One good thing about today is that tomorrow is Tuesday.

Love not working Mondays even when football is as frustrating as it was today.

Had trouble with the stream + missed a fair chunk of the game. 33 points is a fairly par result but the scorecard is disappointing. We were probably due a reality check and got one.

Some really poor disposal forward of the centre today. Viney, love the guy but was shanking them everywhere. Garland, Bail.

Thank God for Lynden Dunn.

He was good in defence, but his kicking wasn't great. Handed them at least one goal on a platter.

Also thought Vince and Gawn were good.

Garland is a worry. Better by Grimes. Bail and Matt Jones got good stats but don't hurt with their possessions.

Thought Gawn was an absolute liability when the ball hit the ground. I would have subbed him for JKH.

Grimes was better today, but one of his poor decisions cost us a goal. He was certainly better though.

Disappointing that young Frost cleaned up Dawes. Vince was one that looked like he could make a difference. Pedersen and Nate Jones handy. Young guys were overawed.

Frost killed him, but often Dawes was outnumbered 3 or 4 on 1. We cannot take marks out in front of ourselves. Our snail-like ball movement didn't help any of our forwards (see Salem and JKH).

Bail, Salem, jkh all very average today

Yes, but the ball movement didn't help. We had, what, 35 inside 50s for the game? We kept trying to finesse passes all day and our blokes wouldn't put their hands out in front. I think the kick to the top of the square a couple of times would have been nice, rather than dinky little kicks that get spoilt out of bounds and rebounded quickly.

Jetta - best game yet and was one of the only players to shepherd

Tyson - he can pencil that down as the worst game so far in the red and blue. Got caught with his pants down and turned it over too many times

Salem & JKH - forgetable. There was moment in the final quarter when both were chasing one Collingwood player, provided no pressure and Collingwood rebounded

Viney & Watts - need to nail those shots

Garland - extremely rusty and cost us a few

Jones - reliable

I still don't understand why Jamar was subbed off. It should have been Gawn and the results after the substitution speak for themselves.

A very big reality check.

I agree with all of that, PJ. The one I didn't give credit to earlier was Jetta. He was fantastic.

From a serious doubter, I thought Watts played well, worked hard , didn't shirk it

Didn't have a particular problem with his game, but he should have nailed that goal. He usually would have.

Vince was BOG. Jones, Dunn, Cross, Pederson, Jetta and Watts all good.

Slow movement into forward line, terrible turnovers.

Garland, Salem, Tyson, Matt Jones all below par.

Viney needs to improve kicking quickly. Jones and Bail too many turnovers. Think Blease should come in for some speed and offensive run. Collingwood are the best defensive side we've played and it showed up our skill level.

I agree with the bolded part.

So many of our guys were sloppy when the ball was within their grasp. No one was clean. The pressure got to them and the occasion got to them, I think.

Free kick count: 13 to 5.

Farcical, absolutely farcical. [censored] useless white maggots, I hope Roos goes off his head in the presser, they sucked the life out of the game when it was getting close. They did everything in their power to stop us from getting anywhere near them by cherry picking [censored] frees. Gutless pricks. When will there be some goddamn accountability from the AFL about these flogs?!

The inexplicable call against Jetta that denied Vince a goal and would have put us within 4 points, turned the game. They then went down the other end, scored a goal and never looked back. Young sides need everything to go for them. Vince's goal may have swung the momentum our way and who knows.

Well, that was like pulling teeth...

Just a huge imbalance in defending and attacking, which is not all bad, you want a well drilled defensive first and foremost.

But basically no classy forward thrusts for the whole game.

We lack a dashing HBF with foot skills, that has to be our priority post-season.

I was pleased with the first half, expected the shackles to be released at some point but it never came. Easier said than done against a drilled side like Collingwood.

Tyson had his worst game for the year.

Garland had his worst game ever.

Viney is a bull but his kicking was shocking.

JKH and Salem looked a bit lost.

Why Salem wasn't subbed off I'd love to know. He offered nothing and Jamar was having a great game. Once he went off they got an easy ride from the clearances.

Dumb move. Same as last weeks sub. Roosy, I love ya, but stop [censored] up the subs.

Jones, Dunn, Vince Jamar and Cross led really well. They all stood up and played really well.

Was happy with Jetta yet again and I think there's no doubt he's bonafide now.

Pederson was epic.

Just need some leading forwards that kick goals, and some class to stick it down their throats and we'll go alright.

Let's smash Essendon.

If he can improve his kicking to a solid level, he'll be A grade. If his kicking doesn't improve his ceiling is B grade. He reminded me of his old man today.

Spot on 'Webber', will write more on this when I have more time (posted a bit on it the other day). It's something to do with the AFL idea of continuous play and it's ruining the game. Evans needs to be held to account for this.

What I find interesting after attending today's game was seeing up close, at times when it was near me, what the umpires don't pay and what they do. The umpires weren't paying much and I generally like that but then they would pick out something when they didn't need to and you wonder why? There was the so called deliberate kick out of bounds, the ignoring of Elliot's high flying when the ball was no where near him, ignoring Clokes holding but pinging Dunn when he did, ignoring what was happening to Dawes in the contests but then paying a soft contest to Beams right in front when there was no chopping of the arms in the contest, which they weren't paying that day anyway.....I can go on and on. It didn't cost us the game but it is frustrating.

My point is that the AFL, commentators and fans get in a tizz over the lack of goal camera technology. The idea that a ball may go thru for a goal and we don't know for sure whether it was touched or hit the post is a huge problem that may decide games and so. But really tight games are decided much more often by umpiring decisions up the field every week. And the fact interpretations change from week to week.

Melbourne allowing Collingwood to play a loose man in defence was costly.

The best piece of play was when Pedersen had the ball on a half forward flank he actually played on straight away and took the game on which opened up the forward line and eventually resulted in Howe kicking a goal.

Melbourne allowing Collingwood to play a loose man in defence was costly.

The best piece of play was when Pedersen had the ball on a half forward flank he actually played on straight away and took the game on which opened up the forward line and eventually resulted in Howe kicking a goal.

If Pedo could kick 60 rather than just the 50 metres we would have had another 3 goals I think. He was accurate each time but couldn't get the distance.

Realistically this was the outcome I expected, and we should have lost by a bit less because we fluffed some easy shots in the last quarter, and were robbed of the Vince goal.

This was our 2nd worst effort for the year, but I think it was admirable that we fought the game our defensively. Our midfield was well beaten, and Tyson was really tagged out of the game which didn't help. Our forward movement was also woeful, and Dawes had an absolute stinker. We aren't at the stage where we can afford too many of our top players to be down on form.

Having said all that, we kept at it, we had a good first half, and our own errors were what really cost us. In the end if we used the ball better we would have gotten closer.

The improvement is still palpable, we are still very much on the up, and the lessons learnt today are valuable. We dust ourselves off and we move on, remembering that this time last year we were embarrassed, humiliated and destroyed in nearly every game we played. Today we lost to a far better team in far better form in a respectable manner.

Excellent post ... not much to add other than to say that if this is one of our worst efforts, there's a big upside. We can only get better with time and with at least one productive off season. Probably 2 off seasons in all reality but one thing at a time. By the end of the season, a much clearer picture will have unfolded.

At 3/4 time we had a realistic chance of winning the game but luck was against us and we ran out of legs (which in turn, affected our poise and delivery) The fact that a lot of us are annoyed that we're not winning these sort of games says to me that we've come a long way and we're on the right path.

The truth is that we lack finishing skills and to fix that problem, we require the time to practice and work on our skills (under pressure) and also, our list management will be high on the agenda.

- media saturation leading up to the game

- tyson tagged out, learning curve

- frost is unreal

- astonishing ump calls

- media saturation leading up to the game

- some other excuses

we'll smash the bombers

Didn't see it, and the match report lists the injuries as TBC, but I thought at the time that the only reason to sub Jamar off was an injury.

There was nothing wrong with Jamar.

Roos said on 360 they were debating in the box for about 10m deciding who to sub and thought Gawn would be fresher as he didn't ruck as much as Jamar. Roos said like the Tyson sub this was a mistake. He also said he hates the sub rule and that they needed to sub someone off cause u can't leave JKH on the bench for 4 qrts.

I still don't think we've brought above 80 per cent intensity over the last two weeks. The tackle count is the indicator. We had ordinary tackle numbers for the Port game and managed a similarly low numbers this week. On the one hand, that means there's great scope for improvement with his group, but it's disappointing they haven't been able to bring the intensity of that Adelaide game or even the Richmond game. The benchmark for tackle count should be 65ish. You don't win games with 40ish tackles.

If Pedo could kick 60 rather than just the 50 metres we would have had another 3 goals I think. He was accurate each time but couldn't get the distance.

Another thing, Melbourne players not standing on the goal line for both his shots on goal. Only Dawes went down there but was out-numbered!

Realistically this was the outcome I expected, and we should have lost by a bit less because we fluffed some easy shots in the last quarter, and were robbed of the Vince goal.

This was our 2nd worst effort for the year, but I think it was admirable that we fought the game our defensively. Our midfield was well beaten, and Tyson was really tagged out of the game which didn't help. Our forward movement was also woeful, and Dawes had an absolute stinker. We aren't at the stage where we can afford too many of our top players to be down on form.

Having said all that, we kept at it, we had a good first half, and our own errors were what really cost us. In the end if we used the ball better we would have gotten closer.

The improvement is still palpable, we are still very much on the up, and the lessons learnt today are valuable. We dust ourselves off and we move on, remembering that this time last year we were embarrassed, humiliated and destroyed in nearly every game we played. Today we lost to a far better team in far better form in a respectable manner.

yeah it was our 2nd worst scoreboard result....but effort?? No way

Seriously crueled by some "interesting" decisions as well as unfortunate ball bonces, but that happens.

That was a ridiculously low scoring game. we played a team with 4/4 of a teamsheet ...we had may 2/3 3/4 best.

Not a bad result,not the best either. Good learning effort

Edited June 9, 201411 yr by beelzebub

How the fk does Bernie Vince get ping for holding the man on Pendles when they were both having a one on one scuffle! Pulled it out of his ass that umpy. Another protected species is pendles..

He made a simple point Nasher. That after our first goal some 23 seconds in, in the rest of the game we only managed 2 more. I think we all understand what he meant.

Redleg, I have difficulty understanding "what people meant" if it's not what they said at the best of times (call it a disability if you like), but in this case I think what he said was such a long way off what he meant (and said in a subsequent post) that I couldn't make the same connection that you have. Judging by the number of likes on my post, I wasn't the only one.

Frost absolutely killed us, he owned Dawes.

Redleg, I have difficulty understanding "what people meant" if it's not what they said at the best of times (call it a disability if you like), but in this case I think what he said was such a long way off what he meant (and said in a subsequent post) that I couldn't make the same connection that you have. Judging by the number of likes on my post, I wasn't the only one.

For the love of god let it go.

Edited June 9, 201411 yr by DemonOX

There was nothing wrong with Jamar.

Roos said on 360 they were debating in the box for about 10m deciding who to sub and thought Gawn would be fresher as he didn't ruck as much as Jamar. Roos said like the Tyson sub this was a mistake. He also said he hates the sub rule and that they needed to sub someone off cause u can't leave JKH on the bench for 4 qrts.

That is a surprise, but there you go. FWIW I thought that Pedo would struggle in the ruck and rob us of our most effective key forward. Just goes to show we are all human ...

For the love of god let it go.

I have the right to explain myself when respectfully challenged by a poster I also respect. Would not have bothered responding to anyone else.

(Yeah, yeah, letting it go now)

Thought Gawn was an absolute liability when the ball hit the ground. I would have subbed him for JKH.

Adam, this is pretty normal for blokes over 200cm I'd have thought. I can't think of too many men of ruckman size who are any good below their knees.

I reckon if we're relying on Max to impact contests at ground level, we're doing it a bit wrong.

That is a surprise, but there you go. FWIW I thought that Pedo would struggle in the ruck and rob us of our most effective key forward. Just goes to show we are all human ...

At least Roos comes out and admits when he has made a wrong decision.

It's a nice change tbh.

Frost absolutely killed us, he owned Dawes.

Would be a good replacement for Frawley next season.

Edited June 9, 201411 yr by DemonOX

Another thing, Melbourne players not standing on the goal line for both his shots on goal. Only Dawes went down there but was out-numbered!

Spot on. Both times, Gawn would stand on the 50 metre line. He's got a lot to learn, does the number 37.

Collingwood had the luxury of defending a very undermanned fwd 50

look fwd to having a properly manned fwd line

"Technically" is the new "literally", metaphorically speaking.

Adam, this is pretty normal for blokes over 200cm I'd have thought. I can't think of too many men of ruckman size who are any good below their knees.

I reckon if we're relying on Max to impact contests at ground level, we're doing it a bit wrong.

What I mean is that their little blokes would just scoot past him. He didn't lay enough tackles. Admittedly, that's not necessarily Gawn's fault. I think it was a selection fault. We went too big and our big guys struggled to have any impact on the scoreboard.

Edited June 9, 201411 yr by AdamFarr

What I mean is that their little blokes would just scoot past him. Admittedly, that's not necessarily Gawn's fault. I think it was a selection fault. We went too big and our big guys struggled to have any impact on the scoreboard.

Agreed, there was a lack of balance in the team selected and this was obvious before the first bounce.

Edited June 9, 201411 yr by Clint Bizkit