THE SPIRIT WAS THERE, BUT ...

[Jesse Christ 2,884]

I think the biggest positive to come out of tonight's game was the fact that Mitch Clark got up and walked off the ground - I was seating fairly close to where it happened and when he landed, it looked pretty ordinary.

Dude it looked like he broke his neck!

[demon-4-life 467]

I actually didn't mind today. Yes disappointed with the win. Yes disappointed with some crucial umpiring calls/non calls.

All in all my observations:

Morton did some great things, but did some bad things. But I see improvement.

TMac is terrible. Can't hit a handpass to save him. Gave up directly 3 goals from his turnovers.

JMac - I love his hardness and his effort, but struggles with disposal efficiency.

Our goal kicking really let us down. Round 1 and this week, we have had the chances to really put confidence into our boys and put scoreboard pressure on our opponents and have failed to do so.

[dee-luded 2,959]

I beg your pardon??

He has no pace. Can that be rectified?

He will be a good player at best sadly.

He's about as quick as Hodge.

[Undeeterred 3,124]

Frawley's defensive work is still OK but with the ball in hand he's a problem. In 2010 he gave us drive out of the backline and kicked quite well. This year he's fumbling by hand and not breaking the lines as often as he used to.

Yep, fair call. That was the biggest thing for me today, fumbling and clumsiness which stopped any momentum. Every time there was a good look at a runner, someone dropped it, fumbled it, or missed the target. Very frustrating.

I think that will get better with confidence and, in the meantime, I just want Frawley to kill the contest. I thought he did that pretty well tonight, he was in a lot of places when he needed to be.

[Jerry Lundergard 420]

Frawley's defensive work is still OK but with the ball in hand he's a problem. In 2010 he gave us drive out of the backline and kicked quite well. This year he's fumbling by hand and not breaking the lines as often as he used to.

Can you name me one player in our backline you have confidence in when they are trying to get it out of our defensive 50? It's a massive hole in our list IMO.

[Return to Glory 8,448]

Tom Mac disapointed today with decision making

[Cards13 9,117]

If Dunn focussed on getting a kick as much as he does at play acting and diving for free kicks he might be a player. I do not like seeing him in an MFC jumper.

[The Song Formerly Known As 6,479]

If you are first to the footy generally you receive the free kicks or the first opportunity for a free kick to be called in your favour.

Mitch Clark in his first 4 games for this club had done nothing but show absolute spirit, desperation, pride and leadership and today when he stood up after that sickening accident he well and truly did the number 11 guernsey he wore proud.

[Buzzy 992]

the MFC website lists Magner as our best. 12 possessions and only 64 supercoach points. Says it all really.

No Demon even cracked the 100, pretty ordinary across the board.

MacDonald is one of the biggest liabilities to ever pull on the jumper...but what kills me is that Garland kicked backwards to him standing all the way back in the opposition goal square, when clearly there was nothing on for the switch anyway. He just set him up to fail.

I thought Bartram did pretty well today, backed into some packs and always works hard.

Rivers was effective, albeit playing on an absolute spud.

Davey did enough.... but god, Murphy destroyed us! Fantastic player.

I'm pretty sure Stef Martin would give us more than Sellar does, should get a recall hopefully.

The crowd was up and about in that 3rd quarter, it was actually pretty exciting for once....but I always felt a loss was pre-ordained.

Jeez it seemed like the Dogs got all the luck out there, the lucky rebounds, the bounce of the ball, the umpires.

When it all boils down though, too many times we missed easy targets (Morton, MacDonald), kicked the ball too far over our forward's heads (Moloney, Bail), did stupid things in the defensive 50 (McDonald's handball inside instead of out, Frawleys spoil on the line) or simply weren't sure enough with our hands (Watts again and again).

I wasn't angry today, just sad. I think I saw about 5 percent improvement though.

[Hells Gates 505]

Somebody asked me today were you happy with how the Dees went and I had to bluntly say, no way, I feel disgusted.

I keep thinking back to a competitive 2010 where we took it up to Stk, Wb & Coll twice and right now i feel shattered.

Fair enough a lot of water has gone under the bridge and a lot of changes but I dont accept any mediocrity in my own life so why should I for a professional football club.

It heartbreaks me to think back to 2010 to round 4 2012. Our disposal has not improved since 2007 when the rebuild apparantly started. The excuses of kids annoys me as a lot of them arent kids anymore. Whilst Im happy with the way things are heading off field and saw a couple of positives today, Im highly concerned about where we are heading on-field. Over rating our list, just because of where they went in the draft, is blind faith in my eyes.

I just dont know where we are heading and Neeld has a big job ahead of him, he may even need to simplify whatever changes he has made. Bring back the rollercoaster anyday for me. I just want to see some wins.

[Harrisonrules 273]

Let's not kid ourselves. Yes, we only lost by 21 points, but Bulldogs are crap.

We got demolished through the middle again, we couldn't hit targets, we couldn't kick a goal and we sure as hell didn't have the intestinal fortitude to stick it out when the game was there to be won.

For a team to concede two [censored] easy goals two minutes into the last quarter is inexcusable.

Jordie, Jonesy, Rivers and Bater can stand tall. The rest all had patches of absolute garbage and let us down badly.

And FFS Morton stop being so lazy you can't be arsed hitting a target by hand 3meters away.

ARRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!

If you think Bartram can stand tall you are misguided. Their small forwards mangled us. Bartram couldn't cope as he couldn't against Nahas last week. In the third quarter as we were pressing he got a free kick on the back flank at the 29 minute mark and starts waving to everyone he's going to slow the game down. We desperately needed a goal in the final minute so as usually not knowing where to kick sends it safely back twenty metres, because that's all he can do. He doesn't have the mind for this level of AFL. He is what I call a circular player handballs around but never gains yardage. While we stick with him we are settling on C grade plaers. Did you see the way Murphy played that's what good teams have, Shaw, Johncock types and swe have to put up with Bartram and his crazy fan club on this site.

JOrdie McKenzie, plays on his knees all day long. He's another circular player, rarely gets it off to an outside target for an effective clearance. Of course its hard to remember him actually getting away an effective kickd himself, either this game or any other.

This was one of Jonesy poorer games. The number of times he got caught was part of our problem.

At least Rivers could stand tall.

AARRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Edited April 22, 2012 by Harrisonrules

[Flemo56 409]

Small steps were a least taken in the right direction today, we've just gotta stop shooting ourselves with horrible skills, also thought we did show a great deal of endeavour, some really bad umpiring didn't help either, the dropping the the ball rule just seems no existent for some reason.

For sure the sun will rise 2morra and so will I still luvin the DEES

[Ned 156]

Can you name me one player in our backline you have confidence in when they are trying to get it out of our defensive 50? It's a massive hole in our list IMO.

I used to have it with Davey off half-back and Frawley. But yeah, take your point, none. Neeld's sent them into their shell. They're petrified of stuffing up and so stuff up.

[Ryan Dee 140]

Trengove is not just slow. He's not getting the ball and he's not disposing of it cleanly enough. Those players you've named are clean users of the ball and get 20-30 disposals regularly.

It's undeniable that Trenners is having a crap year. I wonder if it's got anything to do with the captaincy. Whatever it is, he's not playing well, and if he wasn't captain there would be far more scrutiny on his position in the side.

What I was pointing out is that although Trengove does not have pace, he can still be a brilliant player like the ones I named.

[Waltham33 475]

Fair enough a lot of water has gone under the bridge and a lot of changes but I dont accept any mediocrity in my own life so why should I for a professional football club.

Well said, tonight was atrocious. We apparently were at base camp 2 years ago and clearly have fallen off the mountain and into a river.

[dee-luded 2,959]

I like your optimism, but i really think the opposition has a lot to do with that.

When we play good teams, we will be back to chasing tail the whole game.

Of course the Opposition does. Thats a given. But we have to start somewhere and today we went in hard to the contest. That may appear ungainly at first glance, & quite Unco' about it. But its the first step towards winning hard contested ball right across the field. The intensity was way up for our part, and that Is a Major requirement of todays footy.

Lets keep this up, build on it & I'm sure the boys will enjoy the encouragement from the outer for having a red hot go. This will become infectious & with the extra pride that comes from head over the ball, not to mention the respect they'll get from opposition teams, they're self respect will grow..

That is the way back towards some real footy respect from across the AFL, & pride is a great motivator.

[Undeeterred 3,124]

My observations, for what they are worth.

• Finally, we saw Melbourne play out a game when it looked pretty hopeless (eg when 5 goals down in the last)
  
• Umpiring was absolutely awful.
  
• Flash got some confidence up and I think it would be madness not to have him running around the forward line for the season. His first goal, front and centre, was vintage and the perfect compliment to Clark.
  
• Cale Morton isn't as bad as everyone wants him to be. He did a few really good things and, despite a few clangers, is consistenty up near our top possession getters.
  
• Jamar will never dominate anybody like he did today. If we couldn't win today's clearances (which we didn't) we never will.
  
• How did Cooney run 20m without anybody being able to catch him, when he only has one leg?
  
• Jared Rivers is a cornerstone and so underrated.
  
• Watts did some great work, but he just doesn't attack hard enough. His ball use is too good to waste as a deep forward. He's heaps better running around the wings, taking strong contested marks through our midfield, and delivering precisely into our forward line.
  
• James Magner makes our midfield look 250% tougher.
  
• Moloney's sleeve doesn't.
  
• Unfortunately for Neeld's gameplan, we looked excellent when we were far enough behind that we were forced to take some risks through the corridor. Best footy we have played in ages.
  
• Having said that, our forward pressure was better than I can remember seeing.
  
• Bate looks much better in the midfield and makes the team better, which says more about the team than him.
  
• Rohan Bail takes a great mark for his size.
  
• We desperately need Gysberts and Sylvia back.
  

That's enough for now.

[Lil_red_fire_engine 11,233]

And FFS Morton stop being so lazy you can't be arsed hitting a target by hand 3meters away.

This is F#cking ridiculous. A game of errors and you call him out on that. Did you actually watch how hard Morton ran to space today? If the rest of our midfield (Bate and Jones aside) attempted to do that we would be playing 2012 football and might win some games. 21 touches, 8 contested, 6 clearances, 6 tackles and he gets singled out for criticism. What a f#cking joke.

How about we mention Dunns refusal to play in front, Joel McDonald complete inability to hit stationary 20 m targets with no pressure. Lets talk about Brent "bleeds red and blue" Moloney inability to get to any ball that doesn't fall in his lap or how an inside mid plays in the centre square all day and doesn't lay a tackle. Mark Jamars 46 hit outs with 3 at best to advantage. Nope Cale Mortons fault today.

Our intensity was better. Our attempts to spread were much improved. We missed the opportunity to put pressure on them in the first quarter with easy missed shots. We negated their ability around the stoppage but we still aren't clean enough through there ourselves. Not happy with the loss but there were some improved signs and hopefully today was the last we see of Dunn and Joel McDonald again.

[dee-luded 2,959]

This was clearly our best game for the year. We tried a lot harder, for longer, and we looked good. In fat, I would say that for more of the game, we were the better side. We just lacked polish in front of goal, and when they had their brief moments on top, they scored goals. We had to play catch up footy in the second half because we couldn't kick easy goals in the first, and that hurt us. If we'd hit the front, with a bit of confidence and the crowd support who knows what would have happened.

Having said that, there are still a lot of problems. Our skills were shocking. Far too many players can't kick or handpass under pressure, and far too many players also can't kick or handpass under no pressure. We still seem to be playing to a rigid gameplan which we're not comfortable with yet, which removes instinct. And too many of our better players are still underpeforming (Trengove, Jamar, Frawley).

Dunn, McDonald and MacDonald were all abysmal, too.

Good balanced post Titan. Thay the way I see it as well.. This is the start of our season. Next a win, soon I hope.

Keep up the aggression boys, with that Intensity.

[Harrisonrules 273]

Stop!!!!!!!! This was our best performance for the year CLEARLY. Seriously, we played the game out and, you know what, Morton was ok. Some of you need to get a grip. It's as if you can't wait to bag the crap out of your own side.

Morton was considerably better, good attitude. Showed self belief. One of the best long kicks in our team which creates opportunity down field.

[cowboy_from_hell 2,390]

Don't look at the fixture, the future is grim.

Tense up, we aint got shi t.

But seriously, we are way too boundry line centric these days. Sick of seeing players in board free and ignored. It's like the centre corridor is seen as a bad thing these days. We were once callled the "transition kings" and that was from coast to coast flashy play. We aint the kings of anything anymore. Well kings of frustration comes to mind.

I can not take sollace in the fact that we shown more fight this week. It means nothing! We were playing an equally sucky team as us and we had something to fight for. Make no mistake about it- Doggies won't make top 8 this year, if we played a final contender we would have been belted like the last few weeks.

What a sad state of affairs. All we can hang our hats on now is sshowing a little fight. Can't even do that for 4 quarters. I don't know what hurts more- the fact we can't fight out a match for 100% of the game or the fact that we have so many spuds on our list with sub-par disposal we are a rabble. Probably the latter. It sucks to be us!!

I can't understand why Neeld didn't take the good parts of our game plan under bailey and put his defensive parts to it. Our coaches that stubborn and arrogant that they think their predecessors gameplans were all completely terrible?

[dee-luded 2,959]

Today sucked for me. I know some on here are sifting through the piles of crap and are attempting to find positives but please we are awful and have hit the reverse gear hard. Our team from 2 years ago would have smashed this bulldogs team today. I don't know what will take longer to build, the wheel at docklands or a good bloody melbourne list. I was one of the positives ones on here " Relax we've got this" Well I am not anymore. Yes we had a crack and for 15 minutes in the third it looked like Neeld had gone to get a beer and the players started to actually play for a while. Then we shut down and died in the ass. It's just not fun to go to the footy anymore my weekend was good until today. I still love the club and i will get over today but there is no enthusiasm for this year from me anymore I haven't got any left.

This is what it looks like when you pull something apart & start reconstructing it, to make it run better. Like hotting up a motor. First few starts, you might be lucky to get ignition, or get the thing to stay running. Each tweak will get it better, as long as we keep the aggression & intensity. Prerequisites.

[Guest Dr Who]

Great game today - great day - shame about the result.

[Matt Demon 1,482]

Problem is we tank on draft day as well

I'll pay that

[Jesse Christ 2,884]

This is what it looks like when you pull something apart & start reconstructing it, to make it run better. Like hotting up a motor. First few starts, you might be lucky to get ignition, or get the thing to stay running. Each tweak will get it better, as long as we keep the aggression & intensity. Prerequisites.

Yeah, a complete engine rebuild when a tune up may have sufficed. Glad you aren't my mechanic!