15 minutes ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

I dont think so. If we finish on 10/11 and then win 15 next year I think that would show great development across Roos' tenure especially with the amount of list turnover.

If we win 10 and then 10 again next year I would be disappointed. 

I think we'll finish up between 10-12 wins and just miss finals which was my prediction at the start of the year. 

Let's wait and see. I still suspect a soft underbelly at the moment. 

2 hours ago, Sir Why You Little said:

Anything under 12 wins is a fail in Roosy's 3rd year...

7 or less is a fail as that says we've gone backwards.

If we improve on the previous year how can it be a fail???

Personally can't see us winning more than 2-3 wins.

Will be the second year in a row that they would have finished below expectations. My standard last year was 8 minimum, and 10 this year. Loses to Essendon and Saints, and the way they lost to Port have lowered my expectations of this team but 10 is still my pass mark.

Finals won't happen this year. Essendon  loss + the last two weeks have made it very tough.

I feel we will underwhelm. 

I think in reality though ROOS  will have helped us  immensely  I think even he might concede his Demons have underachieved.

4.5 well spent....maybe 

4 hours ago, AngryAtCasey said:

7 or less is a fail as that says we've gone backwards.

If we improve on the previous year how can it be a fail???

No at a certain point you have to increase improvement to more than Baby Steps

This Club still cannot take that jump even with all the new personnell

 

7 hours ago, Sir Why You Little said:

Anything under 12 wins is a fail in Roosy's 3rd year...

Bollocks, even 8-10 wins is good considering where we've come from

21 minutes ago, dave said:

Bollocks, even 8-10 wins is good considering where we've come from

Not after 3 seasons of proper coaching. 

There is no reason why this club should not be tasting finals this year

if it doesn't it's a fail

Hard to say.

Losses to Essendon, St Kilda, and Port Adelaide have certainly put us in a position where us supporters still have no faith on which Melbourne will turn up on match day.

Collingwood, Carlton, St Kilda again, Freo, and Gold Coast are the only winnable games I see for the remainder of the year, best case scenario 10 wins for the season.

now, 10 wins is 3 games better than last year but I would still say we are a year behind schedule where the club wants to be...by this year PJ wanted 50,000 members and to be looking at finals.

We are at 38,600 and are looking to come in around 10/11th at best.

I would love to see a couple upsets of course but the team hasn't really given us fans any faith or beleif that that might be the case.

Right now I feel the club isn't out of the woods as to if this rebuild or whatever you want to call it these days is a success, granted we have a very young and inexperienced side and by the looks of your young talent, it is only a matter of time, anything could happen so I still wait here with bated breath as to what happens to the club in terms of on field success over the next 18 months.

27 minutes ago, The Sailing Demon said:

Hard to say.

Losses to Essendon, St Kilda, and Port Adelaide have certainly put us in a position where us supporters still have no faith on which Melbourne will turn up on match day.

Collingwood, Carlton, St Kilda again, Freo, and Gold Coast are the only winnable games I see for the remainder of the year, best case scenario 10 wins for the season.

now, 10 wins is 3 games better than last year but I would still say we are a year behind schedule where the club wants to be...by this year PJ wanted 50,000 members and to be looking at finals.

We are at 38,600 and are looking to come in around 10/11th at best.

I would love to see a couple upsets of course but the team hasn't really given us fans any faith or beleif that that might be the case.

Right now I feel the club isn't out of the woods as to if this rebuild or whatever you want to call it these days is a success, granted we have a very young and inexperienced side and by the looks of your young talent, it is only a matter of time, anything could happen so I still wait here with bated breath as to what happens to the club in terms of on field success over the next 18 months.

Spot on Sailing

after 3 seasons we still do not know which Melbourne is going to turn up. 

If this is still happening in Roosy's 3rd year then we have not come far at all. 

IT WAS THE PLAYERS WHO WANTED TO BE COACHED BY ROOSY...

But they have not bought in 100%

7 hours ago, beelzebub said:

Only the lazy wouldn't have bothered to search for the thread from early this season

I tried to not be lazy, and searched for the thread from early this season, but still couldn't find it.  Could you please post a link to it bb ?    I'd like to compare how many wins folk predicted then Vs now.  [Btw I think I predicted 8-9, but not sure]   

Thanks

3 hours ago, Sir Why You Little said:

No at a certain point you have to increase improvement to more than Baby Steps

This Club still cannot take that jump even with all the new personnell

 

Agree that at some point that time comes.

I'd submit however, that when you're regularly fielding the youngest and least experienced 22 in the comp, it would be unrealistic to expect that jump this year. 

Personally i feel we're tracking about as well as i expected. In 2014 my hope was at least 4 wins which we got. 2015 was minimum of 6, hoping for up to 8 and we got 7. This year my personal minimum mark was 9 with anything extra a bonus. I expect us to get the 9. 2017 will be all about finals.

24 minutes ago, AngryAtCasey said:

Agree that at some point that time comes.

I'd submit however, that when you're regularly fielding the youngest and least experienced 22 in the comp, it would be unrealistic to expect that jump this year. 

Personally i feel we're tracking about as well as i expected. In 2014 my hope was at least 4 wins which we got. 2015 was minimum of 6, hoping for up to 8 and we got 7. This year my personal minimum mark was 9 with anything extra a bonus. I expect us to get the 9. 2017 will be all about finals.

The CEO Predicted finals at the AGM in 2015

if we don't get there the club has not reached its goal

it's way over time that this club got really tough on itself

no one else can do it

13 hours ago, Lord Travis said:

I wouldn't mark down Saints or Carlton as a win. We haven't beaten the Saints in 10 years! And already lost to them this year.

Carlton are playing better than us too and are higher on the ladder. They've knocked off Geelong and had a 4-5 win streak too.

We need to bring intensity and our a game or we won't beat anyone outside the bottom 4.

I agree. We still have structural problems in defence, which good sides seem to regularly exploit, as will average sides on their day. IMO, a win or loss to Carlton or St Kilda could easily be decided by one poor quarter of football from us, which still occurs too often. Despite this, I still believe we are capable of beating any side if we play well.

On a different note, I recall the AFL having a policy whereby the draw for each club is partly influenced by their final ladder position during the previous year i.e. play more often against sides that finish in similar ladder positions. Can anyone confirm that this is actually the case? If it is true, this will make our rise up the ladder more challenging.

2 hours ago, Boots and all said:

On a different note, I recall the AFL having a policy whereby the draw for each club is partly influenced by their final ladder position during the previous year i.e. play more often against sides that finish in similar ladder positions. Can anyone confirm that this is actually the case? If it is true, this will make our rise up the ladder more challenging.

Yes.

This years draw - Carlton vs 2015 bottom 6: Team, no of times Carl play them, (no of times Melb play them) in 2016.

GC 1, (2)

Ess 2, (1)

BL 2, (1)

StK 2, (2)

Melb vs Carl 1

If we are to rise up the ladder we need to beat all comers.  It would help if we beat the likes of Ess and StK!! 

We can't and won't beat St Kilda. They're just too good for us which is bizarre considering some of the rabble performances they've dished up under Richardson.

Collingwood, GC, Carlton, freo are wins i think we're capable of. 9 wins total which would be a reasonable but not great result.

For some reason I've had a gut feel we'd knock off the Crows all season but that's looking unlikely now.

Ten wins will be a solid launching pad for 2017.

Nine is the bare minimum for me, but I'm hoping for 10.

Monday is vitally important. 

Last year we had unexpected wins against Geelong and the Dogs, but we haven't really had the equivalent this year.  I still think we will. 

Beating Adelaide at the 'G works for me. 

We have 2 beat St.Kilda. I expect we will. If we don't then we r not fairdinkum. 

I was expecting / hoping for ten wins at the start of the season and that hasn't changed.

I don't think even 12 wins will get you 8th spot this year.

10 hours ago, The Sailing Demon said:

Hard to say.

Losses to Essendon, St Kilda, and Port Adelaide have certainly put us in a position where us supporters still have no faith on which Melbourne will turn up on match day.

Collingwood, Carlton, St Kilda again, Freo, and Gold Coast are the only winnable games I see for the remainder of the year, best case scenario 10 wins for the season.

now, 10 wins is 3 games better than last year but I would still say we are a year behind schedule where the club wants to be...by this year PJ wanted 50,000 members and to be looking at finals.

We are at 38,600 and are looking to come in around 10/11th at best.

I would love to see a couple upsets of course but the team hasn't really given us fans any faith or beleif that that might be the case.

Right now I feel the club isn't out of the woods as to if this rebuild or whatever you want to call it these days is a success, granted we have a very young and inexperienced side and by the looks of your young talent, it is only a matter of time, anything could happen so I still wait here with bated breath as to what happens to the club in terms of on field success over the next 18 months.

On current form we won't beat Carlton. On current form and 10 years history against St Kilda and our history at Docklands I seriously doubt that we will beat St Kilda, especially if Riewoldt plays and we continue to not play a tall man on him.

1 hour ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

We can't and won't beat St Kilda. They're just too good for us which is bizarre considering some of the rabble performances they've dished up under Richardson.

Collingwood, GC, Carlton, freo are wins i think we're capable of. 9 wins total which would be a reasonable but not great result.

For some reason I've had a gut feel we'd knock off the Crows all season but that's looking unlikely now.

I disagree about us being incapable of beating St. Kilda. We should have beaten them last time, particularly as we jumped them at the start but then Reiwaldt (currently out) nearly single handedly turned the tide. As for the loss to Essendon, that was an absolute disgrace (as our three point loss to the Roos the following week demonstrated)! We are better than our ladder position: we just need to have our best 22 playing together.

11 minutes ago, TeamPlayedFine39 said:

I was expecting / hoping for ten wins at the start of the season and that hasn't changed.

I don't think even 12 wins will get you 8th spot this year.

8th spot is irrelevant anyway. The last four spots in the top 8 are just for revenue generation for the AFL and Fox. They give false hope to fans in two ways:1) that the team can win the premiership, and 2) that the team gets good 'finals experience' and will come back the next year and have a tilt at the premiership. Both are B$. For example look at Richmond. Also look at Freo - yes they were in the top four but what good has 'finals experience' done for them this year?

6 minutes ago, Skin D said:

8th spot is irrelevant anyway. The last four spots in the top 8 are just for revenue generation for the AFL and Fox. They give false hope to fans in two ways:1) that the team can win the premiership, and 2) that the team gets good 'finals experience' and will come back the next year and have a tilt at the premiership. Both are B$. For example look at Richmond. Also look at Freo - yes they were in the top four but what good has 'finals experience' done for them this year?

A side that spends two or more consecutive seasons in the bottom half of the eight and just outside  is not going anywhere.  Genuine improvement  usually happens quickly and not in painfully slow increments. 

49 minutes ago, Skin D said:

8th spot is irrelevant anyway. The last four spots in the top 8 are just for revenue generation for the AFL and Fox. They give false hope to fans in two ways:1) that the team can win the premiership, and 2) that the team gets good 'finals experience' and will come back the next year and have a tilt at the premiership. Both are B$. For example look at Richmond. Also look at Freo - yes they were in the top four but what good has 'finals experience' done for them this year?

North finished in 8th place last year and made it through to the Preliminary Final; currently top of the ladder.

I'm sure that the Bulldogs (6) and Crows (7) also got a lot more out of their finals last year than false hope - they're both playing great football this year.

Personally, I'd take playing finals football over finishing 9-18th and putting my feet up through September.

I thought 8 wins at the start of 2016 and think that will be the mark.  We should beat Pies, Blues and Suns. I did count on beating the Saints at least once but they appear to have our measure.

8-14 record would have us about 13th-14th.

The loss to a half AFL Essendon is still hard to stomach.