1 hour ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

I think May takes Max King. Was fantastic on him last year.

Tomlinson probably takes Membrey which is a slight concern.

Hes had his detractors but I thought

Tomlison played very well. Maybe you are just concerned about this specofic match up.

One thing for sure, its unusual for us to have such a solid backline.

 

Edited March 22, 20214 yr by leave it to deever

1 hour ago, Maldonboy38 said:

Two things important for us to do well if we want to win:

1. Defensive spread from our midfielders. Freo waltzed around us in numbers through the middle of the ground and they achieved 50+ inside 50's. However, at one point we had Jordon, Sparrow and Bradshaw at some centre bounces which didn't help. Viney in is a massive bonus if he is fit.

2. If we hit our targets inside 50, we win. On Saturday, our delivery into 50 and set shot goal kicking was embarrassing.

Re no. 2 it has been this way for years and I have zero confidence it will change. The different between us and the top sides at present is our kicking deliver is terrible. 

Saints without 7 best 22 players and us just missing 2 is an advantage, especially with both their rucks out. King back is a worry

we should win the contested ball easily. They have few inside mids.  Obviously the issue for us is their smalls and outside run. Lonie, Greasham, Billings, Higgins, Butler, Hill. 

jetta, Hunt, Hibbo, Sparrow will be busy on the smalls.
We’ll see if Gus, Oliver and Trac can run both ways

should be a cracker

1 hour ago, old dee said:

Well if nothing else it gave me a laugh. 

Didn't know you could laugh OD  ?

16 minutes ago, Better days ahead said:

Didn't know you could laugh OD  ?

All the time BDA, but the mention of the MFC smartly changes my humour. Honestly without being able to discuss them on here I would have tossed in the towel some years ago. You know talking on  here is better than watching them some weeks. Lots of humour and different opinions.

Edited March 22, 20214 yr by old dee

3 hours ago, Diamond_Jim said:

Yep

we win if we kick straight and they don't.

BTW Freo missed several easy ones

I reckon we missed even easier ones though

28 minutes ago, DubDee said:

Saints without 7 best 22 players and us just missing 2 is an advantage,

Who are the Saints missing?  Didnt seem to bother them against GWS

14 hours ago, McQueen said:

Beau Maister to kick a bag this weekend. Saints by 38 points. 

He’ll get injured and replaced by Beau Wilkes who will finish us off.

45 minutes ago, DubDee said:

Saints without 7 best 22 players and us just missing 2 is an advantage, especially with both their rucks out. King back is a worry

we should win the contested ball easily. They have few inside mids.  Obviously the issue for us is their smalls and outside run. Lonie, Greasham, Billings, Higgins, Butler, Hill. 

jetta, Hunt, Hibbo, Sparrow will be busy on the smalls.
We’ll see if Gus, Oliver and Trac can run both ways

should be a cracker

They have a few speedsters.  

Who would Jetta play on? Can he keep up with any of them?

I think you could play Hunt on Butler,  Langdon on Hill and after that am struggling to find good match ups for the others.

Jetta played much better than expected vs Freo but i am not sure he has any easy matchups this week and is likely to get exposed.  I would have Bowey in there for the extra pace that is going to be needed against their mosquito fleet.

Will be interesting selecting team for this week!  If we go too slow against Saints they will tear us to shreds at  times.

 

17 hours ago, Roost it far said:

As most of you have already soiled yourselves over next week I thought I’d let you know why we’ll win.

1. Our back 6 will own their forward 6

2. With Viney back our midfield can comfortably match theirs

3. With TMac finding form and if Jackson can continue his Q4 form with Spargo and Kozzie running around our forward line can kick a winning score.

4. Gawn and the mids will work better together

5. Petracca

6. Oliver

7. May and Lever

enjoy your week

Good enough for me!

2 hours ago, Pickett2Jackson said:

Who are the Saints missing?  Didnt seem to bother them against GWS

Ryder

marshall

hanneberry

Crouch

Paton

geary

Frawley. 

not sure if they picked up any other injuries yesterday. GWS aren’t that good, not much up front. They have lost so much talent and have their own injuries

the Saints will be a much tougher opponent with Crouch and Marshall back especially 

17 hours ago, Roost it far said:

As most of you have already soiled yourselves over next week I thought I’d let you know why we’ll win.

Because we'll kick a higher score. 

1 minute ago, DubDee said:

Ryder

marshall

hanneberry

Crouch

Paton

geary

Frawley. 

not sure if they picked up any other injuries yesterday. GWS aren’t that good, not much up front. They have lost so much talent and have their own injuries

the Saints will be a much tougher opponent with Crouch and Marshall back especially 

Agreed with all that.   GWS still look good on paper as they still have big names through their midfield but I wouldn't take any of them ahead of Trac and Oliver.

2 hours ago, NeveroddoreveN said:

They have a few speedsters.  

Who would Jetta play on? Can he keep up with any of them?

I think you could play Hunt on Butler,  Langdon on Hill and after that am struggling to find good match ups for the others.

Jetta played much better than expected vs Freo but i am not sure he has any easy matchups this week and is likely to get exposed.  I would have Bowey in there for the extra pace that is going to be needed against their mosquito fleet.

Will be interesting selecting team for this week!  If we go too slow against Saints they will tear us to shreds at  times.

 

Will be interesting to see if they make a change with our smaller defenders (Jetta / Hunt).  But I wouldn't.  Hunt offers the speed and Jetta was back to his best when he was caught in one on one situations.

I think you will find that our defence often works more as a unit doing a zone defence - which is why Jetta or Salem can get caught out against a much bigger opponent from time to time.  I think the two way running in the midfield will be critical this week as many of their mids can be dangerous forward of centre.

Here's our chance to begin to build something.

Max Gawn openly stated a few weeks ago that the players were angry about the way last year finished but to me, I saw very little anger or energy in the way we played against Freo.

The happy-go-luckies pot me for having concerns after a win. Not realising the worrying signs on display against a depleted Freo who aside from their midfield, were very ordinary.

 

Here's a little sneak peek into my thoughts regarding our middle of the road club -

 

I was at both finals at the G in 2018. Lined up at midday with the old man outside gate 2 to get prime position seats. Centre wing, level two MCC. The best. From the first bounce in both games, I remember seeing an awinspiring ferociousness that I simply haven't seen since that 2018 season. I don't understand why. Goodwin, the assistant coaches, the FD and the players would continue to talk about the 'Melbourne brand' which was starting to gain traction throughout that year and opposition clubs were wary of us. We were hard, tough, uncompromising and in those finals, especially the Geelong game we swarmed the opposition. We were building. Building after how many rebuilds since 2007? Ask yourself?

One prelim loss later and we're back to being on the edge of irrelevant, whilst teams who were below us, less developed than us and less talented are now leapfrogging us. Why? How?

I refuse to believe that the exodus of assistant coaches at the same time was simply coincidence in 2019. You're a damn fool if you don't think was a level of friction within the coaching ranks. We all know about the infamous pre season of 2019. The injuries, the limited pre seasons to so many players, the lack of continuity, etc etc. But of course, it was and became our excuse and we were given a free pass..

Move forward to round 1 of 2020 after a gruelling pre-season with a new world class fitness guru. We were raring to go. That's what we were told. We were hurting, we were hungry, we were the fittest we'd ever been. New doco out for all to see. We were every cringeworthy eve of season cliche one could think of and then some... We had West Coast, round 1 back at Subiaco. What an opportunity. What an opportunity to come back and atone for our Prelim debacle. An opportunity to make a statement. No crowd. The pressure was off. 

We simply fluff it. Game Plan/personnel/limited list changes? Which is it? Can't be fitness. We simply do not show up and it was basically a snapshot for our entire season, covid or not. End up finishing 9th after dropping games to two clubs should be well behind us in regards to development, talent, gameplan execution, maturity. All of it.

Fast forward again. To round 1 against a depleted Freo unit at the G. Again, Max tells the afl world openly that we're angry. Goodwin has again decided against making serious list changes over the off-season. We come out, look ordinary at best from the first bounce and end up just getting over the line possibly thanks to two star defenders only. I saw little energy, anger, enthusiasm or killer instinct from nearly all the players who have been there since 2018. Where was Max's anger? Where was our Melbourne brand? 

It's round 2 and we're up against a side who have previously been a premiership contender on two separate occasions. 2004-6 and 2009-12. During those years, we have done absolutely nothing except fail on our attempts at rebuilding. We get one right under Roos and Jackson and now we're back on a knife's edge with a coach who has preached the same messaging to us since 2017. "We want to be a hard and ruthless club".

 

Well show it to us against St Kilda.

 

Here is an opportunity for our club to gain some momentum. Here is a side we should be ahead of. Here is another litmus test that in my honest opinion, will be a serious indicator as to whether or not we've addressed any of what Goodwin and co have banged on about for years. They've talked about maturity and consistency being a theme over summer for us. Well [censored] show us for damn sake. We have an opportunity to go 2 and zip at the start of a new year. No more response games after a poor showing. No more excuses. 

Take a look at what Sydney and Adelaide did over the weekend. Application and commitment. 

 

[censored] show us Melbourne. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, NeveroddoreveN said:

They have a few speedsters.  

Who would Jetta play on? Can he keep up with any of them?

I think you could play Hunt on Butler,  Langdon on Hill and after that am struggling to find good match ups for the others.

Jetta played much better than expected vs Freo but i am not sure he has any easy matchups this week and is likely to get exposed.  I would have Bowey in there for the extra pace that is going to be needed against their mosquito fleet.

Will be interesting selecting team for this week!  If we go too slow against Saints they will tear us to shreds at  times.

 

We’ve gotta stick to our plan. they’ll get past us with run sometimes but we’ll get at them too
Jetta reads the play and has the experience to cope with small fwds. I’d put Sparrow on one of them, he is so competitive. 

I think the saints have huge upside but their game plan will not last over the full 20 minute quarters, it was evidenced over the weekend that they just couldn't keep it up for a full quarter and went missing. If a team is well structured behind the ball (which we certainly did well on the weekend) you can take away their ability to get out the back and hopefully limit the damage their leg speed can provide.

8 minutes ago, GCDee said:

I think the saints have huge upside but their game plan will not last over the full 20 minute quarters, it was evidenced over the weekend that they just couldn't keep it up for a full quarter and went missing. If a team is well structured behind the ball (which we certainly did well on the weekend) you can take away their ability to get out the back and hopefully limit the damage their leg speed can provide.

I thought they finished pretty well in the last quarter, when it mattered the most.

5 minutes ago, Neil Crompton said:

I thought they finished pretty well in the last quarter, when it mattered the most.

I think GWS kept them in the game more than anything, GWS pretty much owned the game from half time until the last 10 minutes. 

If the giants could kick straight and show a bit more composure early in the last saints would have lost by 5 goals.