21 hours ago, Sir Why You Little said:

"You must always strive to be the best, 
but you must never believe you are the best" 

- Juan Manuel Fangio

I am the Greatest

- Muhammad Ali

10 hours ago, hardtack said:

Are you suggesting that we become the Bunnings of the AFL?

Sure, we'll beat them by 10%

On 10/29/2021 at 5:54 PM, Docs Demons said:

We can improve which is scary HOWEVER it is above the shoulders that count. Keep our feet firmly on the ground and have the desire again then I think we can do it again. 

Whoops, I think we were ‘freed from desire’ not long after the granny. 

Edited October 31, 20213 yr by FlashInThePan

Injuries and a lack of hunger could be our downfall.

I want to win a flag in 2022 more than I did this time last year for the  2021 season, which is bizarre considering we've reached Mt Everest and you could be entitled for being more relaxed the following year. Hopefully the players feel the same. (I would imagine winning a flag at the G is a massive carrot to dangle in front of the players)

I know this sounds silly but beware sides such as Essendon, St Kilda and Carlton. Both clubs are paying $26 odd for the flag and I'm pretty sure premiers such as Melbourne, Bulldogs and West Coast were paying about that amount in the pre season when they won their flags.

Can see a lot of improvement in Essendon or Carlton. St Kilda less so, but they had a tough run with injury and still came 10th.

 

 

Edited October 31, 20213 yr by Bring-Back-Powell

16 hours ago, mauriesy said:

Why? If we continue to improve, more players will have "career best years". Depth, fitness and good management can take care of injuries unless they are really numerous and/or severe.

Simply making the point that the majority of players were in great form this year and on the law of averages it’s unlikely to happEn to that degree again. 

Re injuries, good management can’t help collision type injuries for example 

1 hour ago, DubDee said:

Simply making the point that the majority of players were in great form this year and on the law of averages it’s unlikely to happen to that degree again.

We had eight players under-21 in the grand final who are only going to get better. One acquitted himself really well in only his 7th game. We didn't have a player with 200 games experience and only one player over 30. Players like Jordon, Hunt, Tomlinson, Daw, Melksham, Weideman, Mitch Brown and Smith are there as role-playing back-ups.

Of course injures may happen to key players, but the "law of averages" therefore says to me that we are not going to get worse.

 

1 hour ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

we've reached Mt Everest

We will be like the adventurers who once they've climbed Mt Everest, go on to climb K2, all the world's other 8000m peaks and traverse Antarctica!

2 hours ago, mauriesy said:

We had eight players under-21 in the grand final who are only going to get better. One acquitted himself really well in only his 7th game. We didn't have a player with 200 games experience and only one player over 30. Players like Jordon, Hunt, Tomlinson, Daw, Melksham, Weideman, Mitch Brown and Smith are there as role-playing back-ups.

Of course injures may happen to key players, but the "law of averages" therefore says to me that we are not going to get worse.

 

I guess we will find out.  I reckon there might be a few cranky people on here next season when we lose a couple of games early

just because players are young does not mean that will naturally be better next year. We will be targeted, pressure will build. improvement is not linear.  I still think we will be right in the mix but I'm not as confident as some. we did miss finals the previous 2 seasons

2 minutes ago, DubDee said:

I guess we will find out.  I reckon there might be a few cranky people on here next season when we lose a couple of games early

just because players are young does not mean that will naturally be better next year. We will be targeted, pressure will build. improvement is not linear.  I still think we will be right in the mix but I'm not as confident as some. we did miss finals the previous 2 seasons

Just give the players next year off then I reckon?

Every year teams will challenge those at the top, that's footy.  Reviewing the finals and H&A, barely any top 8 side threatened us over the journey. Has any of the top 8 a new player that would change their chances, not in trading they haven't.  But they might develop and refine a new system that can crack ours.  Is saying that, our teams philosophy of total selflessness makes up for gaps in our players, but doing what the team needs first and they have learnt how it leads to success.  Given our age demographic we should continue at least incremental improvements in playing decision marking and skills.  This has already been flagged by Gawny.    The next half decade looks very bright, but there are always challenges. 

the afl should just give us the next 4 flags and cancel seasons 2022 - 2025

seems fair to me

On 10/31/2021 at 11:20 AM, sue said:

Yes, but if they got that 1 goal closer they could have overtaken us wihtin the quarter. A team can be apparently far better than the opponent and still lose. That too is footy.  If you weren't nervous at that point in the game you couldn't possibly be a Demons supporter.  😀    

Anyway, while we  had a great year and a great final series all I'm saying is we shouldn't get over-confident about the size of the gap between us and other teams.   But if it makes any of us happy to be over-confident, fine. Just as long as the players are not.  (Confidence within bounds is of course good.)

Honestly? I wasn't nervous.

We had finished strongly all year. We were in front. They were throwing everything at us and all they could do was slowly cut down our lead.

How many times this year did we build a lead and then absorb the opposition momentum when we knew it would come? 

One of the true joys of watching our dees this year was the apparent lack of a weakness anywhere on the ground. To use the accepted parlance our last six were as good as other teams' first or second six.

Who would be be the last six? The usual suspects Spargo, Nibbler, Harmes, Sparrow, Jordon, Hibbo all played to their potential and, in their time on the field, did not show any deficiency in class or effort.

The next six who did not make the squad are also capable of matching the performance of the rest of the team. No gaps.

Will this sustain us for multiple flags? Who knows but at this stage we are the best placed in the AFL.

On 10/29/2021 at 11:01 AM, deelusions from afar said:

I think Brisbane will come back hard - losing Cam Rayner for the season who has the potential to be their Dusty / Petracca type player and then losing Hipwood and McStay for all the finals.

They were very unlucky to lose to the dogs - I think they're only a player or two away from being very dangerous.

GWS and Sydney certainly have enough talent on their lists to trouble anyone if it all comes together (including injuries and suspensions) at the right time of year.

I think Carlton will come good under Voss but would think it would take a few years of "learnings" to get them playing the right way.  Don't we know about that!

I think the Tigers will also improve when they get their injured players back, but l don’t expect Dusty to be the force he was. The cats to be mid-list and miss the finals.

In short term Brisbane will be the real challengers.  As @deelusions from afarnoted, losing Hipwood and McStay for the finals simply blew their season away.  The same would have happened to us without Brown and McDonald in the same scenario.  They were really unlucky to lose to the Dogs in the semi, and could have actually been our opponent in the GF.

However, the one that will be up and coming are Essendon.  Draper, Zerk-Thatcher, Perkins and Harrison Jones are exactly the types of players around which to build a premiership side....just like we did!  And Parish is finally showing the form in the same way that we knew Petracca would show one day.  When we played them, they really took us to the wire, and have that same youthful enthusiasm that can take you a long way.

Pity is they spent capital on Shiel, Devon Smith and Stringer, who are brilliant one day and miserable the next.  Worse is that when they do come good, their sactimonious fans will be even more unbearable!

On 10/29/2021 at 2:13 PM, robbiefrom13 said:

Even when Bontempelli kicked his third, I had little concern - we were the fittest, we were stronger and we had more stars.  I was sure we'd run it out better than the Dogs.  I said to the young Bulldogs fan next to me, "you watch, they'll put Jackson in the ruck, Harmes will go onto Daniels and shut him down, it's what they do."  he laughed and said something about living in hope - but then it all kicked off.  We were so far a different article, the doggies looked absolutely astonished - and then they folded.  Anybody would have. 

We have got a list nobody can match.  Gawn Oliver and Petracca - who beats that?  but then there's Jackson as well!  Not forgetting Viney and a queue of rising strong learners.  The best backline, able to shut down anybody.  Who has got hold of them in the past twelve months?  Kozzie is only starting, so is Ben Brown really.  Fritsch is pretty good!  We have arrived, and I have never seen a more capable set of players at Melbourne, including 1964; never mind the competition-leading fitness and the team ethos.  We've got the wings sorted, and we can kick goals.  Bowie and Salem are rock-sloid, smart, skilled - absolute guns.  

You hesitate to look over-confident, but the objective facts seem to me to point at MFC being the benchmark by quite a margin.  Short of us stuffing it up, why would anyone think we're going to be looking back later and saying "i'm not surprised"?  This is the  box-seat!   

Clearly the most gifted and well organised team in the competition.  And young enough for it all to be in front of them! 

Max shows the way - hard-working to the nth degree, but with that in place, it's all about fun.  I loved the way Petracca spoke so unselfconsciously about knowing he had the talent.  It's simply a fact.  This is all new for us, but it's real and we should enjoy!

Gee the future really is very bright.

Liam Jones has officially retired. Carlton's resurgence delayed another year you'd assume?

If we play sides with there best players back then they will be competitive. Tigers were cooked when martin went down , stewart with geelong . If we play like we did in the finals , we will win most games