When is Aimee Mackin due back from injury or has she recovered already? 
I thinks she’s a must if fit, pacy and classy.

Not the only factor, but we got smashed in the ruck until the last qrt which created a lot of their dominance. Pearce really struggled against a more athletic high jumping ruck. Pearce is a fantastic ruck but didn't match up well tonight. Our dominance in the 2nd came when Zanker was rucking. It was a shame to lose Rhi Watt, but dropping Cambell for Watt was a stupid selection in my opinion. No shade on Watt, but she is low on match experience and Cambell has been terrific this season.

Girls just [censored] my multi. 

  On 04/11/2023 at 09:56, DistrACTION Jackson said:

Just gave away a home Grand Final with a p i $ $ poor performance.... pretty used to that though now as a Dees fan

It's so typical of a Melbourne team to do that 

Not surprised by result. We played poorly though. Really missed paxman. Hore has to be played in the forward line all the time. We lack goal sense without her there.

  On 04/11/2023 at 10:03, godees said:

Very very poor showing.

Selection baffling with Campbell and Wilson out for Ivey and Watt (why?!), and Gall ultimately staying in the team. 
We look very one-dimensional without Paxy and really missed Lampard and Gay’s steadiness in the backline. Gall looks to have talent but clearly is not ready for finals-like footy.

Brisbane destroyed us with footy smarts. A lot of really dumb decisions, particularly by West who had a stinker.

Such a frustrating watch.

I didn’t mind Watt for Campbell. Watt looked good for me and it’s been a long year for Campbell. Plan might’ve been to use Pearce forward more too.

Ivey for Wilson was very strange.

Paxy a late out, I would’ve bought Wilson back in and sent Ivey forward. But no good options there given we likely didn’t have any runners as emergencies.

Need Paxy, Aimee Mackin, Colvin and Gay back next week if possible with hopefully just Watt out injured. Gall, Ivey, Fitzsimon (unlucky) make way. 

Can Sheriff play 3rd wing and Banno go deep forward and get them out the back?? Bannan is ineffectual on the wing and high half forward, needs to be able to do her out the back runs. 

FB: Gillard Colvin
HB: Goldy Birch Gay
C; Mackin Heath McNamara
HF: Paxy Harris Mithen
FF: Zanks Hore 
Foll: Pearce Purcell Hanks 
Int: Chappy Banno Sherriff A. Mack West 

Noooooooooooo! Credit to Brisbane, they really brought it and we were simply not up to it.

Negatives

Outplayed all over and SO MANY MISTAKES. Frustrating.

Need to find a way to wrest back momentum and own the ball when the pressure is up. Small sample, but we haven’t been able to do that against proper competition this season and it’s a worry.

We started too reactive and weren’t switched on. Any chance we could come out all guns blazing sometime? Then again, the way the Lions were on…if we’d backed our game, they might’ve had 5 in the first.

Too many were ineffective with the ball under pressure (count West, Mithen and Heath among those).

Goalless in the second half. The forward line was starved and then when we found a bit of connection looked fairly toothless in the last quarter. We’ve struggled to get Bannan’s full impact against the top teams this season.

A couple of our tackles will be looked at. All season players have been getting off for dangerous tackles so of course just watch Hanks and possibly Heath get weeks.

Hate to see Watt who surely has limited chances left in her career have her season possibly ended like that.

Positives

The ball bounced, I guess. Not our way. But it did bounce.

I thought the most likely way for us to lose that game would be through inaccurate kicking. Well, we did lose, but not in that way. I was also worried about their speed and they definitely broke us open a few times…wait, that’s not a positive.

Hopefully that was about as bad as we can play and about as well as they can play. We’ve seen Adelaide and Brisbane’s tactics—do we have a response?  

Paxman as a late out set off a chain of shifts that were less than ideal and left things out of whack. A tough ask for Gall. We can field a better team than this, but no excuses.

Thought it was a good return by Harris overall. Mackin the only player who had any real space. Goldie tried hard. Hore and Hanks tried to lead the way. The backline did about all it could under that level of attack before caving.

People reacting in the gameday thread with vitriol and exaggeration. It’s Demonland code for "This hurts", which translates to “I care”.

May the sting of losing send us into beast mode for finals. Our best beats anyone. Just need to do it. 

  On 04/11/2023 at 11:20, Dees_In_October said:

Noooooooooooo! Credit to Brisbane, they really brought it and we were simply not up to it.

Negatives

Outplayed all over and SO MANY MISTAKES. Frustrating.

Need to find a way to wrest back momentum and own the ball when the pressure is up. Small sample, but we haven’t been able to do that against proper competition this season and it’s a worry.

We started too reactive and weren’t switched on. Any chance we could come out all guns blazing sometime? Then again, the way the Lions were on…if we’d backed our game, they might’ve had 5 in the first.

Too many were ineffective with the ball under pressure (count West, Mithen and Heath among those).

Goalless in the second half. The forward line was starved and then when we found a bit of connection looked fairly toothless in the last quarter. We’ve struggled to get Bannan’s full impact against the top teams this season.

A couple of our tackles will be looked at. All season players have been getting off for dangerous tackles so of course just watch Hanks and possibly Heath get weeks.

Hate to see Watt who surely has limited chances left in her career have her season possibly ended like that.

Positives

The ball bounced, I guess. Not our way. But it did bounce.

I thought the most likely way for us to lose that game would be through inaccurate kicking. Well, we did lose, but not in that way. I was also worried about their speed and they definitely broke us open a few times…wait, that’s not a positive.

Hopefully that was about as bad as we can play and about as well as they can play. We’ve seen Adelaide and Brisbane’s tactics—do we have a response?  

Paxman as a late out set off a chain of shifts that were less than ideal and left things out of whack. A tough ask for Gall. We can field a better team than this, but no excuses.

Thought it was a good return by Harris overall. Mackin the only player who had any real space. Goldie tried hard. Hore and Hanks tried to lead the way. The backline did about all it could under that level of attack before caving.

People reacting in the gameday thread with vitriol and exaggeration. It’s Demonland code for "This hurts", which translates to “I care”.

May the sting of losing send us into beast mode for finals. Our best beats anyone. Just need to do it. 

If Hanks goes for that tackle it will really hurt us.

And..... Make me feel like the aflw is quickly catching up to the ridiculousness of AFL at a fast rate.

We did score a goal in the last remember. It was reversed by another stupid free kick by the ump that paid a dangerous tackle to the lions in the third.

Umpires up to their old tricks?

watt and chaplin won't be playing due to concussion protocols i would imagine?

we could have quite a lot of changes with two forced and bringing in a bit of experience with paxy, gay, colvin and then the smarts of a mackin as well

  On 04/11/2023 at 09:24, Lexinator said:

Davidson being a real grub. Shoulder to the head and arguing and carrying on with Dees players, showing no sympathy to an injured player. 

Full on shoulder charge to the head. Going on previous penalties this season should get three weeks.

  On 04/11/2023 at 12:13, whatwhat say what said:

watt and chaplin won't be playing due to concussion protocols i would imagine?

we could have quite a lot of changes with two forced and bringing in a bit of experience with paxy, gay, colvin and then the smarts of a mackin as well

I stopped watching it but just before I did I thought I heard them say Maeve came back on (?)

  On 04/11/2023 at 11:20, Dees_In_October said:

People reacting in the gameday thread with vitriol and exaggeration. It’s Demonland code for "This hurts", which translates to “I care”.

I don’t need to use the code, DiO. It hurts and I care. It hurts because I know we’re better than that. I care because our girls work so hard and they are the most awesome bunch of people you could hope to meet. But I’ve stopped pouting and now I’m really looking forward to and feeling confident about our first final!

Bring it on!!!

  On 04/11/2023 at 12:53, WalkingCivilWar said:

I stopped watching it but just before I did I thought I heard them say Maeve came back on (?)

She did.

Total lack of run last night. Not having Paxy in hurt, I think we went in a bit tall. But the lack of run wasn’t all due to personal lot was also attitude based  which was disappointing. Bannon offered nothing there or was set up to provide run in an open forwardline with a kick to her advantage side. Our forwards pushed too high up the ground last night.What stood out was a lack of chase. Shelly Heath who is usually a determined player and has wheels stopped chasing a Brisbane player who ran from half bank flank to half forward flank with some handball receives who set up a Brisbane goal from that chain. 
 Our handball receives were way down with little overlap run. Really disappointing result now as we rely on Adelaide to slip up to host a potential Grand Final. It actually was like watching our men’s team last night. Win the inside but getting smashed outside the contest, forwards too high up the ground. Slow ball movement and a lack of run dare. And a few eyebrows raised with team selection. Too many passengers last night but I am sure that the girls will bounce back.

Lack of run and very disappointing skills.

Fumbled and bumbled all night and for a team that is lauded for its run & carry via slick handball prior to the match, along with dominating hard ball gets, this aspect seemed to dry up pretty badly in this one.

You would think the commentators were getting mixed up and referring to Brissy as they were the ones bringing the run and and much slicker game that connected well.  They were also the ones picking up most of the loose ball stuff and easily matched or bettered us with the contested hard ball side.

We stopped hand balling / running and mostly just kept bombing down the line.  Occasional switch across HB but very little changing of angles when coming through the corridor & forward.  Whereas Brissy did very well in this regard i thought.

A number of times we had two to three loose players in the middle but they were ignored and instead we mostly punted down the line to a congested cotest and much of the time over the heads of our girls up forward who were mostly pushed under the ball by clever play from their Brissy defenders, who then took the easy uncontested mark out the back.

Starting to appear like no Paxy, no Demons (against the best clubs anyway)?

Don't think you can play all three talls of Zank, Bannan and Taylor up forward either.

Probably would have asked Bannan to cover their big forward (Davidson?) after quarter/half time.  She was in pretty good form and Bannon played her early career in this role from memory.

Edited November 4, 20231 yr by Demon Dynasty

I don't want to be too negative, but I'm worried for next week.  Potentially Lampard, Gay, Paxy, Colvin, A Mackin, Chaplin, Goldy and Hanks (absolutely should be no concern but the tribunal has been so inconsistent on tackles that anything could happen) may all be unavailable.  I'm also concerned that we've beaten the Kangas six times in a row, and it doesn't matter if you're the better team in the end the law of averages will get you.  Beating a team nine times out of ten still means there's that tenth time.

We really missed a chance last night to set ourselves up.  Imagine If we'd had Gold Coast next week for a week off and straight through to the Prelim?  Brisbane had the three big motivations - the GF loss, playing for a top four spot and to atone for their poor effort last week - but we should have been ready for that.  We yet again were jumped, ironically the only game where we've come out hard was against Adelaide.  Nearly always slow starters, it's as if we want to let the oppo play their best so we can then put in place our counter measures and then take control.  Coming out with steam coming out our ears might not be a bad idea now and then.

And as has been said the team selection was weird.  With Paxy a late withdrawal we go with Gall over Campbell?  With the three emergencies all being talls we didn't have a like for like, but we went for the least experienced option in a game of such importance?

Tackle very similar to Heater's last night paid as holding the ball today. Who would have thought?

RECOGNISING AN

AMAZING TALENT

SHELLEY HEATH

HAPPY 50 GAMES

Heater’s nickname amongst the players is ‘Rash.’ She played her 50th last week but the wind at Casey meant no banner raising. 

 

 

VOTE FOR TAY!!!!!

https://www.afl.com.au/aflw/mark-of-the-year

We were stuffed in this game before it started.  Adelaide and North have both shown that to beat Melbourne you need to be physical, and bring a lot of players to the ball.  That stops us getting the ball out in space where we do damage.

As soon as Paxy was withdrawn, it threw everything out.  Putting Lily in there as a replacement rotation, is not the answer as she does not have the physical strength to combat opposition mids, and cannot kick or handball the ball sufficiently clear.  Starting Purcell on the bench was a big mistake for the start.  We just lost further grunt and skill when needed most.  Don't blame the rucks, we were missing players beneath who could get the ball.

Then losing Rhi Watt meant we were back to the old robbing Peter to pay Paul from there on.  Zanker and Tayla dragged into the middle meant the forward line was lacking.  Still, Eden has looked a long way off it in the past 2 weeks. 4 disposals to 3/4 time was way below par again.  And without the ball getting to the outside, Bannan was starved of opportunity and we needed Tayla to provide a spar, but she was doing it all on her own. Georgia Gall won't be playing again this week.

What was the free kick count?  All one way, and is a good example of home town bias, which we will now face against Adelaide in coming weeks.  That Brisbane kept getting frees for tackles and actions while their players get taken to the MRP for others not noticed gives a fairly good indication of the one way traffic.

 

  On 06/11/2023 at 22:06, george_on_the_outer said:

Adelaide and North have both shown that to beat Melbourne you need to be physical, and bring a lot of players to the ball

Yep, it's why I think we play Goldie in the middle against these teams in particular.

She has the strength to go with them. Lil is most definitely not the answer.

I wouldn't also be against the idea of running Harris in short bursts as a mid to break things up a bit.

We keep giving teams the same look. Mick talks about the teams flexibility, it's time to really show it.

On another note, I hope Makin is back this week..she adds real X factor to the forward half that's been missing.

Edited November 7, 20231 yr by rjay

  On 07/11/2023 at 00:57, rjay said:

Yep, it's why I think we play Goldie in the middle against these teams in particular.

She has the strength to go with them. Lil is most definitely not the answer.

I wouldn't also be against the idea of running Harris in short bursts as a mid to break things up a bit.

We keep giving teams the same look. Mick talks about the teams flexibility, it's time to really show it.

On another note, I hope Makin is back this week..she adds real X factor to the forward half that's been missing.

Zanker has also had some excellent games as a mid in previous seasons. But Goldie in there for sure against Adelaide and Brisbane.