It was a scrappy game – did you feel that’s how it would be when you came here tonight?
No, not at all.

What transpired to make it that way?
I thought it was high intensity. People that sat on the bench said bodies were flying and it was a very physical game. It became quite greasy with two strong contested-ball teams. I don’t think anyone planned for it to come out that way. Both teams had entries, we had 50 entries and they had 50, so it wasn’t like teams weren’t going in. From our end, and they’d probably say the same, I think, but more focused on us and connection we had some opportunities that we would like to have taken a bit better but we need to learn from them.

MATCH REPORT: Freo fall short in tight Crows clash

How difficult is it to lose a game in that fashion given you really fought it out at the end?
I thought we fought all night to be honest. Even in the third quarter we had 13 entries, I think we could only kick one goal. All credit to them, they defended very well, we understand their defence, how they set up and what they do. I think all year they’ve been strong defensively, averaging about 76 points against and we’ve been strong, and they’re pretty strong in the contest as we are. Both teams have been struggling to get their offensive going all year, they’ve probably been not as good and we’ve been marginally better, so when all those things come together it made it for an intense contest and both teams were desperate to win and neither team gave up. So I was really proud that we gave ourselves a chance in the last quarter.

What were your thoughts on the two crucial 50m penalties in the last quarter – Bradley Hill & Darcy Tucker?
You want to be playing well enough to take umpiring decisions out of it. The grass (throwing) probably was (a penalty) if you look at it, I haven’t seen the replay of it. Was it around the edges and marginal or was it a clump of grass, I don’t know. Only the vision will tell us that. Probably to the strict letter of the law you probably shouldn’t throw some grass up.

How did you see the Darcy Tucker incident?
Well he dropped the ball in possession and you need to return the ball on the full so some laws are black and white, it’s costly in a tight game. Sometimes the rub of the green doesn’t go your way but you want to play well enough to take that out of it. I’m experienced enough to sit here and see that we had a wonderful effort and fought it out to the end and gave ourselves a look. We would like to be able to score more, it was finals like intensity, it’s been described as, I’ve been informed, some of the commentators were talking like that. We’ve been trending up on the scoring, we’d like to keep the contest and the defence strong. I thought in that last quarter we found bit of a formula really to go forward and look dangerous, again we couldn’t quite take those opportunities. We’ll lick our wounds, we have the Tigers next week. It will be a positive review and some lessons within that and we need to improve our football.

If the Tucker incident was black and white what was the Bradley Hill one
I’ve never really commented on umpires and even after losing grand finals when the ball has hit the post for a point in 2009, I’m not going to start talking about it in a home and away game. The game has enough beauty in it and analysis without drilling in. Our umpires have an incredibly difficult game to umpire I thought they did a very good job, players make more mistakes than umpires. Let’s focus on the two teams because then you get more in-depth analysis and more interesting articles.                         

Does it give you great heart that your young side was able to stand up in a game that was finals-like intensity?
We’re a young team that is standing up and is improving our footy but we need to keep going. All the results are telling you how even the competition is. Sometimes when equal force meets equal force you need to be able to execute and they probably did it a little bit better but I think they would walk away with a few frustrations as well.