Last season’s Grand Finalists Jets struggled to repeat the same level of displays this term and in the end Merrick’s men missed out on the play-offs for ninth time in the last 10 years.
With the team’s only typical centre forward O’Donovan suspended for the opening 8 rounds it was no surprise that Jets struggled for goals early in the season and won just 2 of those games, while losing 4 times.
From that point on the team had to play catch up and when 2019 started with 4 defeats and just 1 win in the first 6 games the damage was already done.
By that point it was obvious that the summer arrivals Jair and Sheppard were pretty useless and neither of them provided the much needed support for O’Donovan in attack. This combined with the fragile health of Vargas (had 3 minor injuries during the season) and the poor overall campaign from Petratos easily explains why Jets struggled to win many games in which they actually dominated.
Ugarkovic was arguably the best inner midfielder in the entire league and his calm presence in that area allowed Jets to boss many of their games, especially at home, but lack of cutting edge prevented them from earning more.
With just 2 of their 9 league wins against sides that actually made the play-offs Jets clearly showed that the combination of slow and ageing defence + lack of quality in attack was too much for them to be hoping for more this season.
