There are two brothers playing in the AFL Ben and Harry McKay.
Ben McKay plays for the Essendon Football Club and has not had a fantastic start to the season. Essendon Coach Brad Scott found himself defending the under performing Ben after the clubs shocking second round loss to Adelaide.
Scott backed high-profile defender Ben McKay to find form after he became a focus of fan ire over the opening weeks of the season.
“If you look across his career, he’s been under a lot of pressure in the teams he’s played in,” Scott said.
“I’ve got a lot of faith and confidence in Ben. He’s got a lot of good attributes.
“We put our last-line defenders under enormous pressure on the weekend.
“Criticism’s part of this game and on Saturday we all deserved to get criticised. It’s just the price of admission in this industry and Ben knows that.
“But he’s a resilient character and my job as coach is not to respond to criticism about any of our players – my job is to coach them.”
In Essendon’s game against Adelaide it was hard to image a more unstructured and less effective backline and Ben Mc Kay was an integral part of that backline.
Ben’s twin brother Harry McKay plays as a forward for the Carlton Football Club and he himself has only played 1 game this season. McKay in that game kicked 1 goal and had 14 possessions.
He did not play in round two with Carlton making an announcement today he will not play against the Western Bulldogs in round 3 Friday night. Coach Michael Voss also suggesting McKay may not play in round 4 against Collingwood.
Carlton forward Harry McKay will miss the Blues’ clash with the Western Bulldogs due to personal reasons.
McKay is no certainty to return next week for the club’s blockbuster game against Collingwood, with a decision to be made in the days leading into the match.
Unlike his Essendon playing brother Ben, Harry on many occasions struggles to take a contested mark often loosing to the opposition or the ball falling to ground. It is not unusual for Harry McKay to then look to the umpire fr a free kick such is the way be behaves on field.
He is a tall forward but is unable to take a contested mark and when he does there is no guarantee of a goal due to his unorthodox kicking style. Can Carlton remain competitive and get their season back on track without McKay?
As a betting woman I would say yes hoping of course Charlie Curnow plays a better game this week.
I think Carlton, and maybe Essendon to a lesser extent, have significant issues with their club administration, paying stupid amounts of money for players who don’t deliver and trying to turn mediocre players into superstars, refusing to adapt when their plans clearly aren’t working.
Meanwhile the media speculate and write awful articles blaming two guys who are clearly struggling under the pressure they face, from both their employers and the general public. It’s clear they aren’t getting the mental health support from the club that they need.
Harry has been struggling with this for years and it’s not getting better, Carlton are probably treating his performance anxiety the same way they do the game plan – stick with it no matter what happens, even if it’s clearly not working.
I think you are right about the performance anxiety being a possible issue and perhaps Max Gawn also had that issue on the weekend.
The stakes are so high now in the game but what has all changed is the amount players are getting has changed and this causes people to expect a professional turnout each and every week.
Perhaps the expectations are too high. Having said that people like Cripps and Merit have worked hard the first two games for their clubs.
Both teams have such a long premiership drought, so many mistakes and wooden spoons, the pressure must be immense for their players, not just from the fans but even at the club, dreaming of success instead of doing the basic skills needed to make the dream come true. Putting all this pressure on a select few instead of sharing the load equally. As for Cripps, he needs to be studied for his mindset, he’s inspirational honestly.