Rout stirs up unpleasant memories for Fagan
A STUNNED Chris Fagan likened Brisbane’s “out of character” performance against Melbourne on Thursday night to the bad old days of the early part of his coaching career at the Lions.
On the big stage at the MCG in a top-of-the-table clash, the previously firstplaced Brisbane suffered their heaviest defeat in four-and-ahalf seasons, and largest loss to the Demons in 24 years, as they were thumped by 64 points.
Defeats by 10 goals or more were commonplace in Fagan’s first year in charge in 2017, but their latest loss was just their second such defeat since then.
“I didn’t see it coming,” Fagan said post-match.
“We should’ve lost the game by a lot more than we did tonight, we were lucky they didn’t kick straight.
“That’s as bad as we’ve played in a long, long time. That takes me back to the first couple of years (of Fagan’s reign).
“We weren’t in the hunt, it’s terribly disappointing.”
At halftime, the Lions were trailing the Demons in contested possessions by a whopping 32, before losing the category by 37, as Melbourne’s midfielders such as Clayton
Oliver, Jack Viney and Christian Petracca ran riot.
Fagan described it as “staggering” and hoped it would sting his midfield into action for their next game against the Western Bulldogs on Thursday night.
The Lions coach admitted he wasn’t sure how he would approach the review of the match considering his team rarely perform so badly.
“It’s an interesting question, that’s what’s going through my mind at the moment – do I give the boys a mulligan and move on? Or do we go to hard analysis? I haven’t made up my mind which way to go yet,” Fagan said.