POST MATCH DISCUSSION - Round 20

[CBDees 3,167]

What is our free count for and against this year?

I cant recall one game where we have received more frees then the opposition

Nor one game where the opposition were gifted as many frees directly in front of goal. Some of the frees against us for supposed high tackles were scandalous (unless the rules have been rewritten to include tackles between the shoulder and the hips)!

[Little Richard 6,265]

What is our free count for and against this year?

I cant recall one game where we have received more frees then the opposition

The last few weeks, there have been some absolutely atrocious decisions and inconsistency from the umpires. Usually around what constitutes holding the ball and incorrect disposal.

Having said that, it doesn't really have an effect on our result but it does make the game far more difficult to watch and far more frustrating.

[Bombay Airconditioning 6,408]

Why lump Grimes in when he was the sub?

Sub or not, he's one of many that isn't AFL standard.

[chook fowler 19,551]

The umpiring was disgusting but the fact remains if you're at the ball first the frees will go your way.

The Dogs wanted it more and were rewarded, often unfairly.

[ManDee 7,222]

Pet hates,

Handball to stationary team mate who is about to be tackled.

Handball to the feet of a team mate.

Kick to the only opposition player in the middle of three teamates.

Kick to a cluster of opposition players with no teamates in sight.

Giving away soft free kicks inside opposition forward 50.

Undisciplined 50 metre penalties.

Fix the above and we would have been at least a six goal better side yesterday.

Edit : - fix typos

Edited August 17, 2015 by ManDee

[Straight Sets Simon 23,113]

The umpiring was disgusting but the fact remains if you're at the ball first the frees will go your way.

The Dogs wanted it more and were rewarded, often unfairly.

That pretty much sums it up.

The funniest free kick was the one to Garlett I think it was who got a player holding the ball, everyone stopped and about three seconds later the umpire realised it was a free kick and then decided to blow the whistle. How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Clint Bizkit

[Mazer Rackham 14,971]

How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

Yep. Because our umps are so confused by the nonsense direction pushed on them by the ump department they don't know whether they're Arthur or Martha. No wonder there are so many ratspit decisions in every match.

Interpretation of the rules. Name one other sport where there is such a thing as "interpretation"of the rules. You might get clarifications, or examples of how to apply a rule, but actual "interpretations"? It's a farce.

Not to mention the blatant disregarding of various of the rules, eg the "5 metre protected zone". "Running 15m without bouncing" -- happened a fair bit yesterday. Throwing. Dropping.

[Devil is in the Detail 883]

That pretty sums it up.

The funniest free kick was the one to Garlett I think it was who got a player holding the ball, everyone stopped and about three seconds later the umpire realised it was a free kick and then decided to blow the whistle. How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

That was hilarious. The only reason the umpire called it was because all the players in the area of the contest stop and all thought "yep that's holding the ball"

Then some obvious long time later the umpire called it.

[Jesse Christ 2,884]

I see 3 problems from yesterday.

First, I feel that the Dogs are coached far better than us. They know where to go and what to do instinctively, while we react.

Second, we will always lose when we play poorly skilled players, who continually stuff up disposal.

Third, our coaches box let down the team yesterday. When the Dogs got their first 3 goals, we should have thrown in an extra man in defence. We did this after they got 8 goals at about the 29 minute mark of the first quarter and you could then see the change immediately. They stopped the free flowing footy and started going sideways. We caused some turnovers and for about 2 quarters outscored them. Then we go back to normal defence and wham bam and with the help of some pathetic umpiring, they massacre us.

On a side issue, I think if you look at the stats over a number of years, the one side that smashes us with the umpires, are the Dogs. It happened again yesterday, for about the 20th time that I can recall, over about the last decade. Of course it didn't affect the win but again yesterday I think they got about 7 goals from frees and 50 metre penalties. They got numerous holding the balls while we couldn't and at one stage as usual the frees were about 17 - 5 their way before we got a few softies, when it was all over, to end up 19-10 against. We clearly do nothing about it. Eddie would be on the front page of the Sun.

And forth; not an excuse for our pathetic performance, but the umpires were clearly reading from a "dogs are good, dees are bad" script as there were frees paid to the dogs that we didn't receive. It was blatant favouritism. Will we say anything about it though? Nope. Although when you're spanked by that much who will listen?

[Jesse Christ 2,884]

Oh ok I see that's been covered already. What's keeping my interest in this game? Probably only the fact that I've been loyal so long already. What a [censored] corrupt sport we follow

[jnrmac 20,189]

The umpiring was disgusting but the fact remains if you're at the ball first the frees will go your way.

The Dogs wanted it more and were rewarded, often unfairly.

That is simply not right. Against the Saints we had 7 frees for holding the ball paid against us in the first qtr and a half. 12 for the match. By definition we were first to the ball.

[low flying Robbo 979]

That pretty sums it up.

The funniest free kick was the one to Garlett I think it was who got a player holding the ball, everyone stopped and about three seconds later the umpire realised it was a free kick and then decided to blow the whistle. How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

and i believe it was that pr!ck Wallace. Also the one responsible for the 2 shocking high tackle decisions which resulted in the first 2 goals of the last quarter. I'd love to see the for and against stats for him alone in melbourne games. it would be at least 1 to 5. He personally rooted us in both St Kilda games this year.

[Mazer Rackham 14,971]

and i believe it was that pr!ck Wallace. Also the one responsible for the 2 shocking high tackle decisions which resulted in the first 2 goals of the last quarter. I'd love to see the for and against stats for him alone in melbourne games. it would be at least 1 to 5. He personally rooted us in both St Kilda games this year.

And all because of Rod Grinter. They've got long memories, those Wallaces.

[Adam The God 30,421]

That's unfair though, he didn't miss the target - it was a long handball that arrived at Hogan's knees which cost him a crucial second of breathing space. It wasn't perfect but Hogan should have done better with it. Watts gets graded on the harshest curve.

Watts is our best disposer. It's very rare that he turns it over. The last two weeks he has been very poor. It was the wrong option to handball. He needed to kick inside 50, where our forwards had space on their opponents. He'd usually do this. I'm no Watts basher, but there's a line. It is okay to demand more of Jack in these instances. No player is defendable the entire time. Call a spade a spade. Just as Vince and Jones have been near pathetic the last two weeks. I mentioned Watts because you implied it was the umpires that swung the momentum in the last and that's just completely untrue. It was two really poor decisions from Watts, but we move on, hope he improves next week and that the entire team delivers to a satisfactory level.

In other news, I'm happy for the club to low-ball Garland and I think it's what they'll do.

Again, he was trying to get some movement going in a moribund team - not a hanging offence when we were 80 points behind. And M. Jones, Michie & Bail were nowhere near our worst.

You'd be better to complain about the AFL record we must have set in missed tackles.

We played 2005 football, except with a whole lot more mistakes and a whole lot less awareness.

Actually, at that point, we were seven goals down, not 14 goals. We'd had a massive run on and there was no need to do it.

Their clearance work is great because it relies on not having to think. As soon as they get a good possession they give it off in one of about three directions, where they know a teammate will be. Just get & give, without having to think. They know where each other are without looking, let alone thinking. If they get it to a teammate who's 5 metres away from the stoppage, they're away before the other team works out who's got the ball. Many of their clearances follow this same pattern.

We have no idea where our teammates are. So at clearances, one of our guys gets a possession, he's got to look up & find where his teammates are, by which time he's tackled and off balance.

The very best teams (Hawks, Freo, WCE and now Dogs) have that kind of system at clearances.

Spot on. I mentioned the lack of cohesion between our players at one point yesterday. Gawn would tap out the back to space, but our guys had no idea he was going to do that, so the Bulldogs would shark it and whisk it away. Gawn and our midfielders need to be cleverer.

[Straight Sets Simon 23,113]

and i believe it was that pr!ck Wallace. Also the one responsible for the 2 shocking high tackle decisions which resulted in the first 2 goals of the last quarter. I'd love to see the for and against stats for him alone in melbourne games. it would be at least 1 to 5. He personally rooted us in both St Kilda games this year.

The two free kicks where the Bulldogs player ducked into Lumumba were incorrect.

[low flying Robbo 979]

The two free kicks where the Bulldogs player ducked into Lumumba were incorrect.

Exactly. Then another later on the wing where the player clearly dropped his knees and leaned into it

[DeeZee 7,445]

What annoyed me the most was that after being thrashed in the first quarter last week, exactly the same thing happened again.

Surely they would have gone into this game all guns blazing considering the poor start the previous week.

2016 will be a watershed year for us....must win two in a row, must win at Etihad, and win 9 games minimum.

[Adam The God 30,421]

What frustrates me the most is we have good wins, yet we don't seem to learn from those wins and build on them.

Every week it's back to square one.

I actually think this will start to turn. Completely agree at the moment. We don't seem to be learning from our victories, but my feeling is that it's a big concentration thing for a lot of our players. I don't want to make excuses, I'm sick of reading them, but we will start to string three quarters of football together consistently and then four. When we do this, we'll make the finals. It'll happen in the next 12 to 24 months.

Very lucky it was only 100 points. They were goalless in the third. It could very easily have been 120-140 point loss. They were that much better today.

Body language from experienced players was pathetic.

Jones, Dunn, Garland, Watts, Howe, Lumumba. Absolutely pathetic. Jones' body language at the coin toss shaped the day. He didn't want to be there.

Also, Howe is a hack. He's gone. Late in the first quarter he had the ball in the back pocket. Was running it out casually and McDonald was behind him yelling, "you're hot, you're hot". I could hear it from the stands. Howe completely ignored him and got tackled.

These blokes hate playing with one another, and it shows.

Until every player from the Bailey and Daniher years are gone, we will linger. McDonald is probably the exception.

The blokes from the Bailey/Neeld era are so slow to think. That's their problem. The only quick thinker out of the lot is Watts. Tommy Mac is one of the slowest thinkers. At least, he seems to be nutting out his flaws and I thought he was near terrific yesterday. Particularly, in the second half.

I don't see how them being ahead in development makes them a 100-point better side. I didn't expect a win based purely on the face that they're playing confident football, but I expected a good contest because despite them being "ahead of us", we have matched up well against them the last few years. We smashed them in 2013 excluding the last quarter and two losses last year could have easily been wins. Earlier this year we beat them by 40 points. They were always going to win yesterday but it wasn't that we lost, it's how we lost.

It's always how we lose. We either put ourselves in winnable situations against similarly placed teams and then lose due to comical breakdowns, or simply play the defeatist and get pounded.

Goodwin's comments at half-time summed it up. "I just want them to tackle." That's a directive an ubder-10s coach gives. But funnily enough, in Melbourne's case yesterday it was needed.

Development has little to do with it. Our experienced players set the tone yesterday and we lost by 100 points.

It has nothing to do with where the Bulldogs are on the ladder. We shouldn't be losing games by 100 points anymore.

That's the most disappointing thing for me. This season we should not have been beaten by anywhere near 100. We're trying to create a football brand based on defence and twice this year we've coughed up 100 point losses. Not good enough.

The Melbourne culture hasn't changed one little bit. The players are just not interested in playing to win. They are very well paid plodders who choose weekly to put in or not. They are killing Roos and Goodwin

I cannot stand watching them at the moment There are no excuses- Ohh we have the flu ,Ohhh we have general soreness, Ohhhhhhh the Coach doesn't like me! The team should be made to sit down and watch the womens' game and watch how you simply play footy

Take the game on, contest sheppard ,tackle, compete.

This group is not a team dont play like a team and obviously has major problems un- fixable by allegedly the best coach going around

We continue to look like a joke!

We desperately need to attract an A grader that will say enough is enough and lead the rest of his team mates out of the mire. I know it's not ideal and I know it's not going to happen if we get belted by 100, but this is what we lack. Jones, Dunn and Vince are trying as leaders, but ultimately, they're swimming against a very strong rip.

Team football.

We're shithouse at it.

That is all.

Exactly. We never block, talk to each other, spread for each other, shepherd for each other etc. 1%s are very, very rarely in a Melbourne jumper. Blokes like Vanders and Salem are great at this. Even Garlett, but our midfielders very rarely possess these traits and it's why we always look second-rate from stoppages against half-decent sides.

Raises the question why we recruited him in the first place then.

He's a line-breaker. You either play him off half back or on the wing or you don't play him at all. We have to persist with him, because we've no better options.

He finished third in their B&F last year.

Granted he had the benefit of a more skilled and drilled team around him but your logic is questionable.

Regardless, if he's picked this week I will consider not bothering to watch another Melbourne game this year.

And who would you suggest in his place? Salem will come in for Matt Jones. I'd prefer H in than Dean Terlich or Stretch being thrown to the wolves as a half back.

[DistrACTION Jackson 9,247]

Though I don't think the umpiring wasn't the reason we got flogged, it definitely helped.

Lachie Hunter twice ducked his head and got the high tackle called. The one where Dickson tackled Howe over the line was F'ing ridiculous. He literally tackled him, not even a full rotation and they pay it holding the ball. Disgraceful decision.

[chook fowler 19,551]

Would rather have Salem and Grimes off half back.

Cross has been good this year but I think he is getting slower by the week. Probably should call it quits at seasons end.

[P-man 13,366]

That pretty sums it up.

The funniest free kick was the one to Garlett I think it was who got a player holding the ball, everyone stopped and about three seconds later the umpire realised it was a free kick and then decided to blow the whistle. How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

That was one of the lighter moments. Rarely do you see every player literally standing and waiting for the whistle to blow because something is so blatantly obvious.

Was it number 28? Wouldn't surprise me. If he isn't a Dogs supporter I'll go heave. Just had to take one look at the [censored] eating grin on his face every time he awarded them a free kick.

[Adam The God 30,421]

But through excessive and unnecessary handballing we more often than not turn the ball over deep in our defence.

We have to learn to get through this though. If our players learn how to spread (they need to practice bloody invasion games like I do with the year 5s and 6s!), the overuse deteriorates and the ball movement quickens. Our players don't play together as a team and so they don't trust each other. This means that they won't bother even gut-running hard to space, because they know their team mates will turn it over. It's a bit of a catch-22, but until we have team trust, it won't improve. I can see Brayshaw, Vanders and ANB breaking out of this, I just hope it happens soon or they'll begin to be lost to it like the rest of their older team mates.

Well i promised myself if we have another Neeld-era performance in the remainder of season Ill stop bothering with the MFC for 2015, so yeah thats it for me... see y'all back here in the lead up to the trade period..

See you next weekend, HH.

The trajectory of the club remains overwhelmingly positive

We were never going to beat the Dogs, they're on a massive roll

I wouldn't say overwhelmingly, but we're still on track. Overwhelmingly would be not losing multiple games by essentially 100 points.

Would rather they keep playing Harmes to find out if he's up to it, than Bail who we know isn't up to it.

Tyson as an example. If they can do it, they'll show it, given time.

Harmes did cost us 3 or 4 goals yesterday, but at least he was finding the ball. His turn overs were under pressure, they weren't unforced errors like most of Matt Jones and Bail's are. This holds him in good stead if he continues to receive good coaching from the sidelines.

I see 3 problems from yesterday.

First, I feel that the Dogs are coached far better than us. They know where to go and what to do instinctively, while we react.

Second, we will always lose when we play poorly skilled players, who continually stuff up disposal.

Third, our coaches box let down the team yesterday. When the Dogs got their first 3 goals, we should have thrown in an extra man in defence. We did this after they got 8 goals at about the 29 minute mark of the first quarter and you could then see the change immediately. They stopped the free flowing footy and started going sideways. We caused some turnovers and for about 2 quarters outscored them. Then we go back to normal defence and wham bam and with the help of some pathetic umpiring, they massacre us.

On a side issue, I think if you look at the stats over a number of years, the one side that smashes us with the umpires, are the Dogs. It happened again yesterday, for about the 20th time that I can recall, over about the last decade. Of course it didn't affect the win but again yesterday I think they got about 7 goals from frees and 50 metre penalties. They got numerous holding the balls while we couldn't and at one stage as usual the frees were about 17 - 5 their way before we got a few softies, when it was all over, to end up 19-10 against. We clearly do nothing about it. Eddie would be on the front page of the Sun.

We counted 8 goals from free kicks. It really was a horrible display of umpiring. Some of the decisions were bewilderingly bad. Was Wallace being paid off? I would legitimately question his ability to be able to umpire a Bulldogs game without bias, particularly against Melbourne.

Edited August 17, 2015 by AdamFarr

[P-man 13,366]

And who would you suggest in his place? Salem will come in for Matt Jones. I'd prefer H in than Dean Terlich or Stretch being thrown to the wolves as a half back.

It's not always like for like. Salem and Grimes slot into the backline and it's a slight reshuffle. I'd comfortably back any of JKH, Newton, Stretch or even a battered up Toump to provide more to the side than Lumumba at the moment. He should've been dropped after last week.

[Wiseblood 24,637]

Meh. Not surprising really. Dogs are one FIYAH and they play a style of footy that suits Etihad to the ground. They run and run and run and run. We don't at the minute and we were smashed.

No big deal in the context of the season.

Dogs will be found out in September though when they have to play outside.

[Adam The God 30,421]

That pretty sums it up.

The funniest free kick was the one to Garlett I think it was who got a player holding the ball, everyone stopped and about three seconds later the umpire realised it was a free kick and then decided to blow the whistle. How that can happen in professional sports is beyond me.

I reckon I've seen that before against us too. Earlier in the year in fact. Utterly atrocious umpiring.

Though I don't think the umpiring wasn't the reason we got flogged, it definitely helped.

Lachie Hunter twice ducked his head and got the high tackle called. The one where Dickson tackled Howe over the line was F'ing ridiculous. He literally tackled him, not even a full rotation and they pay it holding the ball. Disgraceful decision.

If you recall, the exact same decision was paid against us last year at the Dome, against the Dogs.