Because he wasn't put there at half time!

And he would have won us the game had he kicked straight.

What a disgusting way to spend my afternoon. We definitely did not deserve to win, but we should have.

Jetta 0 tackles. Cross 1 tackle. McDonald 1 tackle.

Viney, Vince, Jones, Brayshaw all below 60% disposal efficiency.

But yeah, they were great....

58 inside 50s to 45

Your clutching at straws here, our forwards had more opportunities as our mids/backs were on top most of the game

Yes, but the context of that is yes we missed a few easy ones, but we also had A LOT of difficult shots due to the horrible delivery inside 50. Is a snap from the boundary expected to be a high percentage shot?

Context please.

There were plenty of low percentage shots but there were also plenty of gettable ones missed, which are important.

Take the 25 scoring shots to 19, add in 58 inside 50s to 45 and 45 clearances to 40, and you see the real issue with this game.

Why was McDonald thrown forward in the last

It was the only good coaching decision of the game. McDonald has been defending hopelessly but was good at running in straight lines and structuring up the f50.

We have improved, but we are just finding ways to lose at the minute, between this game, the saints game it's just so frustrating

yes, we have.. but it's just to such a miniscule amount.. in 2013 we were one of the worst sides ever, how many years at this rate of improvement until we are flag contenders... 20? 30?

ANOTHER DISGUSTING performance.

This club continues to find ways to further distance itself from it core supporters.

Tyson needs a good hard look at himself. His disposal has been unbelievably poor this year.

Reminds me of Cameron Bruce.

The negatives and worries from the game are as follows:

Tyson - Doesn't know what defensive running is and his disposal/decision making at times is awful. Seems as if he's happy with his year last year and is going through the motions. Unless the knee is troubling him still? WTF is going on?

Midfield in general - Banging the ball on the boot far too often when they don't need to. Handball to a free player is almost always there. Vince a major culprit which is majorly concerning given he's one of our smartest and best users. Is this instruction from Roos and the midfield coaches for us to just kick forward blindly? For as long as I can remember, Vince has been a beautiful user of the footy and more often than not makes the right decisions. I don't know why it's changed this year.

Backline - The amount of times we have a combination of McDonald, Garland, Lumumba and Dunn all going up to spoil is comical. There is no structure to what they're doing. They don't play as a unit. Kicking skills from McDonald, Dunn and Garland. When will we ever be bold and run with the ball and create movement?

Effort and intensity - From the start of the game we were being out-worked and out-tackled by a team who had more desire. We were giving them the ball with turn-overs and they were more accurate in front of goal. Why did they decide to play with intensity in the last quarter? How does it go missing so often at this level?

Vandenberg again showed many of his team mates up with his effort, decision making and goal kicking. How hard is it to find blokes like this?

Reminds me of Cameron Bruce.

Your not far off the mark.

58 inside 50s to 45

Your clutching at straws here, our forwards had more opportunities as our mids/backs were on top most of the game

FMD. You can't be this dumb surely? How have you STILL not wrapped your tiny brain around the fact that it was the quality of disposal today? Our 4 most important midfielders wasted half their disposals.

Far out.

Jones, Garland, Viney, Vince, Tyson, Dunn, Dawes, Lumumba, Garlett, Cross and Howe. That's the core leadership group.

How many of them had good games today? Vince? Jones, maybe?

Combine that with the fact that ANB, Stretch and Harmes were all ineffectual, and JKH was a bad choice as sub (yet another game day mistake from Roos), and it's no wonder why we lose games.

The negatives and worries from the game are as follows:

Tyson - Doesn't know what defensive running is and his disposal/decision making at times is awful.

Midfield in general - Banging the ball on the boot far too often when they don't need to. Handball to a free player is almost always there. Vince a major culprit which is majorly concerning given he's one of our smartest and best users.

Backline - The amount of times we have a combination of McDonald, Garland, Lumumba and Dunn all going up to spoil is comical. There is no structure to what they're doing. They don't play as a unit. Kicking skills from McDonald, Dunn and Garland. When will we ever be bold and run with the ball and create movement?

Effort and intensity - From the start of the game we were being out-worked and out-tackled by a team who had more desire. We were giving them the ball with turn overs and they were more accurate in front of goal.

Vandenberg again showed may of his team mates up with his effort, decision making and goal kicking. How hard is it to find blokes like this?

Great post.

Just got home from the game. My god that was the worst 1/2 of footy ive ever seen and this was essenson as well. The 3rd quarter we were non existent.

The last quarter we had 19-6 inside 50's. We had our chances. It was a good move to move Tommy in the forward line and he had an awesome quarter but he just could not kick a goal. If he kicked straight we would have won.

But the frustrations for me today was

Dawes- gave away a silly 50 metre penalty which resulted in a daniher goal

Gawn smashed it in the the ruck but just couldnt get it to our midfield. His contested marking is good though

WE just didnt support each other around the ball. Essendon always had 1 there to give it to.

Look at all those senior players essesndon were missing today. WE have managed to beat them when we have been crap yet couldnt do it today. I reckon our midfield was smashed. Vince and jones were shocking by foot

At time I felt for hogan today. There were times there when he was going up for marks in a pack and getting spoiled by other teammates. Gartlett should stay down and im not sure why Neal Bullen would get in his way. Also in the last quarter when watts had the ball hogan led up beautifully in the centre and watts ignored him. You also have to remember who was playing on him. Hurley is not a bad player. Its dawes we have to be more frustrated with at the moment.

And my nightmare came true today. We bought cloke back into form and now we did it with daniher. Opposition clubs out there if you have a key forward who is struggling just play us. We will get them back into form.

I seriously do not no how we beat geelong. Melbourne cannot handle being favorites.

So glad I chose to work instead of watching them play brisbane next week. Im so frustrated and angry.

Hopefuly howe cops a long suspension for the tackle he laid that concussed a bloke (think it was browne) because the coaches don't seem to want to make that call.

Not surprised, it was typical Melbourne. Just expected to win and played selfish, dumb and lazy football.

I agree but for how unbelievably shithouse we've been for so long.

How can this be.

Leadership is still all [censored] up obviously.

While this is up there for our worst loss of the year.... if we look at a bigger picture then there might be some good that comes out of it...

The heat will come off essendon and hird, so they will not be forced to make a decision on him, and hopefully start new contract discussions...

everyone knows essendon will never move forward will hird is still in charge so the longer they delay in the quagmire of indecisiveness (bit like our coaches today) the better...

Forget about Essendon, we have our own issues to sort out.

Post of the year!!! On top of that comment I do not want to hear any [censored] comments coming from players or coaches at this club.

Shameful and embarrassing. Might as well have lost by 100 points FWIW.

why not 200? If 8 is the same 100, why not just call it a 200 point loss?

oh shut up please politically correct social justice warrior

I'll have you know that I'm actually a corporate lawyer and part-time seal-clubber. Not sure why I stir up your grumpy side more than others. Joe the supposed spud kicked half their score today while our Great White Hogan caught a case of the Dawes.

To many non contributors today. Blokes who cannot and will not ever be good kicks. How can you not make the distance from 35 metres out or kick out on the full from the same distance. Absolutely butchered the ball and played dumb unaccountable football.

Just got home from game.

Not sure why all the doom and gloom - we may not have walked away with 4 points but for once it was a game that we wasted in a true sense - we actually won the inside 50 count 58-45.

Obviously a lack of kicking skills and confidence when going for goals hurt big time and four posters was a factor as well.

Our key forwards really struggled and kept getting push under the ball - but part of that gets down to poor kicking from mids - Viney was probably the biggest offender in that department although his intensity was sensational as usual and he made Heppell work for almost everything.

Crossy also had a howler - very, very rare from him - don't start saying we should drop him or you are a nuffer.

Too often in the first half we lacked the ability to link up and be aware when we had no space or had space to deliver correctly.

All our kids had shockers as well - Stretch couldn't get free and when he was, he was ignored, Neal-Bullen couldn't win it and eventually was sent back to defence I think, Hoges needed to impose and kept getting beaten in air and did not seem to have the pace on a lead, Harmesy made Bail and Matt Jones look good as far as small forwards go, Angus seemed unusually timid and probably just gave Cripps the Rising Star award, while JKH only had a quarter and was just average - but that is what happens with kids, hot and cold.

Gawn was clearly our best, but then again he was up against a relative dwarf and in the third term our midfielders forgot how to rove to him.

Jonesy had a sensational second term, Vince was prolific as usual and Vandenberg made a terrific return - he could yet be one hell of a player.

T-Mac started with a couple of left foot clangers, kept presenting and looked good until Daniher got on a roll in the third term. He was then shifted to the forward line - swapped for Howey. He then showed our forwards how you do it with some nice leads and follow ups, but unfortunately messed it up shooting for goal. But the pleasing aspect is that T-Mac will now be tried a bit more up forward and it's an experiment that may allow Fitzy to get another game.

I was really pleased that Wattsy, after a quiet first half, really lifted and was a huge factor in the last term - almost got us across the line and looked strong at it (yes I know I'm talking about JW).

It certainly wasn't a game where you walk away down in the dumps - just one that got away.

Not sure this is true. We didn't find a way to lose today, we never looked like winning it. Those blaming the kicking are not seeing the truth. They read the game, used the ball better, and began playing for each other in a way we never do. Like the St.Kilda loss, we never deserved to win. People forget that the Saints had the ball camped in their forward line for most of the last quarter. It would have been very unjust if they'd lost. How have we improved since last year? There's simply no evidence at the moment.

except that pesky little win-of-the-decade we pulled off two weeks ago down the highway. That messes with the narrative a bit eh.

2 big kicks in the gut today

That [censored] that can't kick straight kicking 4 and not being able to convert or hit targets going forward

We lost that..... very disappointing

Out-coached?

Their loose man impacted contests and intercepted lots of inside 50"s, while ours often didn't make the contest. How hard is it to figure that out and go one on one?

Our kicks inside 50 were generally deplorable making it hard for the forwards.

Hogan had to take that dickface Hurely up the ground earlier.

As a team, we seem to have zero self belief when challenged. With a hard tag on Jones, who else said "I will lead"?

I believe we were told we will play in the finals in 2016. In what universe does anyone think we will be playing finals football next year. Absolutely miles off the middle still - no chance.

Just can't wait for the spin. Please do tell us again how much we have improved Roosy.

Field kicking remains a huge problem for the club. There were numerous times when we just couldn't spot up a target.

No forward system.

Blind kicks to nobody. How many uncontested marks did they take at half back?

Our forwards weren't going to the right spaces and when they were in the zone people like Dawes and Hogan were generally two or three metres out of position.

Also, we did not kick to advantage.

Lots more chances but from bad places.

Losing an un-losable match, how very Melbourne-like. I was worried about this game all week, and it was almost exactly what I expected. two weeks in a row we have gone in with game plans that clearly weren't working, bombing it in long when our forwards aren't taking marks, surely you re-think the plan and get them to lower the eyes. Tommy Mac have been innacurate but it was at least the correct way of going about it.

This match and the saints loss are two games we should've won but tactically we failed. The pies game as well but I can recognise they are at least a better team than us. Lions next week is a must win, simple as that. We lose that and the progress we've made this year will be rendered meaningless.