Well we all know how the Dees go when the media sing their praises....

I for one am happy they are not on board. Couldn't be happier..

We don't need anyone else's bathwater.

1 hour ago, Salems Lot said:

Just enjoy each game at a time, who cares what the "pundits" think.

Go dees

We are playing well - and still within ourselves - but it is highly enjoyable and I am sure the players feel that way, as well. As the temperatures rise nearing the finals series (of which we are almost a confirmed challenger), it is most likely that our congested player selection scenario will have largely been sorted and with this, the Dees are going to get hot, hotter and angry.

Who cares what others say (I am sure that others - particularly the media - are thinking about just how promising we will look nearing the finals). The media has a role to promote all teams in the competition to maintain high public attention for one reason or the other. Bandwagon teams attracted by the forces of gravity will abound in the coming weeks. We must face it in this time period to come; we are not going to fall off.

Carna Dees!

 

Opinions and A-holes are the same. We all have them and it’s a good way to get whatever sh/t you got going on out. 

Gerard Healy did make the point last night that we have somehow slipped under the radar despite beating Dogs and Lions in recent weeks. 

I was amused by David King's assertion that the Bulldogs are on the verge of a dynasty. I'd have thought you'd want at least one cup in the trophy cabinet before contemplating dynasties. 

our biggest problem will be staying largely injury free

increasing our scoring would be nice but as long as our defence stays strong it's not a deal breaker

2 minutes ago, Witches Hat said:

Gerard Healy did make the point last night that we have somehow slipped under the radar despite beating Dogs and Lions in recent weeks. 

I was amused by David King's assertion that the Bulldogs are on the verge of a dynasty. I'd have thought you'd want at least one cup in the trophy cabinet before contemplating dynasties. 

Think of it this way. Kim Jong-un is also part of a dynasty.

We can strangle teams and come away with wins simply by continuing to do that.

But, It’s just one example but look at the 1st qtr last week. We pummelled Essendon but failed to capitalise up forward. We’ve not shown an ability to put teams away and I think media types wonder about our ability to manufacture a score in a hurry or reduce a deficit. 
 

I don’t care what they think but I do worry about some of the guys who were putting up career numbers early who have dropped away. Have they been figured out? Are they tired? Bad habits forming from lots of wins? 

Yes I know I’m being Capt Obvious but it will depend on which team hits September in top form and relatively injury free. We are as good as chance as anyone. 

5 minutes ago, JJJ said:

We can strangle teams and come away with wins simply by continuing to do that.

But, It’s just one example but look at the 1st qtr last week. We pummelled Essendon but failed to capitalise up forward. We’ve not shown an ability to put teams away and I think media types wonder about our ability to manufacture a score in a hurry or reduce a deficit. 
 

I don’t care what they think but I do worry about some of the guys who were putting up career numbers early who have dropped away. Have they been figured out? Are they tired? Bad habits forming from lots of wins? 

Who are you referring to here?

Pickett? A second-year player with 28 games under his belt?

Who else?

3 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

Who are you referring to here?

Pickett? A second-year player with 28 games under his belt?

Who else?

He’d be one of them. 

His age and experience are irrelevant to our situation right now. We want a premiership and he’s shown the ability to be a match winner. We’ll need that in September.

Same goes for Spargo, ANB, Tom McDonald amongst others. They’ve shown themselves to be capable of more. I just hope that they can show it later in the year.

1 hour ago, Little Goffy said:

Related article today on the afl site: Ladder vs top 8

I think the basic trouble is that out opponents have never looked completely beaten so in any given game we never really look a major class above. Still, with 5 wins and no losses against the other finals rivals I'm not too upset!

Two things will decide how we go in September;

First: Can we get the forward line producing goals again?

Very noticeably in the last couple of weeks we've relied on midfielders, rucks and half forwards to kick goals and that is not sustainable. Many of our forwards have been up and down a bit all season but Pickett, Fritsch and McDonald have two goals total between the three of them in the last couple of weeks.

Second: How will the kids deal with the long season?

Once again, Melbourne's 22 on the weekend was younger than their supposed up-and-coming young opponents. In fact, at 24 years 9 months, Melbourne were older than only... yikes, on closer inspection, only Gold Coast fielded a younger team than us in round 15. That is incredible.

I'm not so much worried about it as a depth factor - we have the luxury of multiple experienced and competent players available at Casey at the moment  - as I am worried about simple fatigue. Physical and mental. The wall the Demons hit to the end their 2018 campaign is still there as a warning.

 

 

 

Hang on, so we were a younger side than Essendon on Saturday?

1 hour ago, titan_uranus said:

Just a reminder that, since 2018, we've won more finals than Brisbane.

This is complete and utter bull[censored].

We have scored the fourth most points in the league.

Read that again. We are top 4 for scoring.

One of the three sides above us is Essendon, which means only two current top 8 sides score more than us.

I meant to say the we're the least potent out of the contenders, and will now edit it.

I just re-read my post and I agree it was ludicrous and was written in error.

My point still stands that our scoring has dried up and we haven't cracked 100 since round 6.

50 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

I wholly dispute the proposition that the fourth-highest scoring side can simultaneously be described as having the "least potent and least reliable forward line in the league".

As to the bolded line, Fritsch is averaging 2.1 goals a game which, if he plays every game from here will result in 44 goals.

Now, I accept that we're lacking a dominant forward, and I accept that our forward half connection was poor vs Essendon and has been poor in many games this year.

But despite that, we're still outscoring 14 teams, and we're doing so with our elite defence (i.e. compare that with a side like Essendon who scores more than us but at a major cost to its defence).

The "problem" exists but it is being blown wholly out of proportion.

I did say that both sentiments can be correct simultaneously.

As to the bolded line; after his first six games Fritsch had 18 goals, in the 7 since then he has kicked just 10 including just one goal int he last two rounds. 'Realistic possibility' of not breaking 40 is what I said and is clearly a valid point given he would need 12 more goals in the remaining 8 rounds.

That our defence is elite has no bearing on whether or not people should consider our forward line to be effective. If anything the forward deficiency is highlighted by the failure to dominate when we have such a priceless source of genuine intercept marks and quality rebounds rather than just killed contests in defence.

It is clearly our weakness, it is clearly the reason why we haven't been able to put teams away and it is clearly the primary reason for both our losses this season.

And, as I said, it is also an area with a very realistic prospect of getting sorted out and thereby making us unstoppable.

Brisbane and the Dogs just had glamour wins against apparent contenders - it's no surprise they're flavour of the month.

Our back 6 is the best in the competition, Petty is the only one that is a bit 50/50 and it was good to see Joel Smith back playing at Casey not that he is any better than Petty but a least we have him as an option.

Our mids can still get caught out over using the ball and the clearance work needs to be cleaned up.

Forward line you would think B Brown will come in this week and get 3-4 weeks to show his worth, if not Weiderman will get another crack in a month, we need one of these 2 to really step up for us to be a chance.

If I look at the Dogs, midfield they are strong forwards can go missing, Brisbane mids and Forward line looks real strong, I don't rate Port at the moment good on their terms, Geelong depends which dads army turns up back line can be scored against, strong tall forwards, West Coast look off the pace slow, they need to speed up their ball movement or teams will just sit back and let them have 50 marks in their defensive half.  Richmond you wouldn't want to play them in September if they are fit

1 hour ago, Clintosaurus said:

We don't have a lot of supporters in the media.

This is true. There is one journo who comes to mind and that’s Nick McCallum. He’s a Dees diehard just like all of us. ❤️?

3 hours ago, John Crow Batty said:

Despite being top of the ladder and having a 10-0 winning record against the next 12 teams below us it appears the local media pundits are not taking us very seriously. We hear comments alluding this is the most even season and anyone can win it. Two weeks ago the Richmond premiership machine was cranking up, then it was Geelong on the march and now the Bulldogs are clear favourites again. The bombers are charging up the ladder many say and are becoming a threat despite being out of the 8. Of course we haven’t proven anything  yet and many of our wins have been hard fought but there is perception we are just a side show to the real contenders. Seems there is a trend to talk up all our Victorian rivals above us. Other interstate rivals don’t get much love either. Despite our continuing success we are still regarded as a Cinderella club in Victoria. Any other opinions?

The media aren't generally deep thinkers with long attention spans and tend to predict the last impressive team they saw. So this week its the dogs after their eagles demolition with Brisbane after the last game.

When Dees beat up both those teams we were flavour of the month until the next big performace by another team. Dropping the pies game didn't have a lot of impact on predictiosn after beating the next big thing -the Bombers.

ON the Couch's Gerad Healy tipped Dees last night for flag if he was forced to predict someone - " haven't done a lot wrong,just need to fix forward connection..." , but also noted the tiges won in 2017 with only 1 tall, and by inference why can't the Dees.

Others said 4 are in the race - us, lions, cats and dogs.

 

29 minutes ago, A F said:

Hang on, so we were a younger side than Essendon on Saturday?

Yep. Just by a whisker - 24 yrs 9 month V 24 years 10 months.

If my estimate is right, we had eight players out there from the last four drafts despite not yet giving a debut to any of the 2020 draftees.

Then we've got a fat wad of 25-years-olds who don't push the average up much - Petracca, Brayshaw, Nibbler, Langdon, Lever, Harmes and Salem, and of course Oliver at just 23 years.

Our only 'old' players out there against Essendon were Hunt (26), Viney (27), McDonald (28), May (29), Gawn (29) and Hibberd (31).

Just 6 players taking the field aged 26 or over.

3 hours ago, John Crow Batty said:

Despite being top of the ladder and having a 10-0 winning record against the next 12 teams below us it appears the local media pundits are not taking us very seriously. We hear comments alluding this is the most even season and anyone can win it. Two weeks ago the Richmond premiership machine was cranking up, then it was Geelong on the march and now the Bulldogs are clear favourites again. The bombers are charging up the ladder many say and are becoming a threat despite being out of the 8. Of course we haven’t proven anything  yet and many of our wins have been hard fought but there is perception we are just a side show to the real contenders. Seems there is a trend to talk up all our Victorian rivals above us. Other interstate rivals don’t get much love either. Despite our continuing success we are still regarded as a Cinderella club in Victoria. Any other opinions?

Better this way

9 minutes ago, A F said:

Hang on, so we were a younger side than Essendon on Saturday?

Not having nearly enough to do and prompted by a Demonlander who suggested we had more young players than Essendon, I checked all top 8 teams playing last weekend plus Esendon and it appears we are in a great position for the future.  Sorry about the formatting 

Team                                       Players under 22             22-27                    Over 27                         Average games

Melbourne                                 7                                      11                                4                                  89.6

Dogs                                           4                                       12                               6                                  95.6

Brisbane                                     6                                       12                               4                                  90.4

Port                                             4                                       11                               7                                  98.9

Geelong                                      0                                        9                               13                                147.0

Swans                                         5                                      11                                6                                 100.2

Eagles                                         1                                      11                               10                                141.4

Tigers                                          2                                       9                                11                                118.3

Baby Bombers                           3                                       15                                4                                  74.7

Our demographic is actually closer to Brisbane than any other club.

There are of course a number of injured players at other clubs who would be in their best 22.  If included, it would raise the number of older players at each club and age demographic.  Moreso others than Melbourne (who would only replace Petty with Tomlinson).

I dont know what it means but we are either too young, in a great position to start a dynasty or alternatively it was an interesting way to spend an hour or so.

 

17 minutes ago, Bimbo said:

Not having nearly enough to do and prompted by a Demonlander who suggested we had more young players than Essendon, I checked all top 8 teams playing last weekend plus Esendon and it appears we are in a great position for the future.  Sorry about the formatting 

Team                                       Players under 22             22-27                    Over 27                         Average games

Melbourne                                 7                                      11                                4                                  89.6

Dogs                                           4                                       12                               6                                  95.6

Brisbane                                     6                                       12                               4                                  90.4

Port                                             4                                       11                               7                                  98.9

Geelong                                      0                                        9                               13                                147.0

Swans                                         5                                      11                                6                                 100.2

Eagles                                         1                                      11                               10                                141.4

Tigers                                          2                                       9                                11                                118.3

Baby Bombers                           3                                       15                                4                                  74.7

Our demographic is actually closer to Brisbane than any other club.

There are of course a number of injured players at other clubs who would be in their best 22.  If included, it would raise the number of older players at each club and age demographic.  Moreso others than Melbourne (who would only replace Petty with Tomlinson).

I dont know what it means but we are either too young, in a great position to start a dynasty or alternatively it was an interesting way to spend an hour or so.

 

We don’t have any players who have played over 200 games playing which can distort averages. Most of our stars are around the 100 -120 games played which bodes well for the future.

41 minutes ago, WalkingCivilWar said:

This is true. There is one journo who comes to mind and that’s Nick McCallum. He’s a Dees diehard just like all of us. ❤️?

Tom Morris is MFC too. Caty Price adopted us after moving from Perth. Is Clint Stanaway still in the media?

The doggies were flummoxed, we ran the Lions off their feet and the Cats old legs will tire over the journey. We are rock solid defensively and I reckon the fittest team in the league.

The media are distracted by bright shiny things. I’m not fussed. I prefer to be under-estimated. Come September I’ll back in May, Lever, our game plan and fitness over every other team.

52 minutes ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

I meant to say the we're the least potent out of the contenders, and will now edit it.

I just re-read my post and I agree it was ludicrous and was written in error.

My point still stands that our scoring has dried up and we haven't cracked 100 since round 6.

That's a sample size of two games.

Against Essendon we did only score 68, which is low, but we also had 23 scoring shots, which is bang on our season average of 24.5 shots per game. The issue there being inaccuracy.

Prior to Collingwood, our previous four scores were 97, 87, 95 and 94. The first two of those scores were produced against two of the best sides other than us, Brisbane and the Dogs.

I am arguing that we can improve our scoring but that it's nowhere near the problem that is being suggested on here (although by clarifying your post it's clear you don't think it's as bad as I had thought you did).

32 minutes ago, Little Goffy said:

I did say that both sentiments can be correct simultaneously.

As to the bolded line; after his first six games Fritsch had 18 goals, in the 7 since then he has kicked just 10 including just one goal int he last two rounds. 'Realistic possibility' of not breaking 40 is what I said and is clearly a valid point given he would need 12 more goals in the remaining 8 rounds.

That our defence is elite has no bearing on whether or not people should consider our forward line to be effective. If anything the forward deficiency is highlighted by the failure to dominate when we have such a priceless source of genuine intercept marks and quality rebounds rather than just killed contests in defence.

It is clearly our weakness, it is clearly the reason why we haven't been able to put teams away and it is clearly the primary reason for both our losses this season.

And, as I said, it is also an area with a very realistic prospect of getting sorted out and thereby making us unstoppable.

Well not the sentiment that we have the least potent forward line in the league.

I also don't agree that our elite defence is irrelevant to considering the effectiveness of our forward line. It's essential, for context. We don't need to score big every week. Maybe some other clubs in the competition do (Essendon would be one example) because they're less capable of stopping sides scoring. In 2018 that was us.

I also don't agree that scoring has been the primary reason for both our losses this season. We scored 95 points against Adelaide. The issue in both those games was that our opponents scored at a rate well higher than any of the other 12 sides we've played this year.

But the key point remains: despite all of the so-called weaknesses, we have scored the fourth-most points in the league. We're 68 points behind Brisbane across 14 games, which is the equivalent of 4.86 points per game, i.e. less than a goal per game.

Another metric is average scoring shots per game:

1. Bulldogs - 27.57
2. Brisbane - 25.07
3. Melbourne - 24.50
4. Essendon - 23.76
5. Geelong - 23.07
6. Sydney - 23.07
7. Richmond - 22.64
8. Port Adelaide - 22.50
9. West Coast - 22.14

We generate the third-most shots on goal and the fourth-most points per game in the competition.

If anything, these stats show me that our inaccuracy is holding us back.

I agree with your final line, though. I'm confident this is a glass half full situation.

1 hour ago, FarNorthernD said:

Yes I know I’m being Capt Obvious but it will depend on which team hits September in top form and relatively injury free. We are as good as chance as anyone. 

It is obvious, but it’s worth reiterating, because most forget that it’s the most relevant fact. Week to week form is king in the media, because they lack both foresight and hindsight.