I’m not actively hoping for this as I believe teams need to pace themselves during the course of a season to win a flag. We did it magnificently last year.

But Damian Barrett (imagine this happening back in 2013), has gone there in his AFL.com article this morning.

Personally, after last night, I can see us dropping one in the next month. We were the better team on the night but we were lucky they were Dusty-less. 

I also don’t think that’s a bad thing. Richmond in ‘18 and Geelong in ‘08 come to mind as teams who raced through the home and away season but weren’t in peak form come crunch time.

Thoughts?

Edited April 25, 20222 yr by Colin B. Flaubert

Psychologically would prefer we dropped one or a few along the way. Would hate the "undefeated" anvil being a media distraction going in to a grand final.

I'm not fussed what the W/L column says as long we finish top 2 and secure home finals

9 minutes ago, gs77 said:

Psychologically would prefer we dropped one or a few along the way. Would hate the "undefeated" anvil being a media distraction going in to a grand final.

Happy to try and cross that rubicon…

Seriously though, we are great and hard to score against but there will be a team that backs themselves and runs through us enough times to kick 90 points like Adelaide last year. We are not infallible.

We will drop games and it won’t be a bad thing. 
We reset so well after challenges I almost feel that once we drop one we will go to another level. 
Besides I have no doubt that if ladder position allows, we will ramp up training halfway through the year which will likely see us drop a few games in preparation for finals. It’s just what we did last year. 
I also wouldn’t put it past us to drop a game against our most likely rival in the lead up to finals. I think we were happy to drop a game to the Dogs in the later part of last season. 

I hate loosing but agree it wouldn’t be a bad thing to drop  a couple. Generally 64+ points gets you top 4 and it’s only 1 game that separates the top 2. We lost 5 games last year and most of them were in the second half.

I think we will go 3-2 in the next 5 games and probably relinquish top spot as a result. 

We'll probably lose 3 or so through the middle part of the season when we up our training loads. It happened last year and not to teams we would expect to lose to - Collingwood, GWS, getting pushed by Essendon.

I’m still dirty about losing to Carlton in the preseason. 

The teams we have beaten so far are #11-#16. Yes, I know you can only beat who you play!!

Let's see what happens when we start playing better sides. Perhaps we'll beat all those sides, perhaps not?

In any event, chalking up all these wins early in the season is (obviously) gold, and in the absence of a massive slump/injuries to many key players sets up a final 4 (hopefully final 2) finish. 

I've supported this Club for over 50 years. It's a weird feeling. 

Edited April 25, 20222 yr by Winners at last

Don't care how many wins or losses we have as long as we finish top two at season's end. 

If we manage that, I can't see us not making another Grand Final. Teams would be [censored] themselves playing us after what we did last year in the finals series. 

Not only that, Melbourne supporters would turn out in droves to see us at the G in a home qualifying/prelim final which would only help the team more. 

The fact we are winning from our reputable grinding brand and the psychological edge which is now building every single game is ridiculous. It's such an enormous advantage, Dunstan spoke about it in his post game interview. Stated how notacibly calm we remain throughout a game no matter the score. 

What a time to be a Melbourne supporter. We were putrid offensively last night and still Richmond were nowhere near us. 

It's genuinely scary. 

Edited April 25, 20222 yr by JimmyGadson

I thought last night was going to be a loss at Halftime. 
The Defence and Midfield were working so hard for such a frustrating output. 
But we were able to reset and play 10 minutes of “Melbourne” Football in the 3rd. 
Hawthorn will push us hard next week, fascinating to see how the Forwards respond 

2 minutes ago, JimmyGadson said:

Stated how notacibly calm we remain throughout a game no matter the score. 

It'd be great to be at the match review, to understand what the emotional experience was like for each player on the ground, when we were scoring points, and how that interacted with each players, intensity, belief and just the urge to continue, whilst experiencing (presumably) disappointment?

Did they feel deflated? Did it feel like it would 'turn' at some stage?

More importantly, now that we've experienced a match like this, what was learned from it emotionally about that sort of situation? And what would happen if it was in a Final?

22-0 Considering i backed them to go undefeated @ $51  Figured we had enough "learnings" in previous years!

6 minutes ago, Sir Why You Little said:

Whorethorn

Spelt 'Hawthorn"... it's such a vulgar name.

If we were to go through undefeated, including the granny, it would mark this team as, statistically at least, the greatest of all time. Not bad. Furthermore, it will go a fair way to reclaiming the title of the greatest club in the competition.  

"The lure of the distant and difficult is deceptive. The greatest opportunity is where you are." John Burroughs.

If we just win the next game between now and 24 September 2022, we get there.

3 minutes ago, Queanbeyan Demon said:

If we were to go through undefeated, including the granny, it would mark this team as, statistically at least, the greatest of all time. Not bad. Furthermore, it will go a fair way to reclaiming the title of the greatest club in the competition.  

"The lure of the distant and difficult is deceptive. The greatest opportunity is where you are." John Burroughs.

If we just win the next game between now and 24 September 2022, we get there.

“Moment by Moment 

Contest by Contest”

Just look at last nights game and if we kick poorly against a better opposition we will get done. Lets hope it does not happen in a final.

One day a team will play a perfect season.

If a team goes through a season undefeated, aren't they entitled to add 'Champion'? That is, 'Premiers and Champions'? Has a nice ring to it.

We're going to lose games this year. Yes, plural.

It's silly to suggest otherwise. Not only does history tell us it is going to happen, but we're simply not as far in front of the competition as some in the media are sensationally suggesting.

We haven't played a side sitting higher than 11th on the ladder. Of the 16 games to come, 12 of them are against the current top 10. The fixture difficulty ramps up from here.

I have the alarming feeling that right now we ARE pacing ourselves.

I think our team has the most precious gift available to a top-performing side; the ability to respond to circumstances and deliver super-intense surges when required, but the rest of the time we maintain full defensive discipline as the standard expected.

We are almost literally using the main season as a training problem with live targets!

Anything can happen with Covid lurking around ready to knock four or five players out at a moment's notice, but that would be why we have the likes of Dunstan and Smith, who each reminded us last night that they are capable at the level when required and would still be thinking they are a shot at their own premiership medals.

I've always looked at 12 wins as the first marker.  That pretty much guarantees finals.  We are halfway there. Win 4 more than that and you are very unlucky to miss top 4. So I'd be happy with 16-6 and even happier with 17 or 18 wins which should get you to top 2.

Journos at the start of the season - 'Will [rubbish team] win a game this year?'
Journos after Round 6 - 'Will [undefeated team] lose a game this year?'

... and every year the answer is yes, and yes. Same as the question "Does Barrett write rubbish that should be ignored?"

 

  

2 hours ago, titan_uranus said:

We're going to lose games this year. Yes, plural.

It's silly to suggest otherwise. Not only does history tell us it is going to happen, but we're simply not as far in front of the competition as some in the media are sensationally suggesting.

We haven't played a side sitting higher than 11th on the ladder. Of the 16 games to come, 12 of them are against the current top 10. The fixture difficulty ramps up from here.

That based on little more than ladder positions - i.e., the combined fixtures the other teams have had thus far this year. If our fixture has been soft, how many of the other top eight teams have had soft fixtures too. The law of averages suggests around half of them.

Edited April 25, 20222 yr by Chook

I was confident at half time to be honest, we absolutely dominated them the entire game and I was sure the goals would come. Good teams will inevitably score when the ball is locked in their forward half for so long. The obvious thing is kicking for goal and this happens from time to time. 
 

The one thing I did notice that others have mentioned already elsewhere, is that we were selfish at times with shots for goals. We’re at our best when instead of having a crack, we look inside for a better option or at least give the chance for a Spargo/kozzie/Fritsch to crumb a goal. To be fair, a couple of Richmond players absorbed a lot of our entries… it was just that we had so many.

Saying that, we address that in our forward line and there’s no reason we can’t go undefeated.

I personally wouldn’t like to be undefeated for my own anxiety levels going into finals, haha