30 minutes ago, Soidee said:

Yes this leadership situation is a farce at our club.  We have not got it right since McDonald was skipper.  Jones is a tough mid, but don't tell me he is a leader in a crisis, because he is NOT. As for Viney, that is looking like an absolute shocker of a decision.  

Yes we lost and we had injuries, but our rubbish leadership in the last 3 weeks has been deplorable. Get the leadership right and we move forward, Im sick of leaderless rubbish at this club.

Agreed. We must be harsh and tough on our leaders otherwise the club will not rise

thankfully more supporters are seeing the problem

1 minute ago, John Dee said:

.... and I don't know who is going to play in the ruck next week.

Watts needs more time up forward, which is why I think Pederson should have played tonight.

That being said, and because Watts will ruck again, do we have Pederson, Frost and Watts doing the work?

2 minutes ago, Scoop Junior said:

Richmond should get no credit for tonight. That was a Steven Bradbury win if I've ever seen one. Them being 5-0 and us 2-3 is about as illusory as ladder positions get.

 

I reckon they'll get done by 80 points in Adelaide next week. The Crows will destroy them.

8 minutes ago, dazzledavey36 said:

There were positives but im gonna go on a rant because i can.

That was the worst 3 goal game i have seen with Jesse Hogan. Thought he cleaned up his attitude over the off season? When Garlett was streaming forward Hogan kept leading back when all he needed to do was lead forward to the ball carrier. Garlett was out on his feet and barely made it to him simply because he wanted the quick easy one out the back. 

Wake up Jesse!

Been saying it for 18 months now but Tom McDonald is not the answer to our backline. He is a 2nd tall defender not a first. I have lost all confidence in our defence and when the general is TMac then we have serious issue's.. Im scared already what Daniher eill do to us next week. Steven May has to be our number 1 priority.

How good was Hibberd though? 

Agree. Hogan's soccered goal when he was whinging at the umps and Jeffy went in and did all the hard work for him was embarrassing. Bad look, even in U15's.

So far this season close but no cigar. Seems to be Goodys start close but no good. Older harder heads could have got us across the line in 2 games. 

No luck with injuries but no composure really killed us. 

Bugg, Kennedy, Peds need to come in.

Any update on Bulls injury? Hoping hes okay

Well, we can kiss finals goodbye, that much is clear. You can't have losses against Richmond and Fremantle (teams we beat last year) and expect to play finals. Yeah, we registered wins against St Kilda and Carlton (Port flogged them by ~100 points whereas we barely fell over the line), but it remains two steps forward and two steps backwards.

I can't wait to see all the optimism going into next week's match only to lose, again, through inaccuracy in front of goal (despite dominating in all stats).

Oh yeah, hope you feel like [censored], Jordan. Three games lost from a lack of leadership; we could easily have been 5-0 with you on the ground.

Edited April 24, 20178 yr by SaberFang

1 minute ago, Cards13 said:

So far this season close but no cigar. Seems to be Goodys start close but no good. Older harder heads could have got us across the line in 2 games. 

No luck with injuries but no composure really killed us. 

Bugg, Kennedy, Peds need to come in.

I think Goody will get it right. It's close now. But the leadership is not working and the real talent, of which there is a lot is still raw and learning. 

But we must keep the heat on the club

The MFC must learn to thrive on pressure, not find excuses. 

Pedo should have played as back up. 

Watts is needed up forward. 

Otherwise i was proud of the effort

4 minutes ago, ding said:

The contrast is exactly what should be played to Jesse multiple times. This is the single thing stopping him from becoming a future legend of the game.

Get rid of his sooking, and replace it with a desire to make someone pay, and you have a champion.

I wish he would just play to the whistle. During a marking contest in the third, he was taken a little high by Rance and started sooking up to the umpire. Play on and JKH forced the ball forward in to Jesse's path as he wandered toward goal and kicked it....the laziest goal in the history of football....Play the [censored] whistle Jesse, geez!! Loads of talent that will go to waste if he doesn't get his head in the game...Rant over, apologies everyone.

 

1 hour ago, Nasher said:

Two men down for over a half - is there anything you would consider a valid excuse?  Just wondering.

Coach failed to adjust. Game over

No team should win with 19 v 21 after quarter time.  2 talls and our 2nd ruck included.  Then you had Petracca and Viney on one leg...so it was 17.5 v 21.

 

Fact that Richmond were lucky to get over us in the end says more about them than us.

 

Massive effort by our guys tonight.

1 minute ago, beelzebub said:

Coach failed to adjust. Game over

You keep farming this line as if you're some sort of brilliant tactician, yet I've failed to see you back it up.  Tell us, coach, what we should have done.

4 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

Coach failed to adjust. Game over

And by adjust, do you mean run an extra couple of players out at half time and hope nobody notices?

Some of the black and white posters on DL are really starting to grate me.

Edited April 24, 20178 yr by Forest Demon

We have got some work to do.

Our issues relate to finishing these days. 38 inside fifties should have resulted in a 4 goal lead going into half time.

Effort is fine. We need the killer instinct.

19 minutes ago, Scoop Junior said:

There are some seriously silly posts on this thread. 

How can anyone have a go at the players for losing that one. "Injuries no excuse"...are you serious? This is a game played by humans, they are not robots. In a high intensity, high pressure game, to lose two players before half time and have another one hobbling in the goal square, it makes it extremely difficult. Add in the fact your no1 ruck is out, then your second ruck goes down before half time, how can you possibly compete on a level playing field? And they are not playing mugs, they are playing a team of elite professional athletes, with 22 fit players. There was nothing more predictable than Richmond running over the top of us. You could see it late in the third.

By all means be frustrated. I am. It's excruciating to know you have a good side, a side in my view that is clearly a class above Richmond, but due solely to bad luck they have beaten us. We outplayed them for three quarters despite our injuries and they only crept past us at the end.

Richmond should get no credit for tonight. That was a Steven Bradbury win if I've ever seen one. Them being 5-0 and us 2-3 is about as illusory as ladder positions get.

Unfortunately we've just copped a shocking run of luck so far this year and in an even competition it can be the difference between finishing 5th or 15th. We finally have a good side capable of getting results and we just haven't had a fair go.

But be frustrated at that. Don't just assume this was an avoidable fade out that the players should take responsibility for. They were fantastic tonight and deserved the four points.

Yeah like every other Friggen year another year another set of excuses. Refer to my "Chew me up thread. Dont want excuses 

How did Geelong find the will to win, How did Freo. Yep injuries played a part but in reality we lost two games due to poor character and even poorer leadership! 

Injuries?? just another thing good sides take in their stride and STILL WIN!

Absolutely shattered, but how good is it to be back playing in front of 85,000 people?! 

18 minutes ago, ArtificialWisdom said:

Better question: Why dosn't anyone honour Hogans leads. He lead alone to the defensive flank over and over during kickouts and they refused to kick it to him. The one time Bernie tried to he missed the target.

Agree, our midfield and those with ball in hand, do Hogan no favours. 

Makes him look wooden and slow.

20 minutes ago, Scoop Junior said:

There are some seriously silly posts on this thread. 

How can anyone have a go at the players for losing that one. "Injuries no excuse"...are you serious? This is a game played by humans, they are not robots. In a high intensity, high pressure game, to lose two players before half time and have another one hobbling in the goal square, it makes it extremely difficult. Add in the fact your no1 ruck is out, then your second ruck goes down before half time, how can you possibly compete on a level playing field? And they are not playing mugs, they are playing a team of elite professional athletes, with 22 fit players. There was nothing more predictable than Richmond running over the top of us. You could see it late in the third.

By all means be frustrated. I am. It's excruciating to know you have a good side, a side in my view that is clearly a class above Richmond, but due solely to bad luck they have beaten us. We outplayed them for three quarters despite our injuries and they only crept past us at the end.

Richmond should get no credit for tonight. That was a Steven Bradbury win if I've ever seen one. Them being 5-0 and us 2-3 is about as illusory as ladder positions get.

Unfortunately we've just copped a shocking run of luck so far this year and in an even competition it can be the difference between finishing 5th or 15th. We finally have a good side capable of getting results and we just haven't had a fair go.

But be frustrated at that. Don't just assume this was an avoidable fade out that the players should take responsibility for. They were fantastic tonight and deserved the four points.

Slow down there Scoop Junior. Haven't you heard we've got a team with no leaders, too many VFL players, an irresponsibly competitive list clogging ruckman, and coaches who don't adjust tactics to game ending injuries? Fatigue and bad luck simply have nothing to do with it. We lose, we're rubbish. There it is. You heard it here. 

Just now, Wiseblood said:

You keep farming this line as if you're some sort of brilliant tactician, yet I've failed to see you back it up.  Tell us, coach, what we should have done.

Dunstall wanted Hogan thrown in ruck.  

 

Another commentator (7) questioned why we threw a number behind the ball in the 2nd quarter after dominating.

 

Personally, he has coached 5 games, and it's hard to play chess when many of your pieces are injured, especially ruck one and two.

 

Gallant as Watts was, he was so buggered he couldn't even contest many ruck contests in the last quarter.  Only problem with the way we played in the last is that we favoured stoppage footy (kick out wide and long) when the avalanche was coming.

 

Roos reckons Frost will be first ruck next week.  

 

Would you trade Brayshaw for Stef Martin in a hypothetical mid season trade?  I sound like a numb dumb SEN commentator so ignore that last proposal.

Boy there is some absolute dross being posted on here tonight.

There's no doubt the injuries cruelled us. We were two down on the bench but Jones, Viney and Petracca were all injured and stayed on the park. It was 17 vs 22. Also, does Richmond have a single player missing due to injury? It was best 22 vs not close to best 17. The fourth quarter was nothing other than a byproduct of the players having given it 100% all night and running out of energy. The fact we were still in front with 5 minutes to go says volumes about how good we were.

However...

We should have been way, way more than 20 points up at three quarter time. IMO we lost this game in the first quarter, not the last. That first five minutes, the ball didn't cross into Richmond's forward half, yet we had nothing but 3 points on the board. We should have been 20 points up at quarter time and 40 points up by three quarter time, which would have made the fade-out in the last quarter manageable.

This is the story of our season. I think we've been the better side for longer in all 5 of our games, but when we are on top with momentum we aren't scoring goals, whilst we concede too many when the momentum isn't with us. So we end up playing better football, for longer than our opponent, but losing 3 games. 

Of the 17 fit players, a few of them were passengers, none more so than JKH. An absolute waste of space and I refuse to believe that he met any "KPI" that was satisfactory. Yes, rusty after 1.5 years out but no, tonight was not good enough. 

As for the positives, HIbberd was incredible, Oliver again a beast, Hunt is a gem, Watts was superb, Jetta is one of the league's premier small defenders, and I thought Melksham and Vince both played their best games for the season (says a bit more about the first few than tonight).

We are one of the better 2-3 sides I've seen in recent years (and Richmond possibly the worst 5-0 side) but at the end of the day it doesn't matter. There is sufficient evidence to say we should have won all 5 games and that's why it is reasonable to be upset with the 2-3 start, despite the circumstances.

16 minutes ago, SaberFang said:

Well, we can kiss finals goodbye, that much is clear. You can't have losses against Richmond and Fremantle (teams we beat last year) and expect to play finals. Yeah, we registered wins against St Kilda and Carlton (Port flogged them by ~100 points whereas we barely fell over the line), but it remains two steps forward and two steps backwards.

I can't wait to see all the optimism going into next week's match only to lose, again, through inaccuracy in front of goal (despite dominating in all stats).

Oh yeah, hope you feel like [censored], Jordan. Three games lost from a lack of leadership; we could easily have been 5-0 with you on the ground.

How old are you?

1 minute ago, hemingway said:

Agree, our midfield and those with ball in hand, do Hogan no favours. 

Makes him look wooden and slow.

He is a sook.  Lucky to kick his last one after he stopped and whinged....

 

Our mids busted their backsides.  Maybe the darts stopped him presenting a few times for our needed bail-out kicks in the last?

Off topic a bit but Richmond were 5.50 to win at 3/4 time....

2 minutes ago, picket fence said:

Yeah like every other Friggen year another year another set of excuses. Refer to my "Chew me up thread. Dont want excuses 

How did Geelong find the will to win, How did Freo. Yep injuries played a part but in reality we lost two games due to poor character and even poorer leadership! 

Injuries?? just another thing good sides take in their stride and STILL WIN!

Not excuses, there are reasons which is something different. 

As well as all the reasons given tonight, the Demons still have weaknesses and players who frankly are not up to it.

We also have not developed match winners like a Martin, Riewoldt or Cochen. Players who provide the impetus and inspiration to win matches when the match is on the line.

Perhaps our match winners are still developing but we need them on centre stage soon.

33 minutes ago, Watts the matter said:

Frustrating game and night, but what I've come to expect this season.

Major issues converting our forward 50's into scores, too many players that are not kicks in the team.

This loss down to the selection panel for mine. Kent and Pederson should have been playing, with Smith and JKH on the sidelines.

Major issues with 3 or 4 defenders going up for the same ball and leaving their opponent out the back. Melksham and Hunt the major culprits.

Hogan needs to stop playing for frees, it's embarrassing. 

Garlett really soft in a contest late in the game in the goal square.

ANB basically summed up his career in this game, not clean enough (how many fumbles in the 1st quarter) and panics under pressure. but you can't fault his endeavour.

Tyson has been horrible this season.

Neville Jetta looked painfully slow.

TMAC crushed in 1 on 1's.

BRING BACK DEAN KENT!

 

This looks like a post written after a 100 point loss.