Assistant Coach Daniel Giansiracusa believes Essendon needs to bottle its third quarter ball movement as a ‘blueprint’ moving forward.
The Bombers found themselves fighting back from a nine-goal to four second term after Adelaide ran rampant from stoppages and turnovers, with the Dons’ offence stifled.
After trailing by 23 points at half-time, Essendon did enjoy their own quarter of domination, scoring eight goals to two in the third term to set up a stirring comeback win, only to fall short at the final siren by two points.
In a game which swung wildly, Giansiracusa admits the Bombers’ ball movement will be a major focus for the side as it looks to nail down a consistent game style.
“We invited that pressure by feeding back too often, credit to them (Adelaide) their pressure was at a high level and we put our defenders under the pump because of that,” Giansiracusa told essendonfc.com.au’s The Last Word.
“That’s probably the main area we’ve got to go to work on, making sure we (move) the ball forward because the blueprint is when we did that in the third quarter, we got the results we were looking for.”
Critical turnovers hurt Essendon defensively throughout Friday night’s fixture, with the Bombers’ inability to stop Adelaide’s efficient scoring a major talking point.
With five games to go in the home and away season, Giansiracusa believes the way to long term success is to ensure a ‘clear direction’ for the playing to group to learn and focus on.
“We gave ourselves enough opportunities, but we gave them too many,” Giansiracusa said.
“It was a game of momentum swings and unfortunately, we coughed up too many easy goals up and they were in front in the end. It’s really disappointing, one we’ve got to reflect on, but there’s still plenty of the season to go.
“We’ve got to give the players a clear direction on where we went wrong and where we can make improvements and we’ll do that.”
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