Big moments have a tendency to reveal essential truths. It\u2019s true of people, institutions, and sporting teams alike. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
They don\u2019t always reveal weaknesses necessarily, like when Hans Gruber and his boys took over Nakatomi and the essential truth of John McClane revealed itself to be that he\u2019s a smartass with a pretty good eye for stopping robberies<\/a>, nor do they always reveal strengths. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They simply revealed truths that were always there if you were looking for them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the qualifying finals, essential truths were revealed about Fremantle and Brisbane. It\u2019s not that they can\u2019t pull a 2020 and end up meeting in the Grand Final anyway, nor is that those truths are fatal to them necessarily, but they are there and they need to be accounted for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For Fremantle, despite being one of the better home and away teams in recent memory, they have a defined method of ball movement and the tweaks that they can make are more around the margins than at their core. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They kick long and wide to Luke Jackson or one of their key forwards who has worked their way to defensive wing to compete.<\/a> Either that player marked the ball, or the Dockers won the ground ball on defensive wing and exploded through their cavalcade of elite runners like Murphy Reid, Shai Bolton, Andy Brayshaw, Hayden Young etc. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It worked for them through the season because while they were middle of the pack at moving the ball from D50 to F50, when they did get it out, they were so quick and precise that they usually scored. They were fifth in taking the ball from D50 to a score and second at turning chains into scores.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond the stats, the method is like a hurricane where it has a natural, destructive momentum. You kick one goal from a long exit and run through the middle, then you kick another, then another, then you\u2019re winning out of the centre square and the game is over.<\/a> That\u2019s what Freo did over and over this year, and why I regularly called them a hit squad. They parachuted in, did some damage quickly, then helicoptered out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The essential truth is, however, that they don\u2019t have many other ways of moving the ball from defence. That method of exit is both a product of good talls and an explosive midfield brigade, but also that they don\u2019t have a creator off half back in the mould of a Bailey Dale. Jordan Clark is the closest thing to it but his kicking is just okay compared to the great half back creators. He had seven turnovers on the best night of his career.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n If you can stop that ball movement, like Hawthorn did by constantly rolling an extra number up to those long down the line exits and forcing Fremantle to go laterally when they did win an up the line contest, Fremantle doesn\u2019t have another way to play. They couldn\u2019t kick it through the Hawthorn press and consistently ended up getting stuck around their defensive wing, the area where they launched so many of their attacks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Imagine the Batcave having no high frequency generators so he\u2019s got no idea where the Joker is doing damage, he just knows that he is. That was Fremantle on Thursday night.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n On the night, Fremantle gave up the fourth most time in forward half that they have all season, had their worst ball use game, and had their second worst chain to score game of the season.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n They had other problems, like shakiness in defence outside of Alex Pearce in 1v1 situations or open forward line situations<\/a> and Mason Cox\u2019s lack of physicality, but all of them are ameliorated if momentum is in their ball movement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It wasn\u2019t on Thursday night, and they were destroyed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For Brisbane, the essential truth is less complex but arguably more dangerous. They had a tendency this season to look past opponents, especially defensively. You got the sense throughout the season that, other than Josh Dunkley and Harris Andrews, most of Brisbane\u2019s players wish they were NFL players and only had to play one side of the ball.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n At times you would look at Will Ashcroft\u2019s patterns at centre bounce and wonder if he knows the other team is allowed to get the ball and he is allowed to chase them if they do. He looked like Michael Cera playing soccer in Superbad<\/em>.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n That poor defensive application showed up in their losses to GWS, Carlton, and even Melbourne early in the season where they gave up over 100 points in games they expec<\/a>ted to win. <\/p>\n\n\n\n On the whole, their defensive numbers are atrocious for a two-time reigning premier. They gave up the sixth most points in the season and were among the bottom 5 in every stopping ball movement stat including being sixth worst at stopping chains to score. <\/p>\n\n\n\n With all that Sydney has been through over the past five weeks, and having lost the skeleton keys to their ball movement in Chad Warner and Nick Blakey, Brisbane looked past them on Saturday afternoon. Tom Papley reported that exact attitude on Sunday morning, when he told the Sunday Footy Show that Brisbane players were \u201csaying\u201d they expected the Swans to \u201cfold\u201d.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n On their way to conceding 141 points, the hallmarks of Brisbane arrogance \u2013 mids absurd running patterns and their inability to stop ball movement \u2013 showed up. Sydney had 15 scoring shots from the back half, 17 from stoppage, and kicked 6.3 from the centre bounce.<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n The delta in intensity across the board was also telling, with the Swans sitting +10 in disposals and <\/em>+15 in tackles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n