SHINING by The Oracle

I was watching the discussion on Foxtel's AFL360 programme on Monday night in which Nathan Buckley and Chris Scott were discussing Melbourne's win over defending premiers Hawthorn. They were both in heated agreement that the result should not have shocked anyone: that the Demons are a much better team than is perceived by the football world and they have been that way for some time. 

Scott pointed to the fact that they were unlucky against the Eagles in Perth, had stretched Adelaide a few weeks before that and earlier in the year came close to beating North Melbourne in Hobart. Buckley nodded and added they had beaten his team twice this year. We all know this, but young sides don't always shine. 

What is of concern is the way that the team has gone in between those better performances. There were the two bad losses at Etihad against St Kilda, the second round humiliation at home against Essendon and of course, the capitulation in the heart of the country when they went down without so much as a whimper to Port Adelaide at the end of May when the Power were struggling. Buckley and Scott said nothing about these games and the football world and euphoric Demon fans in the wake of last week's victory also appear to have forgotten.

That is the problem with assessing how Melbourne will fare on Saturday night at the Adelaide Oval against a team that is similarly inconsistent. Will they be so swept up in the way in which they have basked for a week in their grand final like victory over the Hawks to fall into the all too familiar traps of the past?

And which Port Adelaide side will show up on the night? The one that was completely destroyed by the Swans last week at the SCG or that which outclassed the Brisbane Lions the week before? 

One thing is certain - Ken Hinkley certainly knows how to beat Melbourne. His first win at the helm at Port Adelaide came in his debut match as coach when his team demolished Mark Neeld's dreams in the opening round of 2013 by 79 points at the MCG. They have since beaten Melbourne four times with three of those victories coming at TIO Traeger Park, the last of them being that 45 point drubbing in Round 10 earlier this year. Paradoxically, the Demons' best showing came two years ago at Adelaide Oval when they lost narrowly by three points in a game that could have gone either way.

The Demons have come a long way since then. The make up of the side and the style of play have changed substantially. Their young team is improving in confidence and ability with each passing week. There is always the chance that they will regress on any given week but they have developed a penchant for breaking hoodoos this year and their now seven game losing streak against Port Adelaide is waiting to be broken. Their on ball division has climbed out of third world status and threatens to move into the upper echelon in the not too distant future. 

This is the moment for the Demons to shine and I'm predicting a 25 point win for them at the Adelaide Oval.

THE GAME Port Adelaide v Melbourne on Saturday 13 August, 2016 at 7.40pm (AEST) at Adelaide Oval

HEAD TO HEAD

Overall  Port Adelaide 19 wins Melbourne 11 wins

At Adelaide Oval Port Adelaide 2 wins Melbourne 0 wins 

Past five meetings Port Adelaide 5 wins Melbourne 0 wins 

The Coaches  Hinkley 4 wins Roos 0 wins

MEDIA

TV - Fox Sports3 live at 7.30pm

RADIO - SEN ABC ABC Grandstand 

THE BETTING Port Adelaide to win - $1.45 Melbourne to win - $2.80

THE LAST TIME THEY MET Port Adelaide 18.13.121 defeated Melbourne 10.16.76 Round 10, 2016 at TIO Traeger Park

A wasteful Melbourne lost another game at one of its homes away from home, TIO Traeger Park, Alice Springs. Despite an outstanding ruck performance from Max Gawn and a dominant opening term (everywhere but on the scoreboard), the errant Demons watched helplessly as its defence leaked like a sieve unforgivably leaving opposition forwards on their own. Charlie Dixon booted three goals in the second term on his way to five for the game as the "away" side ran out 45 point winners. Despite making it three defeats in a row to Port in the centre of the country, Melbourne has decided to return again next year.

THE TEAMS

PORT ADELAIDE

B: Darcy Byrne-Jones,  Logan Austin, Jasper Pittard 
HB: Matthew Broadbent, Jackson Trengove, Tom Clurey 
C: Brad Ebert, Ollie Wines, Jared Polec 
HF: Jarman Impey, Justin Westhoff, Chad Wingard 
F: Jesse Palmer, Charlie Dixon, Aaron Young 
FOLL: Matthew Lobbe, Travis Boak, Robbie Gray 
I/C: Karl Amon, Sam Gray, Nathan Krakouer 
EMG: Riley Bonner, Brendon Ah Chee, Jake Neade

IN: Matthew Lobbe, Jesse Palmer, Cam O'Shea

OUT: John Butcher (omitted), Brendon Ah Chee (Omitted), Paul Stewart (Omitted)

NEW: Jesse Palmer

MELBOURNE

B: Sam Frost, Tom McDonald, Neville Jetta
HB: Jayden Hunt, Oscar McDonald, Tomas Bugg
C: Christian Petracca, Bernie Vince, Dom Tyson
HF: Jeff Garlett, Jack Watts, Aaron vandenBerg
F: James Harmes, Jesse Hogan, Dean Kent
FOLL: Max Gawn, Nathan Jones, Jack Viney
I/C: Angus Brayshaw, Clayton Oliver, Cameron Pedersen, Billy Stretch

EMG: Chris Dawes, Colin Garland, Alex Neal-Bullen

IN: Jesse Hogan

OUT: Sam Weideman (quad)

IF

We beat Port - 50:50

Hawks beat North - likely

Swans beat Saints - likely

We are the only team with a chance of taking North's position in the 8.

i believe North's percentage will take a hammering against Adelaide and GWS.

i believe it will come down to the our last game v Geelong.  

We are currently paying $101 to make the 8.  I may have had a little go at it.

Go Dees.

 

Port are the ultimate downhill skiers. About time we smashed them.

22 minutes ago, hells bells said:

IF

We beat Port - 50:50

Hawks beat North - likely

Swans beat Saints - likely

We are the only team with a chance of taking North's position in the 8.

i believe North's percentage will take a hammering against Adelaide and GWS.

i believe it will come down to the our last game v Geelong.  

We are currently paying $101 to make the 8.  I may have had a little go at it.

Go Dees.

 

Jesus! Without being unrealistic, surely that bets worth a tenner!!!

thanks for bringing that to my attention mate

This Saturday is the biggest day of football so far this year.

If Hawthorn beat North then the two Saturday night games become extremely important, I can't wait.

Is anyone else going over for the game?

23 minutes ago, Clint Bizkit said:

This Saturday is the biggest day of football so far this year.

If Hawthorn beat North then the two Saturday night games become extremely important, I can't wait.

Is anyone else going over for the game?

I feel as though someone has said that before every game this year.  It's not a bad thing though, it's actually nice to have an important game in Round 21!

Reckon we are a big chance this week.  Let's hope Whorethorn do the right thing and smash the Kangas to give us a chance.

Just now, Wiseblood said:

I feel as though someone has said that before every game this year.  It's not a bad thing though, it's actually nice to have an important game in Round 21!

Not just for Melbourne, for the whole competition because North can drop out and in theory any of Melbourne, St Kilda or Port Adelaide can take their place.

Couldn't give a toss what Hawthorn do this week. I just want us to back up our performance from last week. I was more confident going into the Hawthorn game than this Port game in hostile territory.

I'm heading to the game, organised the trip to Radelaide earlier in the season with mates and am absolutely thrilled about our chances against Port!

We are playing some of the greatest Downhill skiers in our time so i'm hoping the Dees can get an early run at the scoreboard to silence the crowd. Let Port fans sing a song at the start of the game - we can do the singing at the end!

3 hours ago, hells bells said:

IF

We beat Port - 50:50

Hawks beat North - likely

Swans beat Saints - likely

We are the only team with a chance of taking North's position in the 8.

i believe North's percentage will take a hammering against Adelaide and GWS.

i believe it will come down to the our last game v Geelong.  

We are currently paying $101 to make the 8.  I may have had a little go at it.

Go Dees.

 

The maths is actually very neat.....Norf are a net 138 points higher than the Dees in terms of points for / points against.  If they lose their next 3 games by 69 points (3 x 23) and we win our three by the same winning margin, it will be all tied up!!   A challenging ask...but certainly not preposterous.  We need healthy wins (5 goals plus) over Port and Carlton and then a narrow win over Geelong whilst hoping that Norf suffer substantive defeats at the hands of the Hawks and the Swans and GWS gets up for their first win against Norf at Etihad.

Come out with the same want and desire for the contest that they brought for the hawks game & for 4 qrts and i will be happy, win lose or draw.

1 hour ago, GoldMember said:

I'm heading to the game, organised the trip to Radelaide earlier in the season with mates and am absolutely thrilled about our chances against Port!

We are playing some of the greatest Downhill skiers in our time so i'm hoping the Dees can get an early run at the scoreboard to silence the crowd. Let Port fans sing a song at the start of the game - we can do the singing at the end!

I'll see you there mate.  ill be the other guy with a Dees scarf on standing on the hill

hope we make it out of there alive!

22 minutes ago, AzzKikA said:

Come out with the same want and desire for the contest that they brought for the hawks game & for 4 qrts and i will be happy, win lose or draw.

If they come out like that they will beat any team outside the top 5 or 6, with ease, 9 times out of 10. Unfortunatly the reality of being a young side is not their incapability its just inconsistancy. I hope they will be up this week but I am very cautious about getting too excited. 

1 hour ago, ArtificialWisdom said:

If they come out like that they will beat any team outside the top 5 or 6, with ease, 9 times out of 10. Unfortunatly the reality of being a young side is not their incapability its just inconsistancy. I hope they will be up this week but I am very cautious about getting too excited. 

Thats why it would be so much better if they did do it, although would that mean we fall to the blues again the week after? 

 

My concern really is that we haven't treated last Saturday as our grand final (as we've done in the past when we've won unexpectedly) and that we'll come out and play accordingly.

From now on we need to play as if there's only one grand final in a year and that's at the end of September.

8 hours ago, hells bells said:

IF

We beat Port - 50:50

Hawks beat North - likely

Swans beat Saints - likely

We are the only team with a chance of taking North's position in the 8.

i believe North's percentage will take a hammering against Adelaide and GWS.

i believe it will come down to the our last game v Geelong.  

We are currently paying $101 to make the 8.  I may have had a little go at it.

Go Dees.

 

Love the optimism.  

I've not done much research, but is it fair to say that the teams we have struggled against most this year have tall forwards?

Port have some tall forwards.

Next game? I'm not done with the last one yet.

14 hours ago, hells bells said:

IF

We beat Port - 50:50

Hawks beat North - likely

Swans beat Saints - likely

We are the only team with a chance of taking North's position in the 8.

i believe North's percentage will take a hammering against Adelaide and GWS.

i believe it will come down to the our last game v Geelong.  

We are currently paying $101 to make the 8.  I may have had a little go at it.

Go Dees.

 

Brilliant. Btw what odds were we for the flag??

6 hours ago, Whispering_Jack said:

My concern really is that we haven't treated last Saturday as our grand final (as we've done in the past when we've won unexpectedly) and that we'll come out and play accordingly.

From now on we need to play as if there's only one grand final in a year and that's at the end of September.

It will actually be good to see if our maturity has improved over the course of this year. We know, without a doubt,  that we have improved and we have the talent to back it up. But it takes maturity to put that big win from the weekend aside and turn our focus to Port and not get caught up in the excitement or get ahead of ourselves. I'm hoping to see us come out with the same intensity this week and approach the game in the manner we should each week. 

It'll be interesting to see how we back up from last week... It usually goes one of two ways, teams get ahead of themselves & are still in awe of their previous performance that they go away from the team things & have a let down week. OR the win galvanises the playing group & the momentum built from the previous week rolls into the next. From my experience in team sports it is usually the later... When you have wins like that you just want to be around the playong group, just want to get out there and do it all again & experience those winning feelings again. On the road this week provides that extra bond & closeness of the group. Think we will know a lot more about this group come 10:30 saturday night.

13 hours ago, Clint Bizkit said:

I've not done much research, but is it fair to say that the teams we have struggled against most this year have tall forwards?

Port have some tall forwards.

Like North, and we should have beaten them.

1 hour ago, ManDee said:

Like North, and we should have beaten them.

And Essendon and St kilda 

15 hours ago, Clint Bizkit said:

I've not done much research, but is it fair to say that the teams we have struggled against most this year have tall forwards?

Port have some tall forwards.

I would say we have struggled against ones that are all about uncontested run. Saints and Port tend to struggle against strong contested sides in an arm wrestle yet against us they dont have a problem. They get on the outside and kill us with spread. The tall forwards I say are a problem when they are contested marking and we cant stop them. But the 3 times we have played these 2 so far it has been uncontested marking that has been the problem, not like its been an arm wrestle and their key forwards have been outmarking us, their key forwards just had silver service. 

On 8/10/2016 at 7:04 AM, Demonland said:

THE BETTING Port Adelaide to win - $1.45 Melbourne to win - $2.80

This intrigued me. I understand that Port will be fired up after last week and we may have some let down after our massive win - but really ????

I don't gamble so it doesn't impact me but really ?