POSTGAME: Rd 11 vs North Melbourne

[Wiseblood 24,637]

Just now, A F said:

This call is just as early as Malthouse's. We're still not in the 8 and we're 5-5. Let's see how the rest plays out.

We're in the hunt my friend.  

No doubt our two wins over these last two games have been against poor opposition, but you can see the wheel turning a little in our direction.  

The test will be the Pies.  Knock them off and we're well and truly in the mix.

[Watts the matter 1,235]

Brayshaw was good but for those of you leaving Viney out based on that game, wake yourselves up. That North midfield was shocking.

[Adam The God 30,431]

Btw, that stat about 2017 when we went on our run without Gawn that was brought up at the start of the game, I knew we'd gone on a run that year, but that stat was even more impressive than I remembered it being. 

Just a little bit of food for thought...

Edited August 9, 2020 by A F

[Satyriconhome 10,879]

Spargo was good wasn't he @WERRIDEE @picket fence

[Buzzy 992]

6 minutes ago, Wiseblood said:

For a bloke who lists his interests as watching the Dees win, and then watching it again at home... you sure don't seem to enjoy us winning all that much.

Nothing to do with that, I loved it and I rate Langdon.  But if you're going to quote efficiency stats, they just need to have some context.

Langdon frequently chipped it backwards and played safe a lot tonight, so his efficiency % was higher than normal.

 

[binman 43,836]

6 minutes ago, A F said:

 

Gawn's too good to leave out, so if he's fit, he should come back. 

If Viney is going to play again, he needs to play pressure forward.

 

Has someone hacked you account A F?  

Gawn, if fit should come back? Should?

if Viney is going to play again? if?

I know Goodwin has made some bewildering selection decisions this year, but not selecting his AA captain and vice captain would be brilliantly surreal!

[Jack7 528]

21 minutes ago, dazzledavey36 said:

Jackson, Kozzie, Pickett, Sparrow.

Injecting some serious talent into our side once again.

Spargo was back to his best. Kept it simple and used the ball well. Courageous going in for that ball against Daw and bounced up like nothing happened.

Lever was our best backman by a mile. Kept everything in check. 

I also thought Tomlinson was good. He rarely wasted the footy and gave us some good drive.

Langdon is a ridiculously hard worker. His running ability and workrate to create space and option on the outside cannot be faulted. 

Petracca, Oliver, Brayshae.. all simply brilliant.

Hands up who think our midfield functions when Gus is in there full time instead of Viney?

How good's Viney's year without Gus in there???

When they're both in there,Viney smashes him and Gus can't get a kick!!!

Gus's problem!!!

[Wiseblood 24,637]

1 minute ago, Buzzy said:

Nothing to do with that, I loved it and I rate Langdon.  But if you're going to quote efficiency stats, they just need to have some context.

Langdon frequently chipped it backwards and played safe a lot tonight, so his efficiency % was higher than normal.

 

He finished the game with 321 metres gained, so he can't have been chipping it backwards all that much.

[Dirts 429]

41 minutes ago, FarNorthernD said:

I’m a big Luke Jackson fan

Pick 3 for an untested ruck that plays forward and in middle. This guy will be something else. And we got his mate Rivers to boot! 
Beat the filth and we may just get that dream alive. 

[Vineytime 854]

Horrid performance from NMFC, bottom 2 side. 
The test is next week. 

[Rab D Nesbitt 8,543]

26 minutes ago, Biffen said:

I'm struggling to find any post match stuff on KAYO.

Dunstall trying to be funny is like watching Stephen Hawking attempt the Decathlon in the Olympics.

Throw in the comedic timing of Andrew Gaze and it's like sitting through a major surgery without so much as an aspirin to kill the pain.

The Footy Show minus the misogyny. Comedy for the lobotomised. 

[leave it to deever 17,531]

A special mention to Oliver who has been getting a lot of flack here for his disposal. Has really turned it around.

[rjay 25,102]

21 minutes ago, ThreeOneSix said:

We still need to fix up our disposal into the forward line. Good win but work to do. Petracca is a bona fide A grader now. Oliver once again hung onto the footy and tried to open things up for us - which he did. He is improving thankfully. Sparrow looks good enough to replace whoever we move on next year out of Brayshaw or Viney.

 

20 minutes ago, D4Life said:

While it was great to win well tonight and worth celebrating as it was North, beat the Pies next week and we’re on our way.

Trac, Oliver, & Brayshaw great out of the middle, I would have Viney in forward pocket, 50% of game time! Pickett one pocket, Viney the other!

 

20 minutes ago, Engorged Onion said:

Yep. That's the right call for one of their careers.

 

14 minutes ago, Earl Hood said:

Play Jack forward as a defensive forward who can also kick straight! But still has midfield time as required. 

 

6 minutes ago, A F said:

We look so much better without Viney and Gawn in the middle. People will disagree, but it's so much harder to stop three mids, than just curve one dominant ruckman. 

Gawn's too good to leave out, so if he's fit, he should come back. But I reckon we need to do a lot more of what North did tonight and that is mix up our rucking. 

 

I've been a big believer that our best team midfield is Gus, Trac & Oliver...

I don't see why people like Lloyd and others on here seem to think we should move one of our mids on.

Viney is a different player, I would play him for impact minutes as a burst player on ball and use him rotating as a defensive forward.

All good teams have their rotations worked out, I think we over balanced it with Jack taking too much Gus time...

We sort that out and teach Jack to play more team midfield then we're going to be hard to beat...

 

[58er 6,578]

27 minutes ago, ThreeOneSix said:

We still need to fix up our disposal into the forward line. Good win but work to do. Petracca is a bona fide A grader now. Oliver once again hung onto the footy and tried to open things up for us - which he did. He is improving thankfully. Sparrow looks good enough to replace whoever we move on next year out of Brayshaw or Viney.

Careful what you wish for 

Why get rid of one if both going well and we can get  couple of other outside mids!

[Dirts 429]

Just now, Wiseblood said:

He finished the game with 321 metres gained, so he can't have been chipping it backwards all that much.

 

2 minutes ago, Jack7 said:

How good's Viney's year without Gus in there???

When they're both in there,Viney smashes him and Gus can't get a kick!!!

Gus's problem!!!

Lever was excellent and the weeds will be a Coleman in a few years time. Harmes need some work and the Viney / Gus role needs some work. Vandy grew as game went on and track makes dusty look like at twit.

[Adam The God 30,431]

44 minutes ago, nosoupforme said:

BRAYSHAW IS HE FINISHED?         HAVE A RETHINK ON ALL OF THESE PLAYERS.

Spargo he is no good.

TMAC Shouldn't be playing?

Clarry CAN'T KICK! 

Lever is overrated? 

Have a good rethink about knocking all of the above. There is plenty of upside and just starting to find their mojo.

One of them is still right...

[Graeme Yeats' Mullet 6,779]

16 minutes ago, In Harmes Way said:

It's a strange feeling, being comfortable that we're not going to fold in the last quarter.

I could get used to it.

Thanks Burgess

[In Harmes Way 7,823]

Someone needs to have a word with the Fox commentators to even up the chat around what's a free kick.

Seemed very biased towards North in commentating on the dubious free kicks (despite the fact they were handsomely winning the free kick count). Even needed to pan to Byron shaking his head in the stands for the commentators to then point out that Kozzie was a bit unlucky. FFS.

[sisso 2,580]

1 minute ago, 58er said:

Careful what you wish for 

Why get rid of one if both going well and we can get  couple of other outside mids!

Agree: we’ve spent years putting together a such a talented midfield now isn’t the time to start breaking it apart

[dazzledavey36 55,371]

5 minutes ago, Jack7 said:

How good's Viney's year without Gus in there???

When they're both in there,Viney smashes him and Gus can't get a kick!!!

Gus's problem!!!

Rubbish

[Demon Dynasty 17,109]

Keeping a lid on it as we've played a couple of the cellar dwellers two weeks running.

First half we looked pretty flakey and anything was possible although Norf looked like a B grade team out there skill wise.  Apart from some very early questionable assists from the umps, reasonable play from Norf on a few of those turnovers, a couple of gifts from us we should have been 4 to 5 goals up at half time had we connected / converted better inside 50 imv.

A solid 2nd half mixed with a few too many moments of ineptness in front of goal.  Had we kicked just a little straighter that would have been an 80 point plus thrashing.

LJ was amazing in the middle and around the ground.  Very early days but looks the goods and possibly an excitement machine, given enough experience and pre-seasons.

Our two small forwards did their job very nicely.  Spargo brought a solid game tonight and even showed a bit of urgency / zip with ball in hand along with some clever decision making and excellent attack on the ball.  Kozzy is still a fair way off but he looks to have all the good bits to become a very very good small crumbing pressure forward.  His decision making tonight and hitting up targets inside 50 was hard to fault.

We looked unstoppable whenever Clarry, Gus & Tracc were the starting 3.  Sparrow seemed to be replacing Clarry when he was resting and, although pretty quiet / average early, he slowly worked his way into the match and even went forward to kick his first goal.

T-Mac.  Well lets just say he can no longer jump but brought a serviceable game at times and Goldy certainly never got hold of the middle bounces or T-Mac / LJ at any stage.  In fact apart from a few nice efforts at ground level and a few handy taps i thought Goldy was pretty ordinary most of the night.  Is he coming to the end of a very good career i wonder?

Happy with the win but the real test will be the Pies and seeing if we can put three in a row together.  Hopefully Big M and Viney back and fresh should help.  If fit, Viney comes in for AVB and obviously Big M for T-Mac.

Edited August 9, 2020 by Rusty Nails

[rjay 25,102]

4 minutes ago, Satyriconhome said:

Spargo was good wasn't he @WERRIDEE @picket fence

I thought he was good tonight and I've been one of his knockers.

He was a lot stronger around the ball and held his tackles which is an area where I reckon he's been exposed in the past.

Good to see...

[loges 6,767]

TMac was ok did his job nothing more, nothing less.

[dee-tox 4,835]

Plenty to like.

Lever has strung four excellent games in a row now.

Brayshaw looked creative and like the dominant player he can be.

The game plan was excellent. Norf couldn't get past Lever time after time.

Langdon was good creating space but a bit fumbly.

Oliver sprinting out of contests.

Petracca in beast mode.

Spargo was effective.

Kozzy showed a bit.

Loved Jackson's second efforts.

Sparrow looked more comfortable.

Two negatives were the goal kicking of Weed and Fritta. Against good teams those misses kill you.

 

[layzie 34,023]

Essentially a carbon copy of the Adelaide game, happy to win and happy to get the job done. It was really tough going early and both teams really looked totally cooked but we still had enough run and drive to record the result. Petracca is so full of confidence at the minute to the point where he's almost 'makes' the ball bounce his way. Spinning, evading and doing everything possible to get it to our advantage, couldn't be happier with the way he's turned out.

Oliver smashed it again! Seems to have much more confidence with his kicking and the checkside from the pocket, I'd love to see that splitscreen with the goal from the same pocket in 2017 vs Adelaide. Thought Gus easily had his best game for the year, there are going to be players that know what they are and when they are allowed to do what they believe they do best will excel. It was a no brainer to move him to the middle when Viney pulled out and he didn't disappoint. Jackson keeps impressing and Spargo easily had his best game for 2 years.

But, and yes it is a but, without totally dismissing these two wins we have a fair way to go. Disposal into the 50 is still not consistent enough and we still burn way too many forward 50 entries. I still have no idea what Tomlinson offers apart from being a big guy who hates physical contact but will still give him more time, what else am I gonna do? Sit on my butt and watch Netflix? 

Once again, how good is this team exactly? We will see next Saturday on twilight footy, anothering measuring stick, be there or be square.