Game Day 6/3/16

[DeeSpencer 26,082]

13 minutes ago, RalphiusMaximus said:

 

Seriously?  I think you need to hand back those memberships and go follow Richmond or something.  Why do you bother claiming to be a Melbourne supporter?  If we lose we're a crap team.  If we win we didn't win by enough.  What would you be saying if we'd smashed them by 50?  "Oh, it was just their reserves, it doesn't count, they'll still destroy us in the real season..." 

You can only beat the side that shows up to play you.  It doesn't matter if it's the best their club can field or not.  What we did today was win ugly, and I'll take that over getting cut to pieces any day. 

I can't speak for Steve but if we smashed them by 50 I'd be saying that's a pretty good performance and there likely would've been many positives. 

We beat a reserves team by 2 goals. It's a pretty simple scenario to work out it wasn't a good performance. 

For some ridiculous reason we have to pretend it was because it could be worse? Come on. 

But it's not only about the scoreboard. I would've liked to have seen someone from outside the best 22 put their hands up for a game. Or someone show they've gone to another level. 

We saw Oliver. Watts, Gawn and Viney look in good nick, but we knew that last week. Matt Jones and Grimes are having a crack on the wing and Bugg is a goer. But there really hasn't been anything else of note from young players. 

Bulldogs fans are sitting back enjoying that without 16 of their best they nearly beat a near full strength side. Trust me, I'd be the first to celebrate the honourable nature of that loss if it was us.

[Adam The God 30,420]

8 hours ago, Satyriconhome said:

We have been training all  pre season with a guy called Hogan as the focal point of the attack, take him out and from what I could tell in the first 3/4 the forward structure fell over, finally got it right in the last, we need to practice this

It wasn't that we got our forward structure right in the last quarter. It was that we took our chances when the Dogs couldn't clear their defensive 50. We kept the pressure on them and then finished in front of goal.

[The Reverend 1,736]

3 hours ago, DeeSpencer said:

Hogan and Petracca makes 2, Brayshaw would be a nice 3rd.  Trengove is excluded as Clay Smith from the Dogs is also excluded, we don't know what he'll be when he's back yet. 

That accounts (and being generous) for Stringer, Bont and Macrae maybe. 

Still doesn't account for another 12 players including the skill aspects of the Dogs backline, a large chunk of their midfield and a few other solid forwards. 

Similar young sides to the one the Dogs put out there today - like Carl, Essendon, Richmond and Hawthorn have fielded over the first two rounds - have been absolutely punished by experienced line ups. 

Today was poor, I'm not sure why everyone is keen to reward the mediocrity.

Because we won. We apparently played crap football and still managed to win. A win is a win is a win is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win .

 To quote the less than great Mr Neeld, "It is what it is!"

Yes we played poorly, but when it mattered, we had the spirit to win the game. A couple of years ago, we would have been happy lose and claim an honourable loss. It might only be a small step forward but, FMD, it's an important one. It shows we care. We don't want to be losers any more under any circumstances. Is there anything more important than that?

 

[Adam The God 30,420]

8 hours ago, DeeSpencer said:

Terrible game. 

Skills just aren't there and we should ran all over the young dogs for 4 quarters not just when they tired. Wind was a factor in the first and 3rd quarter performances but not an excuse. Plus the kicking for the goal in the last might've shown we didn't know it was out there anyway.

Grimes, Watts, Kennedy, Tom McDonald, Garland, Harmes, Kent, Frost all showing the same flaws. 

No real answers to who plays in round 1. 

Wagner only played a half, Stretch unsighted, Vanders injured. 

I'm not at all happy. The saints will show us up big time if we can't deal with pressure and defend smarter than we did for most of today.

Certainly our weakness at the moment is our back 6. I think we might have the Saints in the middle though.

[RalphiusMaximus 6,088]

29 minutes ago, DeeSpencer said:

Bulldogs fans are sitting back enjoying that without 16 of their best they nearly beat a near full strength side. Trust me, I'd be the first to celebrate the honourable nature of that loss if it was us.

Except we've had years of those sort of losses and the same division of posters existed.  There were those who said that it was a good performance to get close and those who insisted that if it wasn't a win it wasn't good enough.  Quite frankly I don't remember which camp you fall into, but from your recent posting I would guess the latter.  What has Roos been preaching for two years?  No more "honourable losses."  We want wins.  This was a win.  To complain that the opposition didn't put their best side in is less than useless.  Nobody is saying that it was perfect.  Most of us have singled out the same half dozen or so players as having had a good game while the rest were very rusty.  That doesn't change the fact that we produced a hard-nosed performance characterised by brutal contested play and tackling which got us the win despite the very noticeable skill errors. 

[Bobby McKenzie 2,385]

52 minutes ago, DeeSpencer said:

I can't speak for Steve but if we smashed them by 50 I'd be saying that's a pretty good performance and there likely would've been many positives. 

We beat a reserves team by 2 goals. It's a pretty simple scenario to work out it wasn't a good performance. 

For some ridiculous reason we have to pretend it was because it could be worse? Come on. 

But it's not only about the scoreboard. I would've liked to have seen someone from outside the best 22 put their hands up for a game. Or someone show they've gone to another level. 

We saw Oliver. Watts, Gawn and Viney look in good nick, but we knew that last week. Matt Jones and Grimes are having a crack on the wing and Bugg is a goer. But there really hasn't been anything else of note from young players. 

Bulldogs fans are sitting back enjoying that without 16 of their best they nearly beat a near full strength side. Trust me, I'd be the first to celebrate the honourable nature of that loss if it was us.

I think 16 of their best out is just a slight exaggeration! Name them if you can. Some people are never happy even when we win. Don't you think we use these games to try different strategies and tactics for the real season?

[DeeSpencer 26,082]

53 minutes ago, The Reverend said:

Because we won. We apparently played crap football and still managed to win. A win is a win is a win is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win  is a win .

 To quote the less than great Mr Neeld, "It is what it is!"

Yes we played poorly, but when it mattered, we had the spirit to win the game. A couple of years ago, we would have been happy lose and claim an honourable loss. It might only be a small step forward but, FMD, it's an important one. It shows we care. We don't want to be losers any more under any circumstances. Is there anything more important than that?

 

We beat the Dogs in near identical preseason circumstances last year. 

We beat Collingwood at the height of Neeld rubbish.

We beat Richmond in Roos' first year. 

There's a myth that we never won preseason matches. Just as there's a myth that a reasonably decent 7 win team from last season needs to win presesaon games this year to somehow change the culture.

Playing good football is the important goal and we failed miserably today.

The gulf in the age, experience and allegedly talent between the two teams today should've been a 10 goal win not a 10 point win.

[RalphiusMaximus 6,088]

18 minutes ago, Bobby McKenzie said:

I think 16 of their best out is just a slight exaggeration! Name them if you can. Some people are never happy even when we win. Don't you think we use these games to try different strategies and tactics for the real season?

Have a look at the side that played today.  There are a dozen or more who were regular starters in their side last season.  They're only down half a dozen or so who are clearly better than what was on the park.  It's all just trying to spin a loss they thought would be an easy win.  Bont, Wallis, Stringer, Murphy, Dahlhaus, Wood.  The rest are good players who are interchangeable.  They have a hoard of more or less identical running mid/flankers.  Naming a bunch who didn't play doesn't make them better than the ones who did.  Boyd is getting past it, so throwing his name in there is questionable at best.  Morris, meh.  I'd take three of the backs they had today over him. 

There's no denying that they had probably six of their best off the park today, but the rest is just BS their fans are throwing out to make themselves feel better. 

[dee-tox 4,835]

It's a fan site so objectivity isn't high on the agenda, but I don't know how anyone here could really garner much out of this game. Apart from Oliver and Watts I thought it was goddamn awful. Sure there were nice goals from Tyson, Garlett but so much of it was D grade bordering on F grade.

I don't get the love for Frost. Can't kick, decision making is awful. Headless chook.

Wagner and Hunt look a million miles away. 

Tom McDonald should spend all his time on learning basic skills. It is possible to run and kick at the same time.

Overall, everyone says: yeah, it's only a practice game. But under less pressure and against reserve opposition, AFL standard players should be able to execute their skills at a far higher level than a normal game.

[Bells 155]

Yes it's a NAB game.   No, it doesn't count for anything at all.  BUT, it is a great chance to see what the team has been working on and what they still need to work on.

 

1. Those who were regularly in our side last year not playing yesterday - Hogan, Brayshaw, JKH, Stretch, ANB, Lamumba also Dunn and AVB off with minor injuries, we were not really full strength -although more strength than the opposition).

2.  We won, something we have really struggled with in the past - 2 in a row - mentally for the team this is a big one.

3. Lots of mistakes, lots to work on, but managed to have the heart to win anyway.

I have been a regular reader on here for ages, hoping that once we start winning games the shroud of negativity would dissipate.  Apparently not!

Nevermind, I am at least very happy with how things are looking.  It was weird to actually feel confident at the end of the third that we would come back and win.

 

If you are a glass half full person (like me), the positives are great.  Players like Gawn and Viney are set up for a big season, players that were written off in the past are showing they have some worth (Grime and M. Jones).  We are actually functioning as a team that work together - that is probably the biggest plus for me - I haven't seen a bunch of men trying to do something individually so they don't look bad, they are working on what is best for the team.

 

I am looking forward to this season starting.

Edited March 6, 2016 by Bells

[Nasher 33,617]

4 hours ago, Fork 'em said:

We won ugly over the Bulldog twos.
We'll lose ugly when we meet the Bulldog ones.

And no bouncing up and down here will change it.

This is the kind of horse bog logic that irritates me.  

When we the Bulldog "ones", we might play a zillion times better than we did.  Their "seniors" might actually play with less cohesion that the young outfit they put on the park today.  Every other possible combination in between could happen.  You cannot transplant a whole different team in to a scenario and assume all the other million variables that affect the result of a game remain the same.  

No two games are the same and no two teams ever play the same way twice.  There's a good reason why a lot of people say "you can only beat the team the opposition put on the ground"; all you can take from a game is that your team might have the ingredients to win matches, which we can clearly take from this game given that we did actually win it.

[joeboy 3,166]

I take a slightly different approach to yesterday's win than many here: 

We won ugly and were brought down to the level of our opposition's inexperienced team to achieve it.Yes I know we're not in a position to pick and choose when we display our A game endeavour, but sometimes good teams underperform but still win, like we did yesterday.. and that MUST be a good thing when we consider our recent history.

Edited March 6, 2016 by joeboy

[Jaded No More 68,974]

10 hours ago, Nasher said:

I missed the game, but saw we won so I thought I'd better jump on Demonland to see how awful we were.  You guys never fail to disappoint!

Woke up in the middle of nowhere in France to read that we won. I was pretty excited until I came to Demonland and read that we are awful and Tom McDonald needs to be sacked. 

On the plus side, you know we are doing better than before when we criticize the team when they are winning!

[Nasher 33,617]

10 minutes ago, Jaded said:

Woke up in the middle of nowhere in France to read that we won. I was pretty excited until I came to Demonland and read that we are awful and Tom McDonald needs to be sacked. 

On the plus side, you know we are doing better than before when we criticize the team when they are winning!

I know right? The sad thing was I knew full well that it would be like that before I even opened the page.  

RalphiusMaximus and others have put up some more balanced views since then.

[bing181 9,328]

We beat them on every stat except free kicks. We kept them goalless in two quarters. It mightn't have been a crushing win on the scoreboard, but was solid. They're also short quarters, so I don't realistically know how far we were ever going to get ahead, especially in those conditions. Another 5 - 10 minutes in the last quarter could have started to create some carnage on the scoreboard. Speaking of the last quarter, was pleased that there were no junk time goals to them.

But ... amongst the stats, we had 14 more Inside 50's. That those 14 more inside 50's only yielded a couple of goals extra speaks volumes about the kind of makeshift forward line we had with, ahem, Hogan out.

It's not just about how many out, it's about WHO is out and its impact on team balance and structure. If you have 3 or 4 key mids out, but another 3 or 4 mids ready to step into those roles, then the impact can be minimal.

[Mickey 4,731]

All those saying that we got smashed by the Doggies last year, so we will again this year, seem to have forgotten this game

[Gorgoroth 13,021]

A couple of thoughts from my good self.

Watts was very good, Oliver will play round one. Bugg was sloppy in the first quarter but got much better and finds the ball pretty well.

Frost isn't and forward and Salem isn't a defender and both look lost out there, shove Frost to CHB, Salem to a wing. Forst offers very little forward and as nice as it is having a decent kick off half back Salem's opponent will off set that with goals/goal assists.

 

[The Song Formerly Known As 6,479]

5 hours ago, Bobby McKenzie said:

I think 16 of their best out is just a slight exaggeration! Name them if you can. Some people are never happy even when we win. Don't you think we use these games to try different strategies and tactics for the real season?

The young Bulldogs were missing Robert Murphy, Dale Morris, Jake Stringer, Marcus Bontempelli, Luke Dahlhaus, Tory Dickson, Lachie Hunter, Jason Johannisen, Jack Macrae, Liam Picken, Koby Stevens, Matthew Suckling, Mitch Wallis and Easton Wood.

Not quite 16, but pretty damning.

i am happy to win, but if we play like that in the real stuff we won't beat them again this year.

Edited March 6, 2016 by The Song Formerly Known As

[jackaub 1,402]

Agree Gg Frost is a waste of time playing forward and Salem does't get enough of it at half back move him to the wing.

BTW what is going on with Garland? Two weeks in a row he has stepped over the boundary line with the ball. Has been penalised both times and looked dumbfounded at the umpire both time.s Eirther he is thick, doesnt understand the rule or hasnt been told of the rule change

Two weeks in a row unbelievable.

[Mister Ed 317]

My match report

The Melbourne Demons used the prevailing wind to its advantage to record a 12 point come from behind win over an inexperienced Western Bulldogs side in its second NAB Challenge game at Highgate Arena in Craigieburn.

 The Bulldogs pulled away early with the advantage of the wind but they lost most of the ascendency by half time thanks to the hard work of Jack Viney and Jack Watts. By the last change however, the Doggies had retained a 19 point lead but the Demons, with skipper Nathan Jones playing his usual inspirational captain's game,  took control for a handy 2 goal victory.

Melbourne 0.1.2  0.4.4  0.6.5  0.10.12.72

Western Bulldogs  0.4.3  0.4.5  1.7.8  1.7.9.60

Nine pointers: Melbourne: Nil. Western Bulldogs: L Webb

Goals: Melbourne: J Watts 3  S Frost J Garlett J Harmes N Jones C Pedersen D Tyson A vandenBerg 

Western Bulldogs:   M Honeychurch N Hrovat  L Jong W Minson J Redpath J Roughead B Williams

Umpires: Ben Ryan, Scott Jeffery, Chris Kamolins, Brett Rosebury.

Attendance;  4,139 RAMS Arena, Craigieburn

[mo64 5,881]

9 hours ago, Akum said:

Seems that the opinions of those who were at the game are quite different from some of those who weren't ...

Because those at the ground were  assessing the players performance without factoring in the quality of the opposition. They wouldn't have recognised 75% of the Dogs players.

[Straight Sets Simon 23,113]

12 hours ago, Nasher said:

It might have been a complete trainwreck mate, I acknowledge that.  Just saying I wouldn't know from reading Demonland, because I'll get told it was whether it was or not.  This isn't an isolated incident, there's a good reason why I've taken to avoiding the match day threads in general in the last 12 months.

To be honest, I don't help the situation.

[Mazer Rackham 14,971]

Very encouraging performance yesterday.

First up, it was a win. Imagine the howls if we'd gone down to "a VFL side". But, it was a win. Wins feel good.

In previous years, we would have lost that. Oppo gets 4/5 goals up and heads go down. But we won.

The boys are not going to be "on" every week. Not even Hawthorn are "on" every week. But they find a way to get it done in the bad weeks.

We didn't need every player to be contributing to get the win. Quite the opposite from the sounds of it.

Things weren't going our way. Wind. Some players skill levels down. But didn't drop the bundle.

Now there is competition for spots. Matt Jones a lock for round 1?

For some to be unimpressed by this is fine. It's a free country. If I'd seen it in person instead of listening to 2 quarters on the radio, I might have been unimpressed too. But to win, and be unimpressed with it, is a luxury that we haven't had for a very very long time. That is one of the things that makes me feel sure the wheel is turning, in our favour.

Go Demons!

[Lucifers Hero 40,364]

Has anyone else noticed how comfortable Goodwin is as coach?  Hasn't put a foot wrong in terms of getting the boys motivated to play and several times in the last few weeks to come back from behind.  Regardless of the opposition, we could easily have thought: 'this is only a practice game' and not played the game out and gone back to lazy days.

He also looks really comfortable in the press conf.  Gives real answers, is calm and really looks in control. 

To be able to motivate the troops and to manage the journos are great pluses (not to mention the game plan is looking pretty good) for our coach-in-waiting

Roos is doing a great job of staying in the background and exposing Goodwin (in a good way).  So much so that in watching yesterday's press conf I had forgotten about Roos. 

Regardless of the number of games we win this season the coaching transition will be a success.

Edited March 6, 2016 by Lucifer's Hero

[stevethemanjordan 6,952]

7 hours ago, DeeSpencer said:

I can't speak for Steve but if we smashed them by 50 I'd be saying that's a pretty good performance and there likely would've been many positives. 

We beat a reserves team by 2 goals. It's a pretty simple scenario to work out it wasn't a good performance. 

For some ridiculous reason we have to pretend it was because it could be worse? Come on. 

But it's not only about the scoreboard. I would've liked to have seen someone from outside the best 22 put their hands up for a game. Or someone show they've gone to another level. 

We saw Oliver. Watts, Gawn and Viney look in good nick, but we knew that last week. Matt Jones and Grimes are having a crack on the wing and Bugg is a goer. But there really hasn't been anything else of note from young players. 

Bulldogs fans are sitting back enjoying that without 16 of their best they nearly beat a near full strength side. Trust me, I'd be the first to celebrate the honourable nature of that loss if it was us.

There's no point. 

They won't understand the logical and balanced view you provide.

A wins a win apparently and that's all that counts.

 

Edited March 6, 2016 by stevethemanjordan