Deedubs = Dr D 

only happy when complaining and we have lots to complain about:

7-0 reigning premier

win after Covid challenged week

there are 17 other teams who would change places with Demons

enjoy the ride fellow Demons!!!!!!!!!

 

5 hours ago, rpfc said:

Lever is sore still - right foot. Still think it is his plantar fascia issue from the way he was carrying himself.

The second the siren goes he's with shoes off. Clearly his foot is not 100% and he is labouring.

 

We looked absolutely flat and physically tired yesterday, which all makes sense. Mentally it would have been really exhausting to go through the week with so many unknowns and Lever and Viney both back from Covid meant they were never going to be at their best. Viney looked exhausted when he was coming to the bench, which is unusual for him as he's extremely fit. 

But when we needed to, we put the foot down and ended the game. This is just what we do.

Saints will be buggered after their game this week, whereas we conserved energy in the last quarter. Smart move. 

Edited May 1, 20223 yr by Jaded No More

55 minutes ago, Lucifers Hero said:

A fair assessment.

I think there are several reasons for poor crowds, in addition to not enough dee fans attending.

1) opposition fans don't turn up.

2) We and most teams we play at the G don't have AFL members so that stand is near empty for many games

3) Few if any Friday night games means we don't get the 'neutral' fan to our games.

Hopefully, more dees fans go to our forthcoming games vs 'better' and some 'bigger' teams.  But I feel the 3 points I mentioned above make it difficult for us to regularly get 'big' crowds to our games.

 

Edit:  Now to put the counter point of view😉 our average Home game attendances have been better than most clubs and better than some 'big' Vic clubs.  We sit 3rd.  Being Home games it excluses the ANZAC Eve game.  So perhaps we aren't as bad as we think.   Source:  Footywire after round 6.

LH 

GWS no supporters US (21,000 odd)

Hawks prob 5/8,000 US (32,000)

Bombers about 12/14,000 (32,000)US

Dogs 8/10,000 (50,000)US

You are right re opp supporters 

AFL members not relevant unless Cwood Richmond and I would have thought Hawthorn (over the last 30 years  ).we have very few AFL members but approx 20,000 MCC members.

Font think neutral fans go much at all except on small basis with friends who support the participating team. Not like years ago with games at the G.

So with games vs SaintsvFreo Sydney Lions we still may get below 50,000 to all  of those games except Swans.

Cwood and Carlton are blockbusters if both teams in 8 or challenging.and 65,000 to 80,000 plus is possible.

That  May produce an average of around 40/45,000 per game. 

Not the 50,000 average our 4 year plan wants to achieve at this stage. Of the Plan. 

This is all speculative of course.

 

5 hours ago, Bitter but optimistic said:

He was certainly below his best Neil but I think we need to give him another week or two before making that call. 

Probably not 100% after Rona

27 minutes ago, Jaded No More said:

The second the siren goes he's with shoes off. Clearly his foot is not 100% and he is labouring.

 

We looked absolutely flat and physically tired yesterday, which all makes sense. Mentally it would have been really exhausting to go through the week with so many unknowns and Lever and Viney both back from Covid meant they were never going to be at their best. Viney looked exhausted when he was coming to the bench, which is unusual for him as he's extremely fit. 

But when we needed to, we put the foot down and ended the game. This is just what we do.

Saints will be buggered after their game this week, whereas we conserved energy in the last quarter. Smart move. 

I’ve noticed Lever always takes his boots off quickly - always has. Maybe he just likes walking in the grass in damp socks?

Understand we mainly play for containment in final quarters when ahead. I'd like to see what the plan is if we're behind.

4 minutes ago, Undeeterred said:

I’ve noticed Lever always takes his boots off quickly - always has. Maybe he just likes walking in the grass in damp socks?

I sincerely hope you are right with your observations 🤞

It's a little off topic but i thought it worth a mention

Port and GWS are starting to show some form. Port knocked off the Saints last night who are a rival to us this year. GWS have Geelong and Carlton up next at home. You wouldn't bet against them winning those 2 games

We've already banked the points against Port and GWS when they were playing poorly. Our rivals will have to deal with them when they are playing better. 

Another factor which is working in our favor 

4 hours ago, Lucifers Hero said:

...

 

Edit:  Now to put the counter point of view😉 our average Home game attendances have been better than most clubs and better than some 'big' Vic clubs.  We sit 3rd.  Being Home games it excluses the ANZAC Eve game.  So perhaps we aren't as bad as we think.   Source:  Footywire after round 6.

I've said this a couple of times in the crowds related thread, good to see others noticing the same thing!

My thoughts after watching the replay..

Outstanding effort by our guys to win. The system and confidence they have in each other is a joy to watch. They never seem to panic.

Umpiring was atrocious even though we got the better of the count

The 3 marks to May that were not paid were outrageous and cost us goals. They tried to drag May up the ground at all costs and leave Smith one out.

JJ was very fumbly

Bedford did very well.

Our kicking to the fwd line was abysmal. So many times we kicked to a pack or directly to a Hawk player.

The defence was uncharacteristically out of sorts. Lever was very fumbly as well. Missed Petty big time.

Hunt played well and made some great spoils

Langdon being tagged was unusual and was quite a successful tactic by Mitchell

Tom  Mitchell got some very soft frees.

Frost is a liability

Hawthorn were very aggressive all day trying to niggle us and their supporters are tireless bores.

Hawks played well off a short break and were running hard at the end.  I suspect more of our team was not feeling well than reported.

Max is a gun.

Oliver needs more protection from the umps. You can't have a player at stoppages not facing the stoppage and instead trying to impede Oliver. Pathetic umpiring

 

Edited May 1, 20223 yr by jnrmac

4 hours ago, deejammin' said:

I’d argue if Jimmy had won a premiership he’d be in the discussion for greatest with Max. Ask the players which they prefer, Brownlow or Premiership captain…

Max is clearly the greatest ruckman of the modern AFL era, his competition is Dean Cox, Simon Madden and Nic Nat. The only one troubling him there is Cox imo. And he’ll go past him this year if we keep going. 
 

For those complaining about crowd numbers 40000 is not bad at all, pretty good actually, from where I was sitting the gaps were in the Hawthorn cheer squad. 4.35 is a terrible time slot! Finishes late enough to miss dinner and be going home in the dark, for someone who works nights I had to leave at 3 quarter time. But doesn’t gain any advantage by starting so late. 3-6 is a much better time slot. 

Max is miles ahead of Nic Nat. 

nic nat's best seasons were when he was second fiddle to dean cox

4 minutes ago, jnrmac said:

Max is miles ahead of Nic Nat. 

I agree. But he has been the chief opponent for Max during his career, Nic Nat is 3x all Australian, I had forgotten the Eagles won their premiership without him, I thought he was a premiership player. 
Dean Cox is Max’s chief competition for greatest of the modern era, but I think Max has him covered, particularly if he keeps going and is AA captain again this year.

15 hours ago, Demon Dynasty said:

I reckon the former ... the only reason i can think of is he wasn't 110% sure it was the big sticks it was going through.... in the end only plugger knows why though eh.  He was lucky it wasn't given a point.  I reckon he only just managed to control that before the ball fully crossed the line by a bee's johnson

My take on it was that he was expecting a Hawthorn defender to come at him while he was watching the ball. Not part of his highlight reel, but something for which he would rightly be expected to shepherd for, even though in this case the best thing to do would have been get out of its way and watch it go through.

7 hours ago, rpfc said:

Lever is sore still - right foot. Still think it is his plantar fascia issue from the way he was carrying himself.

He also had his right boot off after the siren.

16 hours ago, deejammin' said:

The frustrating:

I get it but I don’t like the rope-a-dope last quarters. It would’ve been far more fun if we simply kicked straight, (particularly Bailey and Jake), we need to ice games, not try to smash teams and leave ourselves vulnerable, but just kick a sealer. A single goal would’ve completely broken the Hawks, see Sydney last week. We let them keep hope, understandable but frustrating. 
Our forward line needs to get back to separating and leading, the number of times Brown, Gawn, McDonald and Weideman all jumped into each other, or at least two did was very frustrating. Stop bombing to packs, lead!
😈😈😈

Agree and I think it cost us twice last year (the loss to Adelaide and the draw to Hawthorn). In both those games we had a break on the opposition (twice in the Hawks game) and allowed them back in. I'd like to see us a bit further in front before trying to ice a game, 5 goals with a quarter left is nothing.

9 hours ago, Superunknown said:

How’s Corsica? High on my todo list along with Sardinia. Perhaps when we park up in Nice next time post Carcasonne, Cadaques, Mont Ventoux (my spiritual home in France). 

So far so good. We’re in Ajaccio now and it has been good, although a bit more expensive than we expected. We’re heading to Calanques de Piana, a UNESCO World Heritage Site today. 

5 hours ago, Wodjathefirst said:

….. and all the more reason to rock up to the game and support our team (for those of us that can, so excusing the elderly , immune compromised, young kids - night games and other legitimate excuses etc).

I know I’m most likely going to put my head on the chopping block but I feel the only let down for me in this incredible journey this year is our crowd (lack of) turning up to games. 

Maybe we are still scared by the past, maybe we do have a lot of ‘fair feather’ supporters that will only come out of their shell if we make the finals and in the meantime  are good at coming up with all sorts of excuses as to why they can’t/ won’t attend eg it’s a Sunday arvo game or public transport concerns- (I bet that won’t be a issue for you come finals).   Just maybe the general perception that other teams supporters have of us is pretty much spot on. We have room to improve!

For years I dreamed of the mighty Dees coming good and dominating with huge crowds.  First part, tick, second part - still waiting.

Maybe I am a little bit jealous of all the supporters that ‘I love to hate’ that other Victorian clubs have that seem to be  more on board with their team than what we appear to be.
Finally, please don’t see this post as being antagonist, but rather, trying to encourage. I’m not here to say you should stop watching footy on Kayo if that is what you really prefer to do, perhaps just suggesting that if you go / encourage others to go watch the game live you may enjoy it even more.  Word of warning- it could become contagious!

 

Agreed 100%. The atmosphere at our games has been ****house and the empty stands are frankly embarrassing.

Having had the chance now to watch the replay, I walk away impressed by that performance despite the indicators that it wasn't near our best.

Hawthorn approached us tactically in a way that I expect other capable sides to do this year. Faster ball movement and leaving forwards deeper. But to do both of those things requires you to be able to play near-perfect football for four quarters and Hawthorn can't - as a result, their turnovers gave us goals in the first half and then our stoppage game got going in the second half, which I'm sure was in part because they kept deep forwards rather than rolling players up to stoppages.

Better sides will do it for longer and that will present big tests for us. But last night we managed to stem the tide, absorb the punches against us, and then counter, a hallmark of ours, despite missing 6 best 22 players and Lever seemingly not fully fit.

Gawn and Trac were great, Oliver worked through his tag pretty well I thought. Langdon copped a tag and whilst he didn't get any of the ball I rated his defensive work. May had a lot on his plate with Lever seemingly not fully fit, Smith poor before injury and TMac again having to plug a hole.

Really liked Bedford's approach, showing his wares with a full game. The half volley collect for Brown's snap goal was amazing but by and large he is still not clean enough at ground ball and that's a big area in which he needs to improve.

Forward line work still not fully right. Brown did well to kick 4 (don't be fooled by three coming from frees, two of those frees were blatant and a result of Brown taking front position and the third was probably there, if a little lucky) with the way the ball was coming in and with usually both Frost and Sicily covering him. Had chances for 2-3 more goals but some of the kicks inside 50 were just no good, again. Fritsch and Weideman didn't ever appear to be able to get separation inside 50 and even though Bedford worked hard, he didn't have the sort of spark when the ball hit the deck that we might usually get from Pickett.

Still, as I said earlier, with the disruption mid-week, the number of changes, and the aggression Hawthorn showed, that's the sort of game we'd be forgiven for dropping. Pocketing another win in those circumstances is huge IMO.

6 hours ago, Sydney_Demon said:

Not quite sure what your point is about Smith & Hunt being in the same backline given that Hunt has played every game and Smith has  played 5 of 7, we have been missing key backs every game and have won all 7. It seems the backline has been functioning well as a unit and I expect even with the poorer performance against Hawthorn we will still have the best-ranked defence at round end. You could even argue Smith's absence in the last quarter against the Hawks was a big part of them kicking 3 last quarter goals.

I think over-analysing our defensive performance based on one game when we were missing 5 players from covid, had disrupted training and had another 2 players probably not fully-fit coming back from covid is a bit meaningless and unfair.

My point about Smith and Hunt is that both can be loose and aggressive and when they're both doing that at the same time it presents difficulties with our zone and coverage. It's been a weakness for us all year when both have been in the side. Ideally we'd only have one player like them in the back six, and I suspect we'll see that again when Petty comes back to presumably place the injured Smith.

1 hour ago, jnrmac said:

My thoughts after watching the replay..

Outstanding effort by our guys to win. The system and confidence they have in each other is a joy to watch. They never seem to panic.

Umpiring was atrocious even though we got the better of the count

The 3 marks to May that were not paid were outrageous and cost us goals. They tried to drag May up the ground at all costs and leave Smith one out.

JJ was very fumbly

Bedford did very well.

Our kicking to the fwd line was abysmal. So many times we kicked to a pack or directly to a Hawk player.

The defence was uncharacteristically out of sorts. Lever was very fumbly as well. Missed Petty big time.

Hunt played well and made some great spoils

Langdon being tagged was unusual and was quite a successful tactic by Mitchell

Tom  Mitchell got some very soft frees.

Frost is a liability

Hawthorn were very aggressive all day trying to niggle us and their supporters are tireless bores.

Hawks played well off a short break and were running hard at the end.  I suspect more of our team was not feeling well than reported.

Max is a gun.

Oliver needs more protection from the umps. You can't have a player at stoppages not facing the stoppage and instead trying to impede Oliver. Pathetic umpiring

 

Agree with every point.

Oliver applies body pressure at every stoppage and I don’t think that helps him with the umpires. IMO he should leave the contact alone and just move forward to the ball, making it easier to spot holding infringements against him.

Than again who am I to tell Oliver how to play footy.

PS: He has been my favourite Demon since he was drafted. 

As a reminder of the importance of these early season wins:

We have 15 games to go, and of those 10 of them are against the current top 8.

6 hours ago, Wodjathefirst said:

I know I’m most likely going to put my head on the chopping block

maybe we do have a lot of ‘fair feather’ supporters that will only come out of their shell if we make the finals. 

Defs not putting your head on the chopping block. On the contrary, you make excellent points. In particular, the bolded part (above).

This is what vexes me no end. I make it a priority to attend as many H&A games as possible, despite having many of the excuses/reasons others cite as reasons to NOT attend. I concede that I won’t be attending finals since I don’t have the level of membership required. And that’s cool. Except it’s not cool when there are ‘fans’ who don’t bother to show up during the H&A season yet attend finals (their well-worn excuses/reasons magically disappear) with relish. I realise they pay a bunch for the privilege, but how about applying the same level of enthusiasm to H&A matches?

End of (unplanned) rant.  😁

3 hours ago, Dante said:

There was a player in the 50's and 60's called "Big Bob" Johnson and he player in 7 Grand Finals for Melbourne and won 5 of them.

He also topped the goal kicking twice and was a giant of a man (198cm) in that era, just like Max is now. Not saying he was better than Max, but you have to consider his record. Team of the century, Hall of Fame, he was a demon great and his father played for the Dees as well.

He went to play with Oakleigh and he was great value to watch there he was so big they couldn't' get round him, a lot of the oldies on here will remember him..

Wow…. just looked him up, kicked 660 goals from a total of 265 games over 3 clubs… as a ruckman

Must have been some player.

3 hours ago, 58er said:

LH 

GWS no supporters US (21,000 odd)

Hawks prob 5/8,000 US (32,000)

Bombers about 12/14,000 (32,000)US

Dogs 8/10,000 (50,000)

 

 

You're joking if you reckon those numbers are anywhere near accurate