 points.

Hewitt who now had to shoulder the ruck duties without McKernan who the ball out from the opening bounce and kicked beautifully out to the leading Chris Groom, Groom could and should have popped it over the top to Welsh who was on his own in the goal square but he went back to try and kick it himself, he sprayed it badly. Hocking was on fire he ran unchecked thought the midfield to kick his first goal to open the scoring in the second term. Former Kangaroo Brad Sholl followed that goal with another 30 seconds later to again stretch the Cats lead. The field umpire went down with a bad leg injury and had to be helped off the ground, it was unfortunately as the emergency who came on gave us nothing for the rest of the game. North had gone to rabble again, they kept picking out Geelong players as if they were team mates and they were not applying any pressure at all.

It took Wayne Carey's influence to again get North rolling, he won the ball from a boundary throw in and flicked it out to Shannon Grant who snapped it across his shoulder for a goal. Jason McCartney cost North badly he took a great mark on the run but tried to play on in heavy traffic and was run down from behind, Spinks got a goal from it and he followed soon after with another one. In fact he was starting to prove more then a handful for Longmire, he was too quick off the mark for him it could have been worse if he kicked straighter. Corey McKernan came back out from the rooms as Winston Abraham displayed some of his silky skills to set Carey up for his third goal. McKernan came back onto the ground to the cheer of the North fans. He took a big mark moments latter to dispel at worries that the Champ had suffered another serious injury. Spinks had another opportunity but thankfully missed the shot, it had become clear that Longmire wasn't the man for the job and Glen Archer was shifted onto the former Eagle. Ronny Burns kicked Geelong further in front. The Umpiring of Wayne Carey is terrible, he was held by three people and still the umpire didn't see it and called play on. At half time North was down by 27 points and looked to be in big trouble.

Scott Welsh was one of North's better players, he is playing injured though, he injured his shoulder against the Blues at Optus Oval and he was again having trouble with it early in the third term. Geelong made a rare mistake coming out of defence a player kicking it straight to Welsh who bombed in into the square for Carey to mark and goal. If North was going to win there was little doubt who was going to win it for them. Summing up North's day three Roos where surrounding the ball and non of them bent down to get it, they all left it for the other to pick up allowing Geelong to swoop on the ball. They got it out to Spinks who booted another goal. When Barry Hall out positioned Groom in the square to goal things didn't look good at all. Carey was still doing his best to keep us in it, he marked over three players and set Rock up but he missed the easy shot and North were still 6 goals adrift. North did seem to improve a bit though as the term went on, Danny Stevens kicked a goal but it was answered by Stoneham. It was unbelievable how slack North's midfield was there were players running all over the place. I wouldn't mind having Jose Romero in the side, at least he has the ability to tag someone and stick to there side no matter what. It was captain Carey who got North rolling again, he laid a great tackle on the wing and put the ball down Sholls throat. Sholl had been struggling like the rest of the side but his move to the forward line late in the term paid off, he kicked one goal and missed two others. The good sign was the tackling had suddenly got much better, McKernan put a good one on Ronny Burns and the ball ended up with Harvey who kicked a team lifting goal after running a good 60 metres. At three quarter time North was within 19 points and the Crowd had come alive as shocking as we had played so far I actually thought we would finish over the top of them and win the game.

Gary Hocking soon put paid to any hopes of a North revival though he had three important touches early in the final term and kicked a goal. Craig Sholl answered back straight away to keep us around the mark but from that point on it was all Geelong. North's disposal was atrocious, underlining this was the fact the normally centre metre perfect Shannon Grant was also turning it over. Hocking set up two more goals to Stoneham to bury North , Spinks too was proving to big for Glen Archer and he ended up kicking 5 goals. Stevens and Welsh got late goals but it was too late North were sunk.

If it wasn't for Carey it would have been an embarrassment, as it was Geelong didn't play great football, North was just so bad. I haven't seen them play that bad for a long time. Even when we have been thrashed in the past we have put in a more inspired effort then we did today. Its a great opportunity lost, with all the top teams around us losing North could have been right up there with the top two , now they slip back to fourth slightly in front of the tigers. Brent Harvey was North's only other good player everyone else just all had a bad day at the same time, Byron Pickett did a few good things . Corey McKernan continues to jump at shadows at the centre bounce the amount of anti Jason McCartney is very high amongst North fans, he gets blamed for just about anything that goes wrong. The injuries have taken there toll, North only had 10 premiership players out their today the loss of players such as Allison, Roberts, Scott, Martyn, Crocker, Pike and Freeborn have weakened the side considerably in my opinion. Especially Martyn and Scott, Martyn could have delt with Spinks and maybe Scott would have been able to do a better job of taging Hocking.