Howdy all,

Been a tough couple of weeks. Dropping three games we were in and without injuries probably would have won all three. It's a new era for us Demon supporters, we are sadly used to the Ls but this time it hurts a bit more because we know we were the better team on most occasions (all be it a very inexperienced one)

I wanted to discuss the next 6 weeks. Now we've seen what we produce (Exciting football but unable to sustain it for 4 qtrs., and injuries seem to be the highlights of the season so far) I think the next 6 weeks will be season defining on this group.

v Essendon at Etihad

v Hawks at MCG

v Crows at Radelaide

v North at MCG

v Suns at Darwin?

v Pies at MCG

Injuries permitting (if we had Gawn etc) I reckon we would have been a sneaky chance in all these games (we seemed to match up well vs Adelaide last year). But what are our expectations now?

Personally I am hoping for 3 & 3. I think we are 50/50 chances in all except Bombers at Etihad and Crows. Bombers love the flat deck and with no ruckman I think they will towel us up sadly, Crows are obviously a more experienced a offensive beast.. There is no particular easy beat, the competition is very even, but if we can be 5 - 6 and start to get healthy we could be a sneaky chance for the 8 still.

As much as it's sucked the last couple of weeks we haven't been out of games, we have failed to execute at critical stages and injuries have cut down our structures. We need to stay injury free, and selection is another that will be critical going forward if we are any chance of finals but the next six weeks will define the group IMO.

 

Selection

Selection

Selection

I'm afeard...

The old saying 1 week at a time, we just can't look past this week now as we have no idea how our ruck situation will turn out, 1 thing is certain we will find out what Goodwin and the team are made of, and that is a touch exciting I'm not worrying about finals if we are good enough we will make it, I'm excited to see what we come up with against the bombers 

I think we're overrated at times, and call me crazy... but we're a reasonable chance at being 5-1 out of those 6 games.

Huge 5 weeks coming up before the bye. All, bar the Adelaide game, we would normally be more than a good chance to win, but without a ruck it is going to be very difficult.

If we go into the bye at 5-5, I think we are well placed for finals with Gawn not far off coming back from injury.

That would mean winning 3 of Essendon, Hawthorn, North and Gold Coast.

 

I think eventually we will start converting the opportunities we create and if we do that sooner rather than later we have no reason to fear any team, even without gawn. 

13 minutes ago, Luther said:

I think we're overrated at times, and call me crazy... but we're a reasonable chance at being 5-1 out of those 6 games.

OK, you're crazy.

No better than 2-4

 

4 minutes ago, Waltham33 said:

No better than 2-4

 

Yeah my thoughts too.

With wins against GC and Collingwood. 4-7 after Queens B'day.

Hopefully Spencer makes an earlier than expected recovery.

I genuinely think we will beat the pies, suns, hawks and north. The bombers game is probably 50/50 and the crows game will be a tough ask 

Crows will smash us. Too experienced. 

The other five games are 50-50 given our form and injuries. 

So two wins and a draw!

Without a real ruck we're going to struggle in all of these.  Losing the hitouts makes our midfield work harder to compensate, so they will tire more quickly and fall away in the last quarter.  We'll really struggle to hold these sides. It's basically going to be back to turning the ball over on our half back line and trying to score on the rebound. 

Currently 2-3.  If we can split the difference and turn at 5-6 we will still be mid-table, and making our own chances.  We are not a top 4 side, otherwise we would 5-0 or 4-1.  We are a developing side and will start to put this promising stuff together at some point.  ATM we are learning the system.  WHen we play it for 4 quarters, it will be a thing of beauty.  But not yet... so 3-3 from the next 6 would be my call.  Better than that - given our injuries and our learning curve - will be a bonus.

1 hour ago, Unleash Hell said:

 

v Essendon at Etihad  Bombers by 22

v Hawks at MCG     Hawks by 17

v Crows at Radelaide   Crows by 43

v North at MCG   Dees by 27

v Suns at Darwin?  Dees by 13

v Pies at MCG  Dees by 54

 

Unfortunately I feel a 6 game losing streak is coming,..,.  we will all be on suicide watch and talking the draft and is Goodwin any good, but we will turn things around and head into the bye at 5-6 with a percentage over 100.

From there we can launch an assault on the finals.  Its going to be a frustrating and at times exhilarating season.

I'm worried that losing the last three games after being reasonably placed to win them, as well as the loss of key personnel (particularly rucks) will leave our players 'flat' in the short term.  They have given everything for zero reward, and this could be deflating, and in games where one or two percent could be the difference between winning and losing, it could be costly.   Hopefully I just have a dose of the old MFCSS!

Hate to say it, but think it's one week at a time.  If the last 3 weeks have taught us anything, suspensions and injuries play a huge role.  

Essendon coming off a short break in wet weather.  They might snag an injury in the first quarter.
One thing I will say.  We need to be very very aware of their small forwards.  Tippa and Fantasia are top notch. 

We have some very young, very inexperienced players in key roles (eg Oliver, Hunt & Petracca). Plus we have Watts playing in a role that he is not suited too. They are going to tire at some point, and we need to find a way to better share the load (decent team selection would help).

We could win five of the six (we won't get close to Adelaide), but could easily drop the majority as well.

Most likely we will be 4-7 or thereabouts by the half way point.

We are in real trouble without a ruckman, more because of how it impacts our structure. If we can maintain our structure by maybe having Pederson or King ruck the majority of the game, and we stop losing good players to injuries (especially during games), we are a chance to win most of these.

We will get smashed in Adelaide, and I hope this doesn't destroy our confidence. 

Given our situation I'm just taking a one week at a time attitude. Adelaide currently is the only team I fear as I think they look bloody good this year, all other teams on our day and even with our injuries I feel we can beat. 

In a strange way I feel like our club should take inspiration from the Bombers of last year when they beat us. They were depleted and we'd just come off a good win, everything was pointing to a bid win for us but it didn't happen. Now you can look at it as Melbourne failing in that game and there was plenty of that in there, but at he end of the day the Bombers busted their guts harder than us. 

We can definitely win next week, even without a genuine ruckman, in fact both games we've played on Etihad this year we've played well, it's just one of them we decided to kick ourselves in the butt. 

Start with winning next week and reassess after that. 

14 hours ago, Luther said:

I think we're overrated at times, and call me crazy... but we're a reasonable chance at being 5-1 out of those 6 games.

I agree Lex. The Crows too good at this stage but the others are doable. With a bit of good luck.

13 hours ago, Petraccattack said:

Unfortunately I feel a 6 game losing streak is coming,..,.  we will all be on suicide watch and talking the draft and is Goodwin any good, but we will turn things around and head into the bye at 5-6 with a percentage over 100.

From there we can launch an assault on the finals.  Its going to be a frustrating and at times exhilarating season.

At first I laughed but this post makes sense. Not sure we'll lose the next three but it's possible...

What the stats tell us is that we're very clearly a top-8 caliber side. A combination of poor conversion, injuries and suspensions have hurt...yet we've still been super close to starting 5-0. Our percentage is over 100%, which is encouraging. We've played two finals teams and lost by not much, and Freo is no push-over. 

I don't want to discount the Bombers because I think they're okay, they have a lot of good little players about the place. I just trust we will beat them in contested ball, and be a little more refined going forward.

It's also time for Jones, Tyson, and Viney to step up their games. Season is on the line and the three of them have let us down over our three losses. We really need them to start playing better football. Oliver has single-handedly been carrying us.

It's an interesting one.  Yes, injuries are killing us, especially to key personnel, but what is killing us is more about when they are happening during the game, mores than who it is to.  What does that mean?  Sure, we have lost our top 2 rucks, but we've lost both of these during the game in the 2nd quarter of that match.  Arguably, the games we lost both rucks (Geelong and Richmond), our third quarter has been probably our best quarter.  It means that Watts is doing a good job at competing, and that our midfielders are still proving to be quite dominant even when we are losing the ruck battle.

The issue with losing players early to injury is that it leaves us terribly short for rotations, and that's what is costing us in the last quarter.

So with that in mind, I'm very confident we can win all bar the Adelaide game.  I just hope that we can get through a game with no injuries, so that it gives us a fighting chance to show it.

 

Following the Richmond game, I felt so deflated and began to think that perhaps our season was over given injuries and the loss of games that we really should have won. However, after careful reflection, I think our situation whilst undesirable and not ideal, is not as dire as it seems.

It is going to hurt not having a ruckman for the next 6-7 weeks and will no doubt cost us some games as it already has, but I think with preparation and adjustment to our structure, we will be able to handle our next six games. I think a ruck combo between Frost/Pedo/Watts will make do and particularly think Frost has a relatively good leap to compete in the ruck contest. Pedo will be pumped to come in and I think he will give it his everything for us over the next few weeks.

I have a lot of confidence in our midfield and have enough confidence in our forward line – I am cautious though of our backline and this seems to be a real issue for us. Whenever an opposition team enters their inside 50, you can almost guarantee they will score a goal; we are just fortunate that our high-pressure style is good at limiting the amount of inside 50s for our opposition. Our conversion rate and ability to capitalise inside our forward 50 is somewhat concerning but my answers to that over the last three weeks come down to this: Geelong game we were down our most important forward in Hogan and another forward in Watts as he had to take the ruck responsibilities; Freo game we were again without Hogan, but out of all the games, this is the most inexcusable; and the Richmond game, well we were down two key forwards with again Watts taking ruck responsibilities and Smith down meaning that it was only Hogan and Garlett the Richmond backs were having to defend.

Three weeks in a row we have let one poor quarter of footy cost us a game and at some point, it is going to click for the players. With Lewis back in the team this week, I think he adds the composure and leadership we so desperately need. I love Jones and Viney, but they should have stood up more in the fourth quarter as Cotchin did for Richmond, leading his team along with Riewoldt to victory.

There is only good that we can learn from the injury struggles we are currently facing and it will only make us a stronger, more resilient and capable side.

2 hours ago, praha said:

 

I don't want to discount the Bombers because I think they're okay, they have a lot of good little players about the place. I just trust we will beat them in contested ball, and be a little more refined going forward.

 

 

Not even gonna bother trying to analyse or think about this game after their VFL side beat us last season.  Whatever happens happens.

After the first five weeks hard to see the next six being worse but I suspect they will be due to harder competitors and the long injury list.

Before the season I had us 4-1 at this stage with the Essendon game dependent upon how their senior players performed on return. On paper and the Essendon performance we should have been favourites.

Throw in the injuries and the patchy form and it is now a 50:50 at best.

The older players need to fire and a few need a purple patch if we are going to maintain any momentum over the next six weeks.

Sure there is an excuse for each week but each week we were in a winning position and lost. Hell relatively speaking we stumbled over the line against Carlton.