44 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

You're dead right. A howler..

But his howlers are decreasing discernably. 

I'm not overly sold yet but he has certainly put in some decent footy this year when many around him were below bog average.

A bigger howler from @farmer that refuses to see it....

 

47 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

You're dead right. A howler..

But his howlers are decreasing discernably. 

I'm not overly sold yet but he has certainly put in some decent footy this year when many around him were below bog average.

You honestly cannot be serious. A howler? You honestly think he made errors in that video?

No i don't believe it, you must be having a lend. In no way can Oscar be blamed for that goal. No way.

If you watch this video from the 14 second mark you will see that the culprit is initially Oliver for coughing up the ball on the wing, then the midfield for allowing an easy handball to Zaharakis who is all by himself in the corridor and is allowed to take a few steps and under no pressure boot the ball 50 metres to Smiths advantage over the back.

And when Zharakis kicks it Oscar is about 10 -15 metres from the spot where it is marked and the same distance parallel from Smith. he had no chance to cut that off. He did pretty well to get back actually. 

I can't make out the dees player on the half back flank but whoever it is makes no effort to pressure Zaharakis, for instance by diving to smother. Pathetic and the an example of the very thing that causes us to leak goals. Though some still prefer to blame defender in such scenarios as if it is still 1992 and the zone hasn't been invented and only a handful of players players get multiple tackles.

But you think Oscar made a howler? Beggars belief. But hilariously provides a concrete example to illistrate my point about confirmation bias. 

Edited May 1, 20186 yr by binman

@binmanhe stuffed up.

He didn't stuff up all game, in fact i thought he was ok. 

But letting your man be goalside is naughty naughty footy 101

3 minutes ago, binman said:

You honestly cannot be serious. A howler? You honestly think he made errors in that video?

No i don't believe it, you must be having a lend. In no way can Oscar be blamed for that goal. No way.

If you watch this video from the 14 second mark you will see that the culprit is initially Oliver for coughing up the ball on the wing, then the midfield for allowing an easy handball to Zaharakis who is all by himself in the corridor and is allowed to take a few steps and under no pressure boot the ball 50 metres to Smiths advantage over the back.

 And when Zharakis kicks it Oscar is about 10 -15 metres from the spot where it is marked and the same distance parallel from Smith. he had no chance to cut that off. He did pretty well to get back actually. 

I can't make out the dees player on the half back flank but whoever it is makes no effort to pressure Zaharakis, for instance by diving to smother. Pathetic and the an example of the very thing that causes us to leak goals. Though some still prefer to blame defender in such scenarios as if it is still 1992 and the zone hasn't been invented and only a handful of players players get multiple tackles.

But you think Oscar made a howler? Beggars belief. But hilariously provides a concrete example to illistrate my point about confirmation bias. 

You are now being ridiculous Binperson. Even the three commentators including Lyon and Dunstall spoke of how poor he was in that contest. And how poor of him it was that he let Smith run into an open goal. He is a defender FFS. At worst he should have held Smith up and made him kick the goal.

If you cant see what OmcD did wrong in that clip then you are sadly delusional and unbelievably biased.

4 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

@binmanhe stuffed up.

He didn't stuff up all game, in fact i thought he was ok. 

But letting your man be goalside is naughty naughty footy 101

His man? His man was Daniher not a small forward.

So i assume you are serious then. you honestly think Oscar made an error in that case? I have heard everything. I don't want to be rude but i have to say i can't help but judge your football nous more harshly that i previously did. 

7 minutes ago, jnrmac said:

You are now being ridiculous Binperson. Even the three commentators including Lyon and Dunstall spoke of how poor he was in that contest. And how poor of him it was that he let Smith run into an open goal. He is a defender FFS. At worst he should have held Smith up and made him kick the goal.

If you cant see what OmcD did wrong in that clip then you are sadly delusional and unbelievably biased.

That is so funny Jnr.

Dunstall is wrong in his call (unsurprisingly because he is clueless) and you simply repeated his mistake. No way could he hold him up. Smith was running full tilt and is twice as fast as Oscar. Gary Lyon did not agree with Dunstall (he agrees about reward for effort for the bombers) and no other commentator made a comment about it.

Biased? me? Again that is so funny. 

4 minutes ago, jnrmac said:

You are now being ridiculous Binperson. Even the three commentators including Lyon and Dunstall spoke of how poor he was in that contest. And how poor of him it was that he let Smith run into an open goal. He is a defender FFS. At worst he should have held Smith up and made him kick the goal.

If you cant see what OmcD did wrong in that clip then you are sadly delusional and unbelievably biased.

OMac can be enigmatic; I was a very concerned critic of him at the start of this year, having watched most of the 2017 replays in succession and to be honest, I was highly sceptical that his form would be at least, adequate, in the FB position.

Since then, I have changed my stance in this evaluation and regard for him has heightened as he has been a steadier player accepting more responsibilities in the zone against an array of good forwards (even if they are a little out of form). Given  time, if I may be allowed by some of the self-righteous amongst DL posters, it could be possible now to see OMac further improve. I would certainly hope such improvement would continue - and if not, TMac is the only solution on our current lists.

3 minutes ago, binman said:

His man? His man was Daniher not a small forward.

So i assume you are serious then. you honestly think Oscar made an error in that case? I have heard everything. I don't want to be rude but i have to say i can't help but judge your football nous more harshly that i previously did. 

He made 3 errors if you read my previous post.

And you would know more than Lyon and Dunstall?

You are a joke, So you are now saying that a player doesn't have to tackle or chase someone if it isn't his man? I have heard everything. 'sorry, not my man, I'll just put in some lame-arsed effort and no one will notice"

14 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

@binmanhe stuffed up.

He didn't stuff up all game, in fact i thought he was ok. 

But letting your man be goalside is naughty naughty footy 101

Absolutely no way I can see where Oscar stuffed up in that clip.  You are underestimating how seriously good that kick was.

Our entire team were out of position once Clarry lost the ball.  We had players running forward of the ball, and as soon as we turned it over, Essendon had players streaming forward.  That 10-15 metre burst that Zaharakis got because of the turnover meant that Oscar was that 10-15 metres ahead of where the ball ended up being marked.  By the time he realised the mistake was made up the field, he ran straight back but the bird had flown by then.

Absolutely nothing he could do about that.

20 minutes ago, jnrmac said:

He made 3 errors if you read my previous post.

And you would know more than Lyon and Dunstall?

You are a joke, So you are now saying that a player doesn't have to tackle or chase someone if it isn't his man? I have heard everything. 'sorry, not my man, I'll just put in some lame-arsed effort and no one will notice"

What on earth are you talking about? I never said a a player doesn't have to tackle or chase someone if it isn't his man. That would be stupid. In any case as i (actually) said Oscar did pretty well to get back. He did chase, hard. Just didn't catch him. 

He wasn't the one who put a 'lame arse effort in'. His mid field teammates are guilty of that but not Oscar. 

But this is why is stopped debating you about Oscar. There is no point. Your views are etched in stone. And before we fall into into silly name calling lets stop here and agree to disagree.

Edited May 1, 20186 yr by binman

I'm so tempted to make long-winded post but I just cbf'd.

Summary of the last page of this thread: Oscar is a dud because he couldn’t stop a perfectly weighted kick, nor chase down Essendon’s fastest player who some other dope in a Melbourne jumper let get 30 metres in space.

Sweet.

34 minutes ago, Nasher said:

Summary of the last page of this thread: Oscar is a dud because he couldn’t stop a perfectly weighted kick, nor chase down Essendon’s fastest player who some other dope in a Melbourne jumper let get 30 metres in space.

Sweet.

And not give away 50 by stopping him from playing on. Where he could then touch the ball standing on the mark and get blamed for giving away a point that could cost us percentage, finals, and ultimately the club folding as a result. 

13 hours ago, Nasher said:

Summary of the last page of this thread: Oscar is a dud because he couldn’t stop a perfectly weighted kick, nor chase down Essendon’s fastest player who some other dope in a Melbourne jumper let get 30 metres in space.

Sweet.

This is just false. No-one said he was a dud and the orginal post was in response to the hyperbole that OMcD "never panics", "will be a gorilla", "will be better than Rance" and said it was "harsh" that he couldn't stop a ball below his knees because it is "oval shaped".

If you think the clip above is good defending then it really says it all. He was the last man in the zone and his job is to stop exactly the situation in the clip. He let Smith get goal side and then looked like he was trying to slap him with a wet lettuce.  

He has a lot of learning to do.

There's merit to both sides of the argument.

In the past, Oscar was rightly criticised for some bog ordinary efforts and performances. But that's going to come when a club decides to play a 20 year old bean pole as a key defender at AFL level rather than trade for a stop-gap in order to let Oscar develop for a couple of years at VFL level.

Turns out we didn't opt to go down that path and maybe the MFC knew there'd be some bumps along the way, but he'd develop quicker at AFL lever.

To date, it's clearly worked. He's been super solid so far this year, not without the odd-brain fade.

I think part of why posters like Binman and others become enamoured with pieces of play that one would term 'elementary' is because there was a period of time where he was not only getting beaten easily one-on-one, but he was missing spoils completely, getting caught holding the ball, getting out-positioned too easily and making really dumb decisions whether in the contest or not. When a player is doing all of those things on a regular basis, he is going to cop criticism. It's fair.

Now that he's not doing that, we're hearing that he's "improved out of sight", when really, it's just that he's eradicated so many brain fades from his game. He is now competing strongly and is more reliable and consistent in the contest as a key defender. He is good with ball in hand and he is playing with more confidence. All positives. Against Roughhead, I thought that's when we saw the best of him this year with his ability to take intercept marks and out-position Roughie thanks to dodgy kicks on a few occasions.

That's now his next stage of development. Turn some of those one-on-ones into genuine wins by using his body and either taking strong intercept marks or killing the ball with conviction. That's when we'll really see the signs of a high quality key defender. I'm not convinced yet, but the signs are positive so far.

Oscar has been a positive in a disappointing start to the season for the MFC.

 

Edited May 2, 20186 yr by stevethemanjordan

His positioning still needs work but when he is in the right position he contests really well. He works really hard with his running for his size and the skills will get better over time. People forget that Rance while being great over head in his first few years, he was really fumbly and turned the ball over often.

On 4/30/2018 at 7:52 PM, jnrmac said:

Honestly this is just pure rubbish, He has had a really good start to the year, no question but have a look at the first foray Essendon made into its fwd line where he loses the one on one and then allows his man to run off the mark into an open goal as an example. 

He is learning and improving but you are trying to make him sound like Mathew Scarlett and Stephen Silvagni rolled into one.

Some only see what they want to see no matter what the reality is Jnr.

Looks like this is his break out year though and settling in to his role down back.  Very much a keeper now (who else do we have for this one on one role!) but also has the odd moment here and there that leaves me scratching my head.

Only 43 games also which means there's so much learning and football ahead.  Can only get better.  The least of our worries down back right now.

Edited May 2, 20186 yr by Rusty Nails

7 minutes ago, mongrel said:

His positioning still needs work but when he is in the right position he contests really well. He works really hard with his running for his size and the skills will get better over time. People forget that Rance while being great over head in his first few years, he was really fumbly and turned the ball over often.

A work in progress.

Il happily cede he is now stepping up into his role/ability. He's certainly had some cwap games but he was most ablely accompanied by more than a handful.

He still makes some glaring mistakes. Tbh that's expected. Hopefully each one is a lesson.To suppose these dont occur if either arrogance of bias or ignorance of fact.

I don't think anyone is particularly trying to assassinate Oscar but simply , in some instances, highlighting or pointing it out...i.e..the errors.

Sometimes he'll just get beaten by a more adept player...or play.

Stuff happens.

Oscar has beaten Hawkins, Roughead, , Riewoldt, and Daniher in succession.

I've  forgotten who he beat at Brisbane; they tried several on him.

I thought he was good last season, and he has improved.

A.A. in the near future.

2 minutes ago, Jumping Jack Clennett said:

Oscar has beaten Hawkins, Roughead, , Riewoldt, and Daniher in succession.

I've  forgotten who he beat at Brisbane; they tried several on him.

I thought he was good last season, and he has improved.

A.A. in the near future.

Hipwood and he didn't do a bad job on Brown either.

2 of his goals he couldn't do anything about. 

One was a down field free kick and the other one was Gawn giving away a dodgy free kick. 

Edited May 2, 20186 yr by WERRIDEE

1 hour ago, Jumping Jack Clennett said:

Oscar has beaten Hawkins, Roughead, , Riewoldt, and Daniher in succession.

I've  forgotten who he beat at Brisbane; they tried several on him.

I thought he was good last season, and he has improved.

A.A. in the near future.

Yeah because the Demons have had so many AAs in their history....

Been mentioned by a few posters elsewhere as an important signature going forward. Would he be our number 1 priority now?

Sign him up: Oscar McDonald. The 22-year-old has taken his game to another level in 2018, flourishing after assuming the mantle as Melbourne's No.1 key defender. Stronger in one-on-one contests this season and more assured with the ball in his hand, McDonald has played the most game time of any player in the competition after six rounds. Shapes as a key member of the Demons' team over the next decade.

Others of note: Angus Brayshaw, Dean Kent, Jake Melksham, Bernie Vince

Oscar McDonald has definitely improved from last season. There's no doubt. However that doesn't mean that I trust him at all. He is still very weak in 1 on 1 contests and is prone to some brain fades and lack of awareness (much like his brother in his first 5 years at the club). Oscar has decent foot skills and I've been happy with his overhead marking so far but he needs to continue to keep it simple and not bite off more than he can chew. He doesn't show great footy IQ. He doesn't know when to rush the behind, when to play the boundary line etc. And you can't teach footy IQ. He also gives away silly free kicks such as pushing Daniher in the back when he has already run under the ball. This are all the things that cause me worry. 

He was good on the weekend but not great. Two of Daniher's points McDonald had the chance to tackle him but was unable to get a hold of him. 

The Devon Smith goal was a shocker from the whole team, terrible mismatch and could see it unfolding from up above.

17 hours ago, Nasher said:

Summary of the last page of this thread: Oscar is a dud because he couldn’t stop a perfectly weighted kick, nor chase down Essendon’s fastest player who some other dope in a Melbourne jumper let get 30 metres in space.

Sweet.

you missed "the guy who has been his biggest critic can't be bothered to put up a big post rebutting all the positive posts".

edit: nope sorry there he goes.

Edited May 2, 20186 yr by Cards13