Saints legend Leigh Montagna has questioned why it took for the Bombers’ season to be hanging by a thread to discover the ‘Essendon edge’ against Fremantle.
Brad Scott’s side came from 25 points down to storm over the top of the Dockers in a bonkers one-point win at the MCG to keep its finals hopes alive.
The Bombers responded to intense scrutiny following a grim 2-6 stretch where they fell out of the top eight after such a promising first half of the season.
And speaking on Fox Footy’s The First Crack, Montagna, while full of praise of Essendon’s performance against Fremantle, questioned where such spirit has been in recent times.
“I walked away thinking: ‘Where’s that been, why now?’ Why when the pressure was almost off and finals were almost out of reach?’,” Montagna posed.
“They were embarrassed all week in the media ... by all reports Brad Scott looked them in the eye and put those hard questions to a few of them and embarrassed them in the team meeting about their effort and contest.
“Why now do they deliver what they did? Which looked like the ‘Essendon edge,’ there was so many elements of it today ... they were challenged and didn’t fold ... they found a way to grit their teeth and get a win.”
The dual All-Australian praised Essendon’s leaders for standing up in Sunday’s clash, but again queried why they’d been so down in recent weeks when the club had more to play for.
“Where has Mason Redman’s form been? He was terrific. (Sam) Draper beat (Sean) Darcy,” Montagna added.
“Jake Stringer laid a career-high 10 tackles. Why now? Why do it this week when you knew all the attention was on Essendon?
“Zach Merrett continued to do his thing, Darcy Parish was back to his best, Dylan Shiel et cetera.
“I thought it was sensational for them to get the win and full credit. But you have to ask yourself why can’t they have done this for the last eight weeks?
“They’d failed the test in all these other games and now they finally stand up when it almost felt like all hope was gone ... it’s just frustrating it took for this to happen to play with that ‘Essendon edge’ again.”
The Bombers now sit half a game outside the top eight ahead of defining clashes against Gold Coast (Marvel Stadium), Sydney (Marvel Stadium) and Brisbane (Gabba) to finish their home and away.
Scott post match still kept a lid on his side’s capacity to play finals, arguing teams that play September that aren’t ready “can sometimes be even more damaging than being ready.”
Montagna thinks it speaks to a coach still “shielding” his side from pressure and expectations.
“It sounds to me like he’s still shying away from putting the pressure on them and saying: ‘No, we are a team capable of playing finals and doing damage in finals. We just need to play like that more often’,” Montagna said.
“It still feels like he’s shielding them from the pressure, because maybe they play their best when there is no pressure on them. The psychology of football.”
Asked if he believed in the Bombers yet, Montagna said: “I’m not a believer because I don’t know if they believe yet. But if they play like that, they’re going to be in most games. They’ve got to do it more often.”
Essendon Coach Remains Unsure of Finals Readiness
Having already lost three matches in a row to tumble from fourth to 10th, Essendon would have been six points adrift of the eighth-placed Carlton – but now they are back knocking on the door.
“I said last week, and I honestly believe this: We played last week like, ‘Gee, I hope we win,’ or ‘I hope we don’t lose’ – and that’s just a terrible way to attack your footy, but the pressure of results impact everyone,” Scott said.
“Until you’re a really good, consistent team, and you’ve got confidence in your method and your system, and you do it repeatedly under pressure, I think there’s always going to be some doubt.
“But we’ve got to overcome that, and we will. It’s not a matter of if – it’s a matter of when – but I know that if we get all consumed with outcomes, we won’t handle the pressure well.”
Essendon were second with an 8-2-1 record through 11 rounds, and still fourth at 10-5-1 a month ago before losing their top-eight spot in what looked a repeat of last year’s embarrassing fadeout.
They are still long odds to feature in September because of their pedestrian percentage and a challenging run home against Gold Coast and Sydney at Marvel Stadium before a trip north to face Brisbane at the Gabba in the last round.
However, this gutsy victory offers a hint of progress, given how uncompetitive they were down the stretch a year ago, particularly after Scott said on Thursday they had failed “the pressure test” in key moments in 2024.
“Would you choose to lose close games to learn lessons? Of course, you wouldn’t,” he said.
“But the unfortunate reality is you do learn more from them because when you win the tight ones, and whether you get away with it from an opposition mistake or something like that, it can paper over the cracks.
“I was upfront with the players, and the public last week. We had pressure on us and what you’ve got to understand is that if you want to play at the pointy end of the season, against the best teams, there’s going to be pressure on you.
“But again, it’s not what happens. It’s how you respond. We’ve been really frustrated the last couple of weeks … but [today] the fight was there right until the end, which is what all of our supporters want to see.
“We are under no illusions that our supporters want to be proud of their footy club, and we’re working every minute of every day to achieve that for them.”
Fremantle's Midfield Struggles Continue
On the flip side, the defeat could be incredibly costly for Justin Longmuir and Fremantle, who lost their top-four spot and dropped to sixth ahead of a torrid run home against Geelong, Greater Western Sydney and Port Adelaide.
“We’ve been talking about the scenarios for a while now, and I think our players have largely been handling that pretty well,” Longmuir said.
“Melbourne was do-or-die [a fortnight ago], last week was a derby, and in large periods we handled it well today, but it’s the pointy end of the season, and probably the game’s mean a little bit more, so what we’re trying to do is just normalise it and try to focus on our footy rather than the scoreboard.
“It’s going to be important this week. We have a six-day break against another team near the top of the ladder, so they’re all important, but we can’t focus on the outcomes. We need to make sure we focus on our process.”
Essendon’s Xavier Duursma (hamstring) came from the ground late, but Scott was unsure on whether the injury would sideline him.
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