Essendon premiership player Scott Lucas has called into question numerous structural decisions by the Bombers on Saturday night.
St Kilda prevailed in Round 3 to celebrate the club’s 150th anniversary in style, downing Essendon by 18 points after pulling away late.
It was set up by a blistering first term where the Saints booted the opening five goals.
But Lucas believes Essendon didn’t give themselves the best chance to crash the party. He questioned why midfield star Darcy Parish started on the bench and why last week’s five-goal star Kyle Langford found himself at the other end of the ground.
“Kevin Sheedy would talk about it at nauseam… he always would impress on you the importance of the start,” Lucas began on SEN’s Sunday Crunch Time.
“To take it to last night, (Jack) Steele is out of the team, Essendon has been a good clearance team, Parish has averaged 12 clearances a game.
“(They could) set the scene early. They start him on the bench. Langford kicked five goals last week. He started at full back.
“I would look at that, and (this is) purely opinion of course, but St Kilda would have been happy with that… don’t give them what they don’t want.
“St Kilda would have been happy that Langford is at full back and Parish is on the bench.
“In a sense, in terms of matching up against the other team, you’re giving St Kilda what they want to start the game.”
While Essendon eventually won clearances 43-29, with Parish grabbing four of his own, at quarter time the Bombers held only a slender lead in that stat, 9-6.
Parish went on to finish with 34 disposals, while Langford enjoyed 17 touches and a goal after being swung forward in the second half.
Brad Scott said post-game: “You've got to start someone on the bench... this stuff about who starts on the bench, they come on the ground in the first five minutes. I wouldn't read anything into that”.
But Lucas suggested that had Parish started on the ground, the early momentum could have been with Essendon.
“They (St Kilda) dominated field position early in the game, they got entries, they got scores. Essendon in the end won clearances by 14, so they got an ascendancy there in time, but I think it was (close to) square (early),” he continued.
“If you’re a better clearances team and you could have owned field position early in the game, maybe it's you that are two or three goals up and then St Kilda is playing against the scoreboard and the clock to work their way back into the game.
“On top of that, Essendon were extremely undisciplined early Their first quarter was horrible.
“Brad Scott tried to put a positive spin on it, but it was a very poor start to the game and they let themselves down, structurally I just couldn’t quite see it.”
The loss was Essendon's first for the season and a date with the GWS Giants looms next week.