Top post scoop. 

On the pressure hard not to think that they ran out of gas. if true not a good sign as really there is no excuse not have maintained their aerobic fitness levels 

2 hours ago, My name is legion said:

MacDonald is not fit. Fat hips. Slow. Lazy.

Yep. He’s just had a kid in the last year and a bit and I can see he’s put it all on the hips. Same thing happened to me, but like everywhere. Would be keen to see how he goes in the time trial now, looks a mile off unfortunately.

5 minutes ago, Scoop Junior said:

As many have said it was horrible from halfway through the second quarter until the end. It's a rare game where you lead all day and are never headed but arguably deserved to lose. Really disappointing after such a great start to drop away like that and not be able to recover.

The backline seems to be copping it - I actually thought as a whole they probably won us the game (along with some Carlton misses). We went 11-0 in inside 50s at the start of the game; from that point on it was 48 to 29 against us but we managed to keep them at bay really until the last quarter. There were some mistakes from individuals and the defence started to creak quite badly in the last quarter but Carlton were basically walking it in with no pressure on the ball carrier. No defence can sustain a constant barrage of inside 50s when there is so little pressure applied up the ground.

To me it was more the midfield and forward line who were the culprits, despite being so good early in the game.

What happened to the pressure? It was sensational early - Carlton were nervous and fumbly and they barely got any clean ball. Then in the second half we could hardly lay a glove on them and they got out in space time and time again. I just don't understand how it can go from such a high level to such a low level in such a short space of time.

And same with the clearances. We went from a position of absolute dominance to then getting pummelled in the clearances in the second half. This is meant to be a strength of ours with our big-bodied midfield and even more so when it's Gawn against an inexperienced ruckman. Like the pressure it was just so disappointing to completely drop off in an area we should be dominant in.

There's been a lot of talk about TMac - confidence, form, injury, etc. - I think he's just not as good as people think he is/expect him to be. Don't get me wrong, he can be a very handy second tall forward - a really effective foil for a gun KF the way he was for Hogan in 2018. But he's not the main man - it's not his fault, being your side's no.1 KF is the hardest role in footy and not many have the ability to do it. He has a lot of good attributes and is still clearly a best 22 player but he needs help.

We are hugely reliant on Weid making it and being that dominant KF. I still have time for him and he needs a good run at it and to get some form and confidence and go from there. But if he doesn't make it, we are desperately lacking in this area.

It was so obvious in the second half when we just needed a KF to clunk a few to get us out of trouble. Every time it went in Carlton either marked it or ran it out and it meant we could never reset and press up. Carlton just recycled the ball and attacked again and we were constantly on the back foot. Having that big man take a few enables you to structure up again, a bit like a striker in soccer holding the ball up and allowing his defenders to push up and his midfielders to make runs in behind. It's so important when you need to arrest the momentum in a match.

Thanks heaps for the soccer lesson. Enlightening and educational. In the meantime time I'm looking forward to Melbourne beating our next opponent. Do you know who that is? Do you know where that is? I'll tell you: 3:35 pm. Saturday 21 June, MCG....I do hope it is by a solitary point again and I again get to enjoy reading your vitriol. 

26 minutes ago, andrewb said:

Hi everyone, first time poster here. Very happy to get a win, but a bit disappointed with the capitulation. I reckon it will take a few rounds for the crazy scenarios of the past 3 months to settle things down. I am a bit gobsmacked that this is a fan forum and the level of virtriol from 'fans' at our team. From reading a couple of threads it would seem that many posters forget our team is up against another team trying to win, and that our guys deliberately go out of the way to cause them angst. There is more to life than pissanting on dees players after a win, surely. 

Welcome and good on you for being positive. However it is about standards, how many times have you heard the top coaches or supporters at top clubs say they were happy with a win like that. The only other team we could beat with that sort of permormance is Gold Coast.  So massive improvement needed. 

3 hours ago, gs77 said:

On today's showing there are three teams worse than Carlton.  Imagine what this would have turned into if Carlton turned up in the first 1.5 quarters.

I bet Carlton win more games than they lose. Have a proper look at their team. Vastly more experienced than the Dees.

 

i can’t believe the rubbish on this site.  we made 7 changes. 9 of those playing today have not played 20games with MFC. Yet we won. Very lucky but we won. We played 2 kids for their first games,  who will play 200 games and more . I think we have recruited brilliantly. Each of Kosi, Langdon, Tomlinson, Jackson and Rivers will be terrific players . Bennell got through the game.He cost nothing, for heavens’s sake him him time 

 

you can’t expect everything to gel in one match. I agree that May was undisciplined, Smith was poor, so was Melksham. Tom McD was on a very good opponent . We’ve learned we need one more key forward . Ok, let’s go forward, talk of sacking Goodwin is sickening , let alone stupid 

In past years we  would  have lost

3 minutes ago, AC/DeeC said:

Thanks heaps for the soccer lesson. Enlightening and educational. In the meantime time I'm looking forward to Melbourne beating our next opponent. Do you know who that is? Do you know where that is? I'll tell you: 3:35 pm. Saturday 21 June, MCG....I do hope it is by a solitary point again and I again get to enjoy reading your vitriol. 

Vitriol? WTF?

9 minutes ago, AC/DeeC said:

Thanks heaps for the soccer lesson. Enlightening and educational. In the meantime time I'm looking forward to Melbourne beating our next opponent. Do you know who that is? Do you know where that is? I'll tell you: 3:35 pm. Saturday 21 June, MCG....I do hope it is by a solitary point again and I again get to enjoy reading your vitriol. 

The games on Sunday champ.  

Edited June 13, 20204 yr by DemonOX

It's hard to see us having a good season based on that.

We were utterly dominant for 1.5 quarters. Our pressure and clearance work was A-grade. The connection between Gawn and the mids, the connection between the mids and the forwards, and the pressure in the forward half of the ground, was exactly where it should be.

But in an all too familiar tale, our opponent adjusted to what we were doing and when they brought us back to the pack in our "one wood" areas (ruck dominance, CPs, clearances), we went to water.

We will never get anywhere as a club if we cannot respond to our opponent changing things up to nullify our strengths. We will not make finals, or win them, if we can only produce A-grade football when the game is on our terms. We have to learn how to respond to opposition challenges.

There's a lot of heat on our backline. IMO, there were areas where our defenders were poor (May's kicking, Joel Smith in general) but a lot of the problem was that our forward/mid pressure disintegrated so the ball was just coming in with too much ease. Reality is they didn't generate that many scoring shots from tonnes of inside 50s so the defence wasn't completely terrible.

Same old same old with the mids and forwards though. Oliver and Brayshaw look great when we're good, but seem to get run around when we're on the back foot. ANB and Hunt gave us a lot in the first quarter but disappeared completely in the second half. Melksham looked disinterested, TMac is either unfit or down on confidence, or both, but should be dropped, Jones was nowhere, Bennell has touch but isn't fit enough to impact the game. After quarter time it felt like Fritsch was double-teamed and we had nothing unless we put Petracca down there, which was robbing Peter to pay Paul.

 I don't understand Jetta on Mackay - Mackay didn't dominate but it just makes absolutely no sense. 

Jackson has all the promise in the world and I'm beyond excited that he's on our list, but if Weideman couldn't get selected in front of him based on what Jackson showed today, I'm scared for where Weideman is at.

Loved Rivers: he does enough right that IMO we can deal with his errors. Petracca was exceptional, Gawn was generally good (but honestly should have dominated Pittonet all day, not just for a half).

Better a win than a loss, but we've shown again today that our best and worst are too far apart and our worst comes out too often for us to compete for finals.

6 minutes ago, AC/DeeC said:

Thanks heaps for the soccer lesson. Enlightening and educational. In the meantime time I'm looking forward to Melbourne beating our next opponent. Do you know who that is? Do you know where that is? I'll tell you: 3:35 pm. Saturday 21 June, MCG....I do hope it is by a solitary point again and I again get to enjoy reading your vitriol. 

What a bloody silly post! His post was quite constructive.

1 hour ago, Earl Hood said:

Sorry I am a Smith fan but he was shizen today, no idea when to go or when to stay back on your man, total liability. Yes his first game down back but I worry now about his footy IQ. He has ability but how do you use it. I wonder if he is best used on the wing, looks like a limited future. I thought Tomlinson was okay today myself. He wasn’t recruited to take big marks. 

He’s just not a footballer. Not sure if he watched his dad or not but he just doesn’t seem to understand the game. It’s not about ‘getting a kick’ or jumping high - it’s about teamwork and he’s got no idea. No slight on him as a bloke but we need to move past him.

Unpopular opinion. In round 1, Weitering kept Tom Lynch to no goals, no marks and 9 touches in a Richmond win.
 

Maybe the narrative should be a little more about how good Weitering’s start to the season is, rather than how poor TMac was.

35 minutes ago, AC/DeeC said:

 

Ooooooooh! How enlightening! Cooking tips and culture advice. Why don't you just shut the * up and celebrate a win against CFC. I''m celebrating. I am! We WON!. Indeed history has been made... it's 5 wins in a row against the outer suburbanites! Carlton really are a rabble of an excuse for an AFL team now.. G O    T H E   M I G H T Y   D  E  M  O  N  S.     T  H  E    G  R  E  A  T  E  S  T     C  L  U  B     O  N    E  A  R  T  H .

Awesome a new [censored].... just what we need.

23 minutes ago, binman said:

Top post scoop. 

On the pressure hard not to think that they ran out of gas. if true not a good sign as really there is no excuse not have maintained their aerobic fitness levels 

Ran out of gas? After 1 and a half shortened quarters? No way, it's all psychological, they just decreased their intensity and couldn't regain it

6 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

It's hard to see us having a good season based on that.

We were utterly dominant for 1.5 quarters. Our pressure and clearance work was A-grade. The connection between Gawn and the mids, the connection between the mids and the forwards, and the pressure in the forward half of the ground, was exactly where it should be.

But in an all too familiar tale, our opponent adjusted to what we were doing and when they brought us back to the pack in our "one wood" areas (ruck dominance, CPs, clearances), we went to water.

We will never get anywhere as a club if we cannot respond to our opponent changing things up to nullify our strengths. We will not make finals, or win them, if we can only produce A-grade football when the game is on our terms. We have to learn how to respond to opposition challenges.

There's a lot of heat on our backline. IMO, there were areas where our defenders were poor (May's kicking, Joel Smith in general) but a lot of the problem was that our forward/mid pressure disintegrated so the ball was just coming in with too much ease. Reality is they didn't generate that many scoring shots from tonnes of inside 50s so the defence wasn't completely terrible.

Same old same old with the mids and forwards though. Oliver and Brayshaw look great when we're good, but seem to get run around when we're on the back foot. ANB and Hunt gave us a lot in the first quarter but disappeared completely in the second half. Melksham looked disinterested, TMac is either unfit or down on confidence, or both, but should be dropped, Jones was nowhere, Bennell has touch but isn't fit enough to impact the game. After quarter time it felt like Fritsch was double-teamed and we had nothing unless we put Petracca down there, which was robbing Peter to pay Paul.

 I don't understand Jetta on Mackay - Mackay didn't dominate but it just makes absolutely no sense. 

Jackson has all the promise in the world and I'm beyond excited that he's on our list, but if Weideman couldn't get selected in front of him based on what Jackson showed today, I'm scared for where Weideman is at.

Loved Rivers: he does enough right that IMO we can deal with his errors. Petracca was exceptional, Gawn was generally good (but honestly should have dominated Pittonet all day, not just for a half).

Better a win than a loss, but we've shown again today that our best and worst are too far apart and our worst comes out too often for us to compete for finals.

Clearances and forward pressure

The F50 was a disappointment after qtr time. But in saying that the delivery wasn't much better

3 hours ago, Buzzy said:

Pathetic smile on his face at the end.  Could you imagine Roos doing that?

Not sure Goody has an edge that will put much fear (if any) into any of this lot.  Too complacent and easy going.  All good when all is well but when the going gets tough there appears to be a lack of venom / vigour / edge to drive this group to another level and step up to match and pressure / lock down on an opponent when they start getting a run on.

Still too one paced aside from Rivers, Langdon and Hunt, not enough crumbers, no KFs presenting and poor forward structure as a result of no genuine effective KF marking power.

All ahead full steam far too often coming inside 50.  Rarely stop, prop and go lateral or backwards around the arc to maintain possession if percentage outlets are covered.  Instead we continually bomb as per last year.

Negatives >  T-Mac gawnsky up forward?  Straight swap for May?  Jones completely Gawnsky?  Smith horrid down back.  Melk AWOL ....again.  Salem refuses to take the game on and kick further than 20 odd meters or so and mostly down the line.  Fritschkreig about the only marking threat up forward, other than Tracc (when he goes there) but can't hit the broad side of a barn atm.  Why wasn't Tracc played forward for a longer stint?  We are stagnant / hesitant running the ball out of the goal square with all that open space in front playing old style footy while the bulk of teams run the ball out most of the time gaining valuable meters often to mid field.  Why was Gawny lairising with rediculous blind tap outs out the back straight to Blues players on a few occasions in the third quarter?  Cost u so  few goals imv.  General field kicking after quarter time dropped away gradually.  Pressure after quarter time, in particular in our forward 50, was woeful The Blues escaped with relative ease from then on with poor delivery also impacting here.  Match fitness impacting as game went on maybe but it's the same for both teams.  Not enough handball to players out wide in space after half time.  Too much handball in close ensuring the heat remained mostly on.

Positives >  Rivers great debut has some toe, Jackson found it a little as the game went on, Tracc was vg, Gawny good 1st half.  Gus wasn't bad, Langdon ok early but dropped away afterwards.  Viney nb in patches.  ANB's lace out pass inside 50 in the first Q was lovely to watch as was the chain that got it into his hands in the first place.  More of that pls fellas.

In summary a win is a win but we still need more pace, crumbers / smaller players putting pressure on and collecting ground ball at the drop and the biggest elephant....a genuine KPF.

Edited June 13, 20204 yr by Rusty Nails

2 minutes ago, W I S E said:

Unpopular opinion. In round 1, Weitering kept Tom Lynch to no goals, no marks and 9 touches in a Richmond win.
 

Maybe the narrative should be a little more about how good Weitering’s start to the season is, rather than how poor TMac was.

This comment is spot on. Weitering is a star and could possibly be AA this year. He gave Tmac a bath and I reckon he’ll give a few other gun forwards some more.

I’d like to see how Tmac goes next week but he’ll have either Hooker or Hurley on him.

A HEALTH WARNING:

If you, in any way, do not rate Simon Goodwin as a coach, and/or get annoyed at his tendency to speak in cliches and buzz words ('lots of leanings from this game', the players want to win, credit to the opposition) or even get mildly irritated by his upbeat post game vibe or peculiar smirks when we have played poorly:

DO NOT WATCH THE POST GAME PRESS CONFERENCE!

You have been warned.

18 minutes ago, Half forward flank said:

Welcome and good on you for being positive. However it is about standards, how many times have you heard the top coaches or supporters at top clubs say they were happy with a win like that. The only other team we could beat with that sort of permormance is Gold Coast.  So massive improvement needed. 

Not on tonight's showing mate, Gold Coast took the Eagles to the cleaners

7 minutes ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

Ran out of gas? After 1 and a half shortened quarters? No way, it's all psychological, they just decreased their intensity and couldn't regain it

I hope you're right.

I fear you're not as if they did run out of gas it speaks of a group of players that are not as motivated and driven as i had hoped and expected they would be.

I watched the the last quarter of the Gold Coast game. They Suns did not look like they were running out of gas.

Edited June 13, 20204 yr by binman

Leaving Gawn out of the team song and his first win as captain is pathetic and should not have happened. 
 

Very bad look and would only happen at Melbourne. 

8 minutes ago, binman said:

A HEALTH WARNING:

If you, in any way, do not rate Simon Goodwin as a coach, and/or get annoyed at his tendency to speak in cliches and buzz words ('lots of leanings from this game', the players want to win, credit to the opposition) or even get mildly irritated by his upbeat post game vibe or peculiar smirks when we have played poorly:

DO NOT WATCH THE POST GAME PRESS CONFERENCE!

You have been warned.

“We couldn’t connect forward of centre”.  Goodwin has talked about this for all of 2019, after round 1 and now round 2.  Surely he is the coach. It lets us down after we dominate, we find it hard to score.
1.2 in a half of footy was a disgrace today in good conditions.  

Our heart for the contest and our brain to make smart decisions was the issue.  

Gawn beat Pittonet in the first half, even in second half. Gawn either lost fitness or softened up. 

4 minutes ago, DemonOX said:

Leaving Gawn out of the team song and his first win as captain is pathetic and should not have happened. 
 

Very bad look and would only happen at Melbourne. 

With all the protocols in place, or didn't you notice the changeroom set up, the players were probably unsure whether they could do the song. Notice also it was not the normal rendition

But then again any petty point for a whining MFC supporter to hang their hat on

As a few others have mentioned here it's the experienced players that keep letting the team down - as a collective.  Been going on for years. 

Blooding youngsters instead of persevering with NQR's is a necessity.  But don't blame the newbies. 

So it's not one individual experienced player it is all of them bar maybe 2 or 3.  And it's never the same 2 or 3 ... seems to work in rotation. 

Who amongst our experienced players stamps their authority on a match every game?  Gawn?  Who else?

We are lazy and we lack character (especially under pressure)  Endemic in the club's culture. 

We should have crushed Carlton today ... we had a chance to put the jackboot on their throat but we shied away (again)  The participation award seems to satisfy. 

However,  we can beat Essendon next week because they're below average as well. 

After that,  who knows? 

4 minutes ago, DemonOX said:

Leaving Gawn out of the team song and his first win as captain is pathetic and should not have happened. 
 

Very bad look and would only happen at Melbourne. 

They did the song again once Max (along with Tomlinson, Hunt & Langdon) came in and they realised their mistake.

Complete non-issue, however I acknowledge people here need their fix of outrage after missing out for 13 weeks so have at it.

1 minute ago, spirit of norm smith said:

“We couldn’t connect forward of centre”.  Goodwin has talked about this for all of 2019, after round 1 and now round 2.  Surely he is the coach. It lets us down after we dominate, we find it hard to score.
1.2 in a half of footy was a disgrace today in good conditions.  

Our heart for the contest and our brain to make smart decisions was the issue.  

Gawn beat Pittonet in the first half, even in second half. Gawn either lost fitness or softened up. 

Was that even our main problem?

We built a 42 point lead on dominating the ruck and clearances. When Pittonet started breaking even with Gawn and Carlton's mids started getting clearances, everything else fell apart.

Our mid-forward connection was a big 2019 problem, but so was our inability to respond to our opponents changing things up and taking away our CP/clearance dominance (which was what got us to the 2018 prelim).

That, coupled with "leaders" missing (Jones, TMac, Melksham, Brayshaw, arguably Viney), were far worse than our forward-mid connection today.