The Bombers looked to be out of the contest after being thrashed all over the ground by a rampant St Kilda in the first quarter. Essendon managed just 29 kicks for the quarter to trail by 31-points. Had St Kilda kicked straight, it could have been a far bigger gap.
""Obviously the first quarter was poor when they just put a space between us and them. We were beaten badly around stoppages and from then on you were playing catch up football and that can take a bit out of you when you have been doing a fair bit of travelling’’ Harvey said.
""But I still think the players showed a bit of courage in that they kept coming at them. In the last quarter we kicked five behinds and we hit the post a couple of times in the third quarter. If we had kicked straighter the game might have tightened up a bit.""
The form of Matthew Allan was a bonus for the Bombers. In only his second hit out of the pre-season, Allan got 20 hitouts, collected nine possessions and four hard ball gets. They were encouraging numbers given the time he spent on the bench.
""I think Matthew has been terrific because he is coming off a limited pre-season without any practice games and being thrown straight into the thick of the action. Every time he goes into the ruck we start to get things happening in there,"" Harvey said.
Harvey also felt Mark Alvey had showed some promising signs in his first game in the red and black.
""He showed some signs – it is going to take him a while to get back to full fitness and confidence after a knee injury. The goal he kicked early in the last showed the class he has got and we will look to get him up and running and into the midfield as soon as we can,"" he said.
Essendon will now firmly focus on its preparations for the Round 1 clash with Port Adelaide at AAMI Stadium. And there will need to be plenty of planning done – particularly in defence with Dustin Fletcher missing through suspension and Sean Wellman unlikely to be fit.
""The team has had a pretty solid pre-season competition. We have got a few guys to come back and some others are starting to get back to full fitness. From here on in it is just a matter of tuning them up for round one,"" Harvey said.
""We have had a few problems with hamstring injuries in the pre-season – I think we have done six already so we will just go back and have a look at that to ensure it doesn’t become a problem during the season.""
