11-2

13 Rounds played…..11 wins….. still only 44 points in the premiership bank and nothing has changed from last week. We still sit on top of the ladder thanks to a Cats win against the Bulldogs

Bit different this last weekend not having any football from the Demons. Still I am sure they have enjoyed a weekend off.

And so, to Round 15 and we play the Bombers, the team that suffered a number of player suspensions due to systemic drug cheating.  We play them on Saturday night on the G….. maybe. I am not sure what to make of this iteration of the Bombers. I find their list a strange mix of bits and pieces. Some good young talent and some older more experienced guys that tend to run hot and cold. Biggest interest for me is to see what sort of shape we turn up in after the break. Will we be switched on or flat? We seem to be making all the right noises but the time over the white line will tell us what the players understand and believe.

The facts:

We have the week off – Advantage us

Their home match – Advantage them

We play at the G – Advantage us

They are coming off a win last week against the Hawks – Advantage them (maybe)

Problem areas of the game for us. Still the bloody forwards….

Our defenders are well settled and have the first half of the season in form. They did not look shiny and bright in the outing against the Pies but I am looking forward to seeing them re-set and work back into form. Stringer and Jones look to be their main avenues to goal and I see that they have their own version of our Wied in Wright. He is not in good form up forward and would not be surprised to see him ‘rested’. Our defenders will need to be sharp as a number of their forwards apply good pressure and tackles. As long as we stick to our structure and trust in each other we will get on top in this area of the ground.

We have the talent in our midfield… I am sure that is not news to anyone. This week I think we will add Viney to the mix and it will all be for the better. Not just a break to freshen up but the return of a fired up Viney to spark the others. Parish is the one we need to shut down he is the one that drives a lot of their scoring ….. Harmes anyone? Merrett and McGrath are his main partners in crime but if we contain Parish we will go a long way to winning this.

Max and Luke will dominate the ruck contests, but we need the players at their feet to work off them properly. Essendon will have done a lot of work on our ruck’s tap work. It may be that Max spends a lot of his time either back or forward depending on the state of the game and Luke taking the rucks.

Now for the forwards…….

The good; Well in the bigger picture we are 11-2 without a performing forward structure. And while we have the least points scored against us so far this season, we are only have the 5^th highest points for.

The bad; Weid’s form but that may not matter this week

The ugly; It could be BBB’s hair this weekend.

I really hope that there has been some in depth thought and coaching that has gone into our forward 50 structure. While our delivery into the forwards has improved, I am not sure that the delivers have confidence in where the forwards are going to be. We do not seem to be able to consistently find space on the lead and in static marking contests we lack some weight and strength.

Selection will make for some interesting reading this week. I expect Weid to be dropped and for B. Brown to come in. Viney in for Sparrow? Most likely.

The Bathwater Express is all polished up and ready for the sprint home. I have not started it up since it has just been serviced so I am not sure how it runs at the moment. Expect it to rumble into life with a power surge come Saturday night.

Tough to predict this week. I want to see us turn up to this game a we turned up in Round 1….. Fresh, tough and well disciplined…. If we do that, I believe we will run out winners by 6 goals.

 

Go Dees!!!

We have lost 2 of our past 4 games to two bottom 4 sides. The Melbourne of old is starting to rear it's very ugly head.

Time to reassert ourselves and firm up our top 2 spot, especially with either Geelong or Footascray dropping a game off the pace.

Are we getting lazy, or did we simply drop our guard unexpectedly?

 

Experience tells me we lose this game and get the rest of the comp thinking we are pretenders. Win, and we are back as Premiership favorites.

 

Essendon by 20 points

Collingwood was very concerning. Pretty terrible efforts all across the field. Backmen killed, midfield murdered and forwards missing. 
 

Essendon by 37

15 minutes ago, faultydet said:

We have lost 2 of our past 4 games to two bottom 4 sides. The Melbourne of old is starting to rear it's very ugly head.

Time to reassert ourselves and firm up our top 2 spot, especially with either Geelong or Footascray dropping a game off the pace.

Are we getting lazy, or did we simply drop our guard unexpectedly?

 

Experience tells me we lose this game and get the rest of the comp thinking we are pretenders. Win, and we are back as Premiership favorites.

 

Essendon by 20 points

Ouch!

The 2 wins there though, without question, our best this year - v Doggies win an absolute statement, v Lions win - a GTFOOH statement!

Confident we were all just gassed on QB.

My mind is all about our Port game the following week & making it a royal-flush on all this years contenders.

Us by 11 points this week, 1 point the next.

 

We badly needed a mental and physical break. Especially the midfield, young blokes and Gawny. Lockdown impacts everyone, even footballers

Bombers will come out firing but over the four quarters we will be too strong at the G. Our midfield is far better and out defence will be too good.

Demons by 32pts

I hope we don’t play another game this year at the SCG, we didn’t play that ground well at all.

Back at the G, we’re a much better chance. Yes that beat the Hawks last week, and we are coming off the bye - but their previous game 3 was ago vs Tigers showed they aren’t a 4 quarter team and fell away at the end. This bodes well for us and I think we’ll be too good (hopefully).

The only decent win the Bombers have had is over the Eagle and even then the Eagles were well depleted. 
Otherwise they’ve been flat track bullies in a couple of games and beaten teams at the bottoms of the ladder. 
 

Media is way OTT on this mob. 
 

We will win comfortably and firm even more as Flag favourites. 

Danger Mr Robinson Danger.

This mob have one of the quickest ball movement and transition in the comp. it is also our weakness because it doesn’t allow us to setup defensively.

We will need to be switched on to take the 4 points here or prepare yourselves for another disappointing outing.

 

6 minutes ago, CYB said:

Danger Mr Robinson Danger.

This mob have one of the quickest ball movement and transition in the comp. it is also our weakness because it doesn’t allow us to setup defensively.

We will need to be switched on to take the 4 points here or prepare yourselves for another disappointing outing.

this

their speed of ball movement and risk / reward style of football is the sort that really troubles us

26 minutes ago, whatwhat say what said:

this

their speed of ball movement and risk / reward style of football is the sort that really troubles us

If we are a true Premiership chance, we expose Essendon for their young bodies and unaccountable defensive gameplan.

Lose and we are just another pretender.

8 hours ago, whatwhat say what said:

this

their speed of ball movement and risk / reward style of football is the sort that really troubles us

Adelaide played the same and we couldn't respond Beaten all day by an inferior team

I find it astonishing that we are 11-2 sitting clear at the top of the table and people think we will lose to essendung 

such is life as a war torn humiliation battled demons fan 

oh i long for the day when I can trust the MFC to comfortably account for those teams making up the numbers 

This is going to be a very interesting game.

I am quite confident we will win but the game against the pies is still annoying.

It was a game that we should have won. We are a much better side than cwood. Much better.

We took it way too lightly and played our worst game.

Our Crows loss wasnt great but we didnt play that badly against them.

I believe the club will come out and play their best....tough and relentless surge footy.

I hope we can find a third tall this game in one of the Browns so that come finals everything is in place.

Dees by 36 to show why we are on top of the ladder and atone for the pies game.

The line at 1.90 22.5 is very tasty on this one

Edited June 21, 20213 yr by Superunknown

We’ve lost 2 of our last 4 matches to bottom four teams. The concerning things in both those games was our structures fell apart and we didn’t handle pressure. It was all a mental thing, which has long been our issue. Even in the wins we had, as pleasing as they were, we didn’t play four quarters. We switched off for a half and ground out wins.

We’re not in great form, but on the flip side we’re 11-2 and have heaps of improvement still. Earlier in the year we were playing four quarters and we were a much better team. We scored more freely and had a mobile forward line. The three talls up forward hasn’t worked, so I’d like to see the coaches drop Weid and try the mobile forward line again. Bring the speed and pressure!

I hope we are switched on against the Bombers this week. They’re playing well recently and have the talent to beat us if we don’t bring our A game.

We only lose to bottom 4 teams. :') 

 

Routine 4 goal win coming up.

15 hours ago, McQueen said:

The only decent win the Bombers have had is over the Eagle and even then the Eagles were well depleted. 
Otherwise they’ve been flat track bullies in a couple of games and beaten teams at the bottoms of the ladder. 
 

Media is way OTT on this mob. 
 

We will win comfortably and firm even more as Flag favourites. 

Ripper attitude, held by many of us - let's hope our theme of the week is 'mongrel' and we anhilate across four quarters. 

7 hours ago, leave it to deever said:

This is going to be a very interesting game.

I am quite confident we will win but the game against the pies is still annoying.

It was a game that we should have won. We are a much better side than cwood. Much better.

We took it way too lightly and played our worst game.

Our Crows loss wasnt great but we didnt play that badly against them.

I believe the club will come out and play their best....tough and relentless surge footy.

I hope we can find a third tall this game in one of the Browns so that come finals everything is in place.

Dees by 36 to show why we are on top of the ladder and atone for the pies game.

Beating essendon by 36 doesn't atone for the pies game. Maybe an 80 point win or some ruthlessness in the win would but we've shown an inability to win big this year and an inability to put out a team out of the game all season. Atoning for the Pies game would be beating a wce, port or geelong. Losing the pies game took away our win against Brisbane. It was bloody hopeless. 

If we are the real deal and not just a first half of the season front runner we have to and should win this game albeit against a side who will bring in a youthful enthusiasm and a hunger to beat the top team that will be hard to quell.

There are 3 other top eight clashes this week with Brizzy v Cats, West Coast v Dogs and Port v Suns.

This is the time to put distance on rivals. This is what teams capable and committed to winning the top prize would do. If we win this week we are that much closer to sewing up a top 4 spot and well favored to finish top 2. Drop this one and we let others in.

This is about understanding the competition and what victory means. We should have good plans to stop Essendon, shut them down, get the game on our terms and win at all cost. If we come out like against Collingwood I will be super disappointed. If we lose we are probably still too immature yet to win the flag.

22 hours ago, McQueen said:

The only decent win the Bombers have had is over the Eagle and even then the Eagles were well depleted. 
Otherwise they’ve been flat track bullies in a couple of games and beaten teams at the bottoms of the ladder. 
 

Media is way OTT on this mob. 
 

We will win comfortably and firm even more as Flag favourites. 

This.

We have our problems, but the Essenscum revival is a media beat-up. Watch them run forward of the ball this week . . . 

20 hours ago, Dr.D said:

Beating essendon by 36 doesn't atone for the pies game. Maybe an 80 point win or some ruthlessness in the win would but we've shown an inability to win big this year and an inability to put out a team out of the game all season. Atoning for the Pies game would be beating a wce, port or geelong. Losing the pies game took away our win against Brisbane. It was bloody hopeless. 

I just checked the AFL website. We still have the 4 points from the Brisbane game believe it or not. 

On 6/21/2021 at 12:19 PM, CHF said:

Their home match – Advantage them

We play at the G – Advantage us

I find this strange.

I think our midfield will be too physical for them especially if Viney returns.

My only concerns are if Stringer strings another good game together (he's playing for a new contract) and that we don't seem to have an obvious match up for Tippa unless Salem locks down.

A lot of the time this season I have looked to our defence to be the bedrock on which we build a win. While I still understand the importance of the defensive structure we have in place and the success of it, in this game winning the midfield is of primary importance. They are very good at finishing inside their forward 50 so we need to disrupt their supply of quality ball into that zone. 

We have the talent and the systems in the middle to contain their key play makers in Parish and Merrett. I would be asking Harmes to close down Parish with a hard tag the way he did with Libba in the Bulldogs game. He does that and it takes away a lot of the ball and drive they get from stoppages.

Must win game.
If we get rolled by this mob I'm gettin' off the forken bandwagon.
Must reassert ourselves pronto.