Now the dust has settled on the bitter disappointment of yesterday, the time is ripe for a cold look at our chances of making the finals. 

Presently 7 teams sit on 3-4 wins, ourselves being the best of the teams on 3, with a higher percentage than the Saints (8th) and the Dockers (9th). Those teams are shaping as our strongest direct competition, the Saints are in blistering form with what should be four points against the Blues at home, while the Dockers take on Richmond at the 'G. Port and Gold Coast, two other rivals, are also playing each other in Shanghai, with a real possibility that the jet lag and pollution could affect them in the next round. The Bombers and Collingwood could still conceivably make the finals but the Pies are down on confidence and the Bombers are horrendous. 

 

Of our direct rivals, the Saints have an easier month ahead, with the Dockers playing Richmond and the Crows in the next three- the Saints however will have a tough run of it after that with successive games against the Dogs and the Crows, which if results go our way could see us make up points by beating North and the Suns in Alice. I don't think we'll have our colours lowered by too much vs eh Crows either, we have matched up reasonably well on them. In another 4-5 weeks we should have Spencer back in the ruck, and with the bye and a couple of wins to us and losses to direct opposition, we are still a strong chance to make the 8 in what is an unpredictable and even season. 

Finals?  What are they?

I remember now.....what the Demons participated in every year I was at school, bar the last year, and only a very few times since.

To play finals, and to win finals, pathetic excuses such as "not being ready to play" or being "not switched on" must be taken as unacceptable.  

Until and unless that happens, we will remain also rans, just making up the numbers as cannon fodder. 

In light of the blown games vs Hawks, Richmond and Freo we will now need to win at least two of the following matches to make up for them - 

Round 8 vs Crows in Adelaide

Round 13 vs Bulldogs at Etihad

Round 14 vs West Coast in Perth

Round 15 vs Swans at the G'

Round 17 vs Crows in Darwin

Round 20 vs GWS in Sydney

 

 

 

I foresee some more short-term pain before we go on an absolutely barnstorming run post-bye before a couple hiccups toward the end of the season leave our finals hopes in the balance. I base more so on us than our opposition.

44 minutes ago, Petraccattack said:

In light of the blown games vs Hawks, Richmond and Freo we will now need to win at least two of the following matches to make up for them - 

Round 8 vs Crows in Adelaide

Round 13 vs Bulldogs at Etihad

Round 14 vs West Coast in Perth

Round 15 vs Swans at the G'

Round 17 vs Crows in Darwin

Round 20 vs GWS in Sydney

We could lose all of those games and still be on 11 wins, so I think we could win just one of those and have a reasonable chance of finals.

12 wins was sufficient in three of the past four years (2016*; 2014**; 2013)

*In 2016, St Kilda were pipped by on percentage by North because the Saints had a very ordinary percentage of 95.8% (that was actually less than the percentage of teams nine and ten - Port and us).

**Essendon were excluded from finals in 2014, but 12 wins was enough anyway.

30 minutes ago, Rogue said:

We could lose all of those games and still be on 11 wins

Only if we won every other game, which we wont. We are going to need to cause some upsets to get to 11 or 12 wins.

I've come to the realisation that we're just not very good (yet). I don't think it's bad or negative to acknowledge that. I don't think St Kilda has more talent but I do believe they are a better *team*. Good teams play finals, bad teams lose games they should win. Thinking about finals now is just silly. Now it's all about Goodwin developing his coaching, guys like Oliver, Petracca, Hogan, Viney, Tyson, Salem, Hunt, Wagner, Frost, Brayshaw, etc. getting more games in together, and now how to get over the line together. 

Our plans have now shifted away from finals and are now once again plastered on development. Harsh reality unfortunately. I said before the season that missing finals would be a failure but not surprising. 

What I am worried about is that, not just with Melbourne but with all teams in this situation, the wheels can fall off very easily. We're banking on a very young core to win us games, and it's scary. I *believe* we'll go on a 4-5 game winning streak tear, but I don't know for sure that we will, and I'm not overly confident.

Sorry, guys, but thinking finals now is silly. It's going to be "one week at a time" for a while. Let's reevaluate after Queen's Birthday. That's 11 games in. IMO if we haven't won 5 games by out 12th game (Round 13), then finals won't happen. Just like last year, we've dropped games in the first half of the year that will ultimately prove to cost us at the end of the year. We win the games we've lost this year, and we're 2/3 of the way towards a finals appearance.

I've done my ladder predictor so many times now and it makes less sense the more the season progresses. The recent upset wins and losses like GWS and the Crows makes it even more difficult. The bottom line is, we need to win games. It doesn't matter who we win against as long as we start to rack up the four pointers. So far we have lost games we should have won. Now we have to win some where we aren't favourites. (Statement of the bleedin' obvious, I know.)

It was said in the media multiple time's that St Kilda could win the same amount or even lose more games this year than last and still improve, and I always thought we could do exactly the same. I've been enjoying us play this year, and being in front (or level) in the last quarter of every game shows we've taken massive strides, in the last few years we would have been blown away by Hawthorn or Freo or the Saints when they went on big run but we've been able to peg them back. We've had major injuries against the Cats and Tigers - I know it's no excuse for not winning but the way we played despite being down on numbers was great.

I don't think missing finals is a failure for this year, failure will be going back to old ways and going down by 100 points or getting beaten badly by a team well below us. Have a look at the way our side is balanced from an experience point of view, against the Hawks we had 1860 games of experience, of that nearly 1,000 came from 5 players - Jones, Lewis, Vince, Watts and Garlett. There's a lot of maturing to be done by guys like Hogan, Oliver, Salem, Petracca, Hunt, OMac who've all played less than 50 games.

Just had a play around with the ladder predictor on the AFL site. Put us down for dropping the next two games - Crows (highly likely) and Roo's (50/50) and tipped the rest of the rounds games on current form. The outcome is not good:

15th place by the end of round 9.

If the season isn't already shot (as in the chance to play finals) it certainly will be if we drop these next two games.

38 minutes ago, Red and Blue realist said:

It was said in the media multiple time's that St Kilda could win the same amount or even lose more games this year than last and still improve, and I always thought we could do exactly the same. I've been enjoying us play this year, and being in front (or level) in the last quarter of every game shows we've taken massive strides, in the last few years we would have been blown away by Hawthorn or Freo or the Saints when they went on big run but we've been able to peg them back. We've had major injuries against the Cats and Tigers - I know it's no excuse for not winning but the way we played despite being down on numbers was great.

I don't think missing finals is a failure for this year, failure will be going back to old ways and going down by 100 points or getting beaten badly by a team well below us. Have a look at the way our side is balanced from an experience point of view, against the Hawks we had 1860 games of experience, of that nearly 1,000 came from 5 players - Jones, Lewis, Vince, Watts and Garlett. There's a lot of maturing to be done by guys like Hogan, Oliver, Salem, Petracca, Hunt, OMac who've all played less than 50 games.

Last year we finished 11th and would have finished 9th if we had not stuffed up the Carlton game.

Making finals was not too much to ask.

The reality is that waiting for a team to "gel" is foolish... while we wait others improve and our team stagnates etc.

In a year or so we will be desperate to retain the younger stars. Unrealistic to expect that we will keep them all unless we deliver success.

Already there is talk on the radio about how Hunt would be a perfect target for many clubs.

We continue to pay the price for no A grade senior players. It will be years before we achieve list balance so in short we have to win with what we have.

Might sound unrealistic but I was expecting finals plus one or two wins in the finals

Edited May 8, 20178 yr by Diamond_Jim

Thing is, the current list seems to perform better when there's no expectation on them- no one expected us to beat the Cats but we should have, ditto the Tigers. Our situation now is frustrating because we lose games we're in commanding positions in, but I'm expecting a response this week against the Crows.

Feel Goodwin will make a statement after the capitulation on Sunday, so wouldn't be surprised to see him roll the dice and drop the likes of JKH and Tyson: I'd like to see Tyson sent back to the VFL for a spell, and Brayshaw put in the middle, he played his best footy in the guts as a first year player and it could be what he needs to get back into form. 

Of course missing finals is a failure esp when the club has stated that was its intended goal of 2017.

Shuffle shuffle...... shuffle shuffle

8 hours ago, monoccular said:

Finals?  What are they?

I remember now.....what the Demons participated in every year I was at school, bar the last year, and only a very few times since.

To play finals, and to win finals, pathetic excuses such as "not being ready to play" or being "not switched on" must be taken as unacceptable.  

Until and unless that happens, we will remain also rans, just making up the numbers as cannon fodder. 

Exactly right Mono. 

This club has always needed an excuse to fire up

it is not the standard. 

This is the job Goodwin has in front of him

10 hours ago, monoccular said:

Finals?  What are they?

I remember now.....what the Demons participated in every year I was at school, bar the last year, and only a very few times since.

To play finals, and to win finals, pathetic excuses such as "not being ready to play" or being "not switched on" must be taken as unacceptable.  

Until and unless that happens, we will remain also rans, just making up the numbers as cannon fodder. 

Any chance you can go back to school?

Until we play 4 quarters we won't win another game the competition is too tight now and if your a bit off you will pay the price, and we can't rely on other clubs to have an off day, so finals is just a pipe dream at this point, will be lucky to match last year with 10 wins, the difference being we won't get smashed by anyone so still could be an improvement on last year 

Anyone projecting and pencilling in wins against lower teams is way off the mark.

We will cause an upset or two, but we will continue to drop games we "should" win. It's what we do.

Our only chance is scraping a couple of wins before the bye, and hoping Gawn comes back sooner rather than later, and we can get on a run.

Until we play four quarters on a regular basis, finals are a fantasy. It is more likely that we will finish bottom 6 if we keep going to sleep for a quarter here and a half there.

That would be a massive disappointment and a big fat fail. Our list is good enough, but our players still pick and choose when they play.

It's lucky that the Bulldogs didn't decide last year that they had the wrong profile to win a premiership, and accept that being mediocre was okay because that was the prevailing view.

1 hour ago, brendan said:

Until we play 4 quarters we won't win another game the competition is too tight now and if your a bit off you will pay the price, and we can't rely on other clubs to have an off day, so finals is just a pipe dream at this point, will be lucky to match last year with 10 wins, the difference being we won't get smashed by anyone so still could be an improvement on last year 

And there it is all packaged neatly in a nutshell, the inconvenient truth

So we now have to step up .... and do something we haven't done all year. Play 4 qtrs of football.   The caveat, in a fashion, is you dont have to play brilliant football for for qtrs , but  you have to be there abouts, there in the contest, mind in the game.

Scarey and sobering to think we've yet to do that.

Finals....fmd  , this season could get very ugly if we aren;t careful and resilient.