POST MATCH DISCUSSION

[jnrmac 20,055]

That's my point - Roos knows the problem and is polished enough not to bag his team in front of the media, unlike you - know - who.

Anyway, it's a rebuild of a rebuild.

I'm philosophical enough to accept that.

Surely you mean a rebuild of a rebuild of a rebuild??

[jnrmac 20,055]

Lot of smart people on this site.

How would the wrist slashers have been had we not kicked 10 points straight? Say 4 goals six points instead? After all 2 were posters...

With all the injuries we sustained and lack of available rotations I'd be betting some would be hailing Roos a genius....

[RalphiusMaximus 6,024]

Can't agree with the notion that Roos was outcoached. In what way exactly? The fact that he kept Tom acDonald on the park when he was injured? What else could he do? Take us down to a bench of 2? He tried to keep him in position and then shifted him to FF to see if he could take a couple of grabs. I don't see any bad coaching in that. You can't possibly be claiming that the terrible kicking for goal was a result of his coaching? That rests entirely with the players who failed to kick them. Tell me exactly what you think he did or failed to do that contributed to this loss.

As for the opposition, their tactic was to flood the backline and look to Saint Nick once they got the turnover. Amazing tactical mind at work there.

The wrist-slitters need to open their eyes and take a breath here. We lost solely because we couldn't kick straight. There was no great coaching move that made a difference to the game. The injuries were not a deciding factor, nor were the umpires or the coaches. We played with a little too much timidity, which as has been said repeatedly will be alleviated as players get more comfortable with the plan and their teammates, but even that was not a decisive factor.

We won the possession count, the tackle count the inside 50 count and broke even on the contested possessions. That in itself s gold given what we've done the last few years. We had 6 players with a disposal efficiency below 75%. Again, we would have killed for that last year. We could go further and say only 2 had less that 60%. We even had more marks inside 50. This was a good night for us.

Honestly, the only bad here is that it might cost us a spot or two on the ladder, and I don't see that as all that important right now. It's not like we're aiming for the 8 this year, and going up a couple of spots in the draft order never hurts.

[Sir Why You Little 36,982]

Roos wasn't outcoached. Once we lost 2 (more) talls his hands were tied

[Akum 2,660]

In hindsight, we didn't have a chance.

That game answered the question of whether it's easier to replace 4 A-grade mids, or 7 of the 8 best talls on your list? (the 7 being Clark, Dawes, Hogan, Garland, Gawn, Jamar, and then McDonald; the only one of our top 8 talls who played was Frawley; Watts played as a mid; our only other talls are Fitzy, Spencer, Pedersen, and King)

The answer is: It's easier to replace the A-grade mids, because you replace them with B-grade mids, and as long as you don't come up against an A-grade midfield, you'll get by.

But you just can't replace that many of your best talls ... you can only substitute tall-spuds, or not-talls. Either way, it's a loss that simply cannot be made up for.

Then Fitzy and McDonald were both injured 15-20 minutes into the first quarter; we were effectively playing two short from that time on. They may well have been our two most critical players in that game - our only remaining half-decent tall forward, and the one man who could nullify the other side's one matchwinner (who ended up winning the match for them). If it was, say, Bail & Byrnes who'd been injured, we'd still have been playing two short, but it wouldn't have mattered so much.

And not only did we lose our two most critical players & have to play 2 short - those injuries totally destroyed any semblance of structure. And any switches that Roos tried only made things worse. Watts or Tyson or Vince to the forward line weakened the midfield; putting Frawley or Dunn onto Riewoldt meant that we lost any chance we might have had of attacking from defence.

We have gained some very good midfielders, but that doesn't mean we've yet got a good midfield. These guys are just starting to learn how to play together, and it will probably take them the best part of the season. Plus nobody seems to be able to work out yet where Spencer's going to tap it to (least of all Spencer). But it won't take much for the mids to gel. And Viney in as another clearance in-and-under mid will improve the balance.

Oh, and St.Kilda's midfielders may have had less polish than ours, but they were fast and tackled hard, so they were able to nullify us to some degree, and limit the damage of having their star mids out. Newsflash - until our mids work it out and it all becomes instinctive instead of having to think about every disposal, they will do better against a skilful midfield like RIchmond's, and will struggle against a hard & tough midfield of whatever quality.

The most amazing thing was that with all these obstacles, we still could have - and should have - won the game. We created far more chances, but they were able to simply make the most out of fewer chances. That's what tall forwards allow you to do.

I can understand the frustration at losing to the Saints, but when you analyse it (rather than just react out of emotion), it wasn't so bad. A lot of Demonlanders had way too high expectations. We've definitely improved a lot since last year - we've got the foundation (but only the foundation so far!!) of a game plan, the framework is looking promising, and a lot of the building blocks are there to be put in place, but there's still a lot of building to be done. Roos said during the presser that the players are much better than they think they are, and he repeated that it will take until Round 5 to see the total picture of what he's trying to do. We've still got a way to go until we're a good team. But the signs are there.

[Arrow 1,257]

We had 75 interchanges. 75.

We had 20% more I50's than St Kilda.

We had more marks inside forward 50.

We won the hitouts by 14 with our second or third string ruckman, and a VFL player backing him up.

We won the tackle count despite having more of the football than St Kilda.

It doesn't lessen the pain, but I have absolutely no doubt that with one forward we would've won that game. With Fitzy playing the whole game, I truly believe we would've won. But that's footy.

Our biggest mistake was over possessing the football, too many times the straight running kicker was running through a gap, yet stopped to look to handball to someone. It's basic errors that are made by a team just not 100% in-line with the game plan. St Kilda have it easy, they hit pressure and put it on Roo's head. We never had that easy option and I'm excited to see the difference when we do have a structured forward line whenever that is.

Not sure if it would have been able to see on the TV but especially in the first half it was very impressive to watch the game open up when we effectively switched the ball from half back through the middle and watching player's in the MFC jumper spread hard and line up with space in front of them. It was great to watch. Bail was working hard side to side, Watts was general in the middle and Fitzy was presenting well up the line. The overlap we were creating was the best football I've seen Melbourne play since 2010 when we spanked Sydney with hard run.

I was absolutely distraught last night, and I got sick of telling myself the same excuses that with a forward line we coulda, shoulda, woulda.

The realistic nature is last year we were the worst team and minus Michael Evans having the best quarter of his life we would have won the spoon. You lose your second best key defender and your best key forward, and you're already playing short- you're cooked. Doesn't help our sub was 160cm and weights 70 kilos either.

People will tell me all week that Fitzy and Tom Mc are nobodies and them going off shouldn't have impacted the game. Let me be clear, I don't particularly rate Jack F but as soon as he went off, **** did I notice how much we needed him for structure. Never thought I'd ever say I missed him, but he was one of about 4 players we couldn't have lost, and we did. TMac was giving Riewoldt a bath, sadly Nick went on the give Frawley a bigger one. Frawls is a great defender but he's not as athletic as Tom and it showed.

I'm upset we lost to the worst team on paper I've nearly ever seen.
Hindsight tells me that the signs are there that this football team will be competitive. Round 16 last year I wouldn't dream to be where we are now, we were climbing Everest blind. We've taken a small body blow with this loss, but I won't start worrying until Round 16 this year and the same problems.

Come on Melbourne, let's start the climb.

[angrydee 842]

Mmmmm.....at the risk of offending the 'Vegies', I'm not sure that's a good thing in an elite sportsman.

Didn't do Brett Kirk any harm.

[angrydee 842]

They said he was in contention for round 1, then we are told minimum 8 weeks? Obviously Mitch Clark is going to miss games that he is indeed physically fit for, and he is genuinely the most important player in the side bar none, and it IS going to cost us wins. To me it is shocking that everyone seems to be so accepting of this.

You'd think in this day and age, you'd understand about depression. Clark showed nothing but courage playing in the red and blue. This is not the first time he's crashed after being down on himself for being injured. It happened early in his career at the Lions. But he came out of it bigger and stronger. Hopefully he'll do so again.

I sincerely hope that mental health problems don't befall you or anyone in your family. But karma can be a [censored], and while you bravely attack a young man struggling with his mental demons (pun not intended) from behind your keyboard, hope and pray it doesn't strike you or yours.

[Arrow 1,257]

You'd think in this day and age, you'd understand about depression. Clark showed nothing but courage playing in the red and blue. This is not the first time he's crashed after being down on himself for being injured. It happened early in his career at the Lions. But he came out of it bigger and stronger. Hopefully he'll do so again.

I sincerely hope that mental health problems don't befall you or anyone in your family. But karma can be a [censored], and while you bravely attack a young man struggling with his mental demons (pun not intended) from behind your keyboard, hope and pray it doesn't strike you or yours.

It's quite sad. I love Demon supporters but I don't get the stuff about Clarky.

Menzel from Geelong has missed 3 years in a row now and all the Cats supporters do is tweet him support and back him in. Clark keeps getting injured by being courageous in the red and blue and people like Curry want an apology and a money rebate from him?! Get a grip.

If he never plays for us again it'll be extremely disappointing, but I'll be grateful that for 2 years he gave me a reason to watch us when nothing else made me want to go to games.

[Undeeterred 3,123]

what perspective? There is no reason to suggest we will getter any better than what we saw last night which should mean going winless for the year. Even GWS has already beaten Sydney, leaving us exposed for the wooden spoon. Can you imagine if we were playing the Hawks last night, we would have lost by 110 just like we did 2 weeks ago. Dawes and Clark are going to kick about 3 goals between them for year so where are the rest going to come from? We have Pederson named at FF that is where we are at.

Here's the scary thing: Jones, Watts, Tyson, Vince and Grimes got an average of 30.4 touches each. Together they helped us to 47 inside-50s, which is nearly an average amount. If that's all you knew about the game you would assume we kicked 13-14 goals and probably won, but we kicked SIX.

So go ahead and give me some 'perspective' and convince me how we are going to improve. I'm guessing that come round 22 you'll be talking about how we might have won a game for the year if only poor old Mitch had cheered up and played a game.

Sadly, this is 1000% correct.

[Undeeterred 3,123]

A ruckman who doesn't take an around the ground pack grab is surplus to needs IMV.

So we've got three?

[robbiefrom13 887]

Roos has said that he does most of his work before the game. One thing he did before this game was turn Watts into a midfielder. Who'd thought of that before?

And, if we hadn't had injuries in the game, we'd surely have won. In time, the one thing that will be remembered from Roos' first game at Melbourne will be Jack Watts' re-creation and first appearance as a classy midfielder. There should be a lot more to that story - he had all the tools and then some, in just his first appearance in the role. Nice work, Roosy!

[Demon Disciple 12,065]

And, if we hadn't had injuries in the game, we'd surely have won.

We should have won the game anyways, with everything that did happen regardless. 6.15 is woeful kicking for goal.

Vince kicked 1.4, Jones missed a relatively easy shot, so too Trengove, don't get me started on Pederson's miss (though Billings' howler was just as bad).

St.Kilda didn't win that game, we lost it through our pathetic accuracy on goal and rule of handballing a million times before we allowed ourselves to kick it.

[Chelly 810]

Jon Ralph of the Herald Sun tweeted overnight:-

"@RalphyHeraldSun: Stunned by Melbournes critics. No Hogan, Dawes, Clark. No Garland/Gawn/Jamar. McDonald hobbled, The Fitz off. That's 8 of 10 best talls out"

Says it all.

[old dee 23,781]

We should have won the game anyways, with everything that did happen regardless. 6.15 is woeful kicking for goal.

Vince kicked 1.4, Jones missed a relatively easy shot, so too Trengove, don't get me started on Pederson's miss (though Billings' howler was just as bad).

St.Kilda didn't win that game, we lost it through our pathetic accuracy on goal and rule of handballing a million times before we allowed ourselves to kick it.

We were just not good enough.

You can come up with all the excuse you want.

The score board says the Saints won

end of story.

[jackaub 1,402]

Yep rjay.

Why is it that people cannot accept we have a poor list.

PR and the new FD can only do so much.

For four years the people that run out to play have been showing us their skill level.

We have started to replace a lot of the NGE's but there is still much to be done.

IMO we need another two years to get a decent list.

Yes Old Dee that is the problem all right. We are going to pay for poor recruitment for a long time yet. Two years Minimum maybe 3 to 4

Some on here can't /won't accept the fact that our recruitment is the cause of most of the current playing problems. Why our recruitment was so poor can be explained by many other issues discussed on here. Culture, management,personnel, leadership etc

Poor recruitment is a result of all of these and will take years to fix. I believe Carlton are now in a similar situation.

Edited March 23, 2014 by jackaub

[Undeeterred 3,123]

While not really wanting to provide an excuse/reason for last nights result, consider this fact.

Any team in this competition would struggle if they could not field their 3 best tall forwards, 2 of their 3 ruckmen, their best up and coming mid and their best defender and then lose their only remaining tall forward and a key defender in the first half, and that includes Hawthorn,Fremantle or whoever you want to put forward.

Keep this in perspective, yes it was disappointing to see and we all would have loved to see a win but remember the base we are coming from, yes St.Kilda was missing 3 mids but our list is at a point where we just can't cover the key players missing.

If St.Kilda had no Reiwolt last night we would have won yet we were missing 3 of our equivalents which made it very tough.

This kind of appraisal needs to be conducted at round 15 or 16 not after 1 round with a very injury riddled team.

Understand the venting just don't know if it is fully justified.

The other fact is we lost an eminently winnable game against a garbage opposition.

Talk to me when we win our first game. Given we have a run of about ten through the middle of the season where we will be lucky to win one, I'd be surprised if we were better than about 2-15...

[jumbo returns 6,739]

Roos is not immune from critical feedback.

The man has respect, nous and I'm sure he's built an excellent working relationship with his assistants.

It was not one of his best coaching nights.

He'll need to get into it as well.

I'm 100% sure he's unpacking the game as we speak.

Stop defending him - he'll be okay.

[Undeeterred 3,123]

Trengove, Sylvia, Watts and Cale Morton were supposed to become these players but of course they didn't. Don't know why anyone would expect the next crop to be any different.

I've agreed with the sound and fury from you on this thread, but this is a touch off the mark. I'm spewing about the loss, but I think in time this particular aspect of past failures will be rectified.

[KingDingAling 3,752]

Good piece there Arrow

[praha 11,236]

What makes St Kilda garbage? They had experienced Grand Final players, a Hall of Famer, and the knowledge of the ground. They play more than half their games there for crying out loud!

The players went into their shells at the most inappropriate times. TBH I really think it was as simple as that. The two errors across the middle that led to goals, they came when a Melbourne player refused to just bomb it long. There are many variables involved in that scenario. Good and bad response to a lacking forward line. Melbourne had to control the play, keep possession, it did for a majority of the time, but then one error in the worst possible spot and you're on the other foot: making an error at Etihad is costly. It is at every ground, but especially Etihad.

I don't understand why Melbourne was favourite. It was a pity bet. The Roos factor. Romanticism. Melbourne has done NOTHING to deserve going in favourite against a team like the Saints.

This team will come good.

Edited March 23, 2014 by Cudi_420

[Undeeterred 3,123]

To who brainiac?

I don't understand why so many people are too stupid to understand this very fundamental issue.

[pitmaster 3,513]

Jon Ralph of the Herald Sun tweeted overnight:-

"@RalphyHeraldSun: Stunned by Melbournes critics. No Hogan, Dawes, Clark. No Garland/Gawn/Jamar. McDonald hobbled, The Fitz off. That's 8 of 10 best talls out"

Says it all.

Wow, thanks for pointing that out. The media reaction has been so misinformed - Rohan Connolly in The Age missed all of that completely.

I have not read the entire thread - could anyone? - but has anyone else pointed out that Paul Roos did say don't form judgements for the first five or six weeks.

Like others I can't see us winning anything until we get some players back but we will improve over the year - the second half should be significantly better.

Now I am going to try to convince myself.

[Undeeterred 3,123]

What makes St Kilda garbage? They had experienced Grand Final players, a Hall of Famer, and the knowledge of the ground. They play more than half their games there for crying out loud!

The players went into their shells at the most inappropriate times. TBH I really think it was as simple as that. The two errors across the middle that led to goals, they came when a Melbourne player refused to just bomb it long. There are many variables involved in that scenario. Good and bad response to a lacking forward line. Melbourne had to control the play, keep possession, it did for a majority of the time, but then one error in the worst possible spot and you're on the other foot: making an error at Etihad is costly. It is at every ground, but especially Etihad.

I don't understand why Melbourne was favourite. It was a pity bet. The Roos factor. Romanticism. Melbourne has done NOTHING to deserve going in favourite against a team like the Saints.

This team will come good.

Seriously? They had Riewoldt, Dempster and, well, now I'm struggling. They had a rookie upgrade tear us a new one. That's like us bringing Jetta and him having 20 touches.

We should have given them a bath and the fact that we were so close when we were so absolutely rooted cattle wise, and still should have won, is enough for us all to drop the excuses.

Flat out, we should have won.

[Ted Lasso 19,306]

Seriously? They had Riewoldt, Dempster and, well, now I'm struggling. They had a rookie upgrade tear us a new one. That's like us bringing Jetta and him having 20 touches.

We should have given them a bath and the fact that we were so close when we were so absolutely rooted cattle wise, and still should have won, is enough for us all to drop the excuses.

Flat out, we should have won.

It's alot easier to give another team a bath when you have someone capable of kicking goals to kick too.