HOW do you describe losing to a side which had not won a match for the season?

It’s a tough one.

Still, a win was never just going to happen for Melbourne against GWS. The Giants have played some good football recently, and the football community is fully aware of their super talent. They are already showing signs of what’s to come, given they have some of the best young talent in the country.

The loss wasn’t a massive surprise from an outsider’s point of view – GWS entered the match as favourites for the first time in its history.

Upon reflection – after Melbourne’s 37-point loss – coach Neil Craig said it was a much better showing than the previous week against North Melbourne, when Melbourne went down by 122 points at Etihad Stadium. And he was right.

To put that loss against the Kangaroos in perspective, the Demons have only produced eight worse losses since they became a foundation VFL/AFL club in 1897.

Craig said Melbourne had a bad day against the Kangaroos. He at least felt that the Demons had a crack and matched the Giants in some areas, even though Melbourne fell away in the final term and it turned out to be a terribly frustrating loss.

Two frustrations for Craig were Melbourne’s turnovers and poor execution, which he said ultimately cost his side the match.  

“Last week’s loss was a really poor day for the Melbourne footy club, because we were inept last week. I didn’t think we were inept today (Saturday) in terms of our effort,” he said.

“The contested ball aspect of it was relatively even. Clearances and centre bounces were relatively even and inside 50s went plus seven their way. So there was nothing that really said ‘wow’.

“The one that stood out for us though, was their scores from turnovers. We were really poor on our execution, and I thought we fixed up the effort area from last week, but we were really poor on our execution.”

The telling message from Craig though, following the loss against the Giants, was the fact that Melbourne couldn’t just win because they wanted to, or because they were playing the bottom of the ladder team.

Again, Craig reiterated how much his team’s execution and turnovers proved critical in the end result. And for Craig, those areas need to be progressed by season’s end.

“You’ve got to be able to be good enough to win, and part of being good enough is to bring competitive effort to the game, which I thought we did today (Saturday),” he said.

“Then you’ve got to be good enough to bring that capacity to execute. I’m not talking about every play that you get, because that doesn’t happen.

“You won’t win until you fix it up.”