SYDNEY defender Tadhg Kennelly says the Swans’ “embarrassing” ball use cost them victory in their round one clash against St. Kilda at the Telstra Dome on Saturday night.
The visitors were held to just one goal in the first term and trailed by 20 points at quarter time before a dogged effort saw them level at half time before finishing just two points adrift.
“Our ball use was very disappointing because we tried to work on that all summer, we’re still not using it well enough,” Kennelly said.
“I don’t think we turned up to play in the first quarter and they jumped us really.
“We were all over the place with spare men going everywhere.
“We just didn’t play Swans one on one football. We closed them down in the second, third and last quarter and had our opportunities to win the game but we couldn’t kick straight either.”
The 26-year-old insists that lack of competition and round one rustiness can’t be blamed for the first quarter lapse.
“That’s an easy excuse,” he said.
“You’d like to think we’re competitive in the way that we train and we’ve been doing it that way for the last three months and we should be better than that… we just turned the footy over, over and over again.”
Nick Davis kicked a goal to get the Swans to within two points in the final quarter and then looked like he could be the Swans’ saviour when he had another shot. But he missed a subsequent set shot which could have stolen the game. Jared Moore also squandered a chance for victory missing a more difficult flying shot in the dying seconds.
“No one means to not kick goals but it’s disappointing when you work so hard and we don’t kick the goals like we should but we’ll work on it and it’s not the end of the world but it would have been nice to start out with a win,” Kennelly said.
Kennelly himself, who was top in the Swans’ disposal count with 25 touches, says he’s delighted to be back in action after a 2007 season where he was curtailed to just 13 games due to a knee injury.
As well as a high disposal count, the Irishman also showed the 36,614 crowd his distinctive attacking running style.
“It felt great, I was jumping out of my skin the last couple of weeks and really looking forward to it. It’s great to be back and giving the boys that run… it’s a part of my game that I love doing, but then if you’re not using the ball well it doesn’t matter how much running you do.”
Famous for his superstitions, Kennelly had a new addition to his uniform this week after a knock to his shoulder in a reserves game last week put him in doubt for selection.
“I’ve got a St. Christopher’s medallion sewn on to the back of my shorts. He’s the patron saint of protection. My grandmother gave me a few of them,” he said.
And while he met his religious obligations by going to church on Good Friday, he misses out on Easter Sunday mass due to the team flight back to Sydney but his housemate and compatriot Brendan Murphy promised to fill in for him.
“I’m getting Brendan Murphy to go for me. He’ll go twice and if he does that we’ll definitely win next weekend,” he laughed.
