Disagree.
It's a fact. Sure, there "footballing reasons" that contributed to why we ended the year poorly (as well as injuries), but we won enough games last year to come second on the premiership ladder and that can't be disputed. Something must have been going right for us to beat the eventual premiers in round 2, the eventual GF runners up at Brookvale and the defending premiers twice in the same year.
If you run a fine tooth comb (as you like to do) over our structures and what not, I am sure you'll find some issues (many that I would probably agree with), but you could do that with any of the 16 teams in the competition. The fact still stands, that we were two points off the minor premiership.