'Not AFL standard': Dons legend savages damning Merrett vision

Essendon legend Tim Watson has lashed Zach Merrett for subpar efforts in the first quarter of the Bombers’ defeat to GWS.

John Worsfold’s side sit on the bottom of the ladder after round one following the 72-point belting.

Few Essendon players fired a shot in the loss, including Dylan Shiel against his old club, but vision of Merrett’s pressure drove Watson mad.

With three minutes left in the first term, the No.7 hovered around a fight for the ball and only stuck a left arm out in an attempt to stop a handball.

“It’s almost as if he’s given up. This is as bad as it can possibly be,” Watson said on Channel 7’s Talking Footy.

“Look at the effort there, the token effort just to put up a hand.

“This is tough on Zach Merrett, he’s a youngish type player – that is not AFL standard.

“There is not a coach in the competition that would accept that as effort.”

The vision did the rounds among Bombers supporters on social media on Monday, with another first-quarter play highlighted:

Merrett played in both pre-season games and round one despite suffering an ankle injury in January, ruining a month of training.

The 23-year-old recorded 16 disposals, with just five contested possessions and three tackles in the loss to GWS.

Dons didn’t drink their own bathwater

Essendon coach John Worsfold doubts the pre-season hype over the Bombers has affected his players, but will work on every aspect of their game after a woeful first-up effort on Sunday.

His side were routed on Sunday by a GWS unit missing a number of veteran players and crashed to a 72-point loss in Sydney.

Essendon had more inside 50s in the first quarter but mustered just four behinds .

Worsfold cited slow build-ups, wrong options, dropped marks, and missed opportunities for their miserable final score of 5.10.

GWS won 39 more contested possessions with Worsfold attributing the alarming disparity to his side’s fumbling.

He said Essendon looked flat and shell-shocked and didn’t match the Giants’ intensity.

Essendon were widely tipped to be one of the big improvers this season and a candidate for a top-four spot, but also lost their two pre-season games prior to Sunday’s fixture.

However, Worsfold wasn’t convinced all the positive pre-season buzz about the Bombers had adversely impacted on his players.

“I don’t think so, I’m not sure how it would,” Worsfold said.

“There’s not too many athletes especially if they move into the top echelon, that get affected by that

‘If we were affected by that, them we need to really assess and address it, but I wouldn’t think so, we just played poorly tonight.

“We have to look at everything its not one little area that we’re going to say was off, it was pretty much everything.”

His GWS counterpart Leon Cameron cautioned against reading too much into the result.

“Collingwood lost their first two last year and they played in a grand final, (eventual premiers) West Coast got beaten in round one,” Cameron said.

“There’s lots of hard sides out there and Essendon will bounce back.

‘We got spanked a couple of years ago (by Adelaide in round one of 2017)……. and came out and won the week after.”

Former Giants star Dylan Shiel collected an equal team-high 25 disposals on Sunday, in his first AFL appearance for Essendon, but had little impact on the game

“Overall we know what Dyl is going to deliver for us and (he was) unfortunately part of a group today that didn’t deliver,” Worsfold said.

“He’s hurting, as we all are and hungry to grow from that.”

with AAP