Jump to content

Featured Replies

38 minutes ago, seventyfour said:

Our Round 7 game is against Richmond, so we'd be 5-2 if results went the way of the above. Would be a brilliant start to the year.

I'd take 4-3.

Then West Coast in round 8 which I'm sure the boys will be itching to atone from last year's disaster over there.

4-3 is good on paper, but we have a really tough 3 weeks from rounds 9-11 with Hawthorn, Brisbane (away) then Sydney. May have to win a statement game against Fremantle or Geelong in Geelong (ideally get to 6-2) to bank some early wins before that challenging 3 weeks.

There's also a horror four weeks where we have Port, bye, GC and Adelaide all away.

Edited by Bring-Back-Powell

 
24 minutes ago, Bring-Back-Powell said:

There's also a horror four weeks where we have Port, bye, GC and Adelaide all away.

Still way better than last year though. The early season run in 2024 - something like 5 games in 25 days - was ridiculous. We were never a chance to beat Brisbane at the MCG that night.

8 hours ago, binman said:

We open with a bye. 

Quite. But at the end of Round 6, every club will have played six games and it’s a good time to reflect on how the season’s going.

I’m picking us to win our opening game at home vs GWS Giants. Geelong at the Cattery will be tough and if we beat the Dockers we should be well set towards a top four finish. 

I am however, still going to take things one week at a time.

  • 1 month later...
 

Bit of a difference in predictions here (https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/winless-tigers-hawks-on-the-rise-our-experts-predict-season-2025-20250206-p5la7d.html)

Jake Niall - 6th
Michael Gleeson - 8th
Peter Ryan - 11th
Jon Pierik - 13th
Andrew Wu - 6th
Marc McGowan - 9th
Sam McClure - 11th
Caroline Wilson - 4th
Emma Kearney - 12th
Libby Birch  - 13th
Bob Murphy - 11th
Mathew Stokes - 13th
Scott Spits - 7th

adam simpson yesterday when freo were kicking with the wind and dominating "yeah i see them sliding"
full time "they reminded me how good they can be"


10 hours ago, roy11 said:

Bit of a difference in predictions here (https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/winless-tigers-hawks-on-the-rise-our-experts-predict-season-2025-20250206-p5la7d.html)

Jake Niall - 6th
Michael Gleeson - 8th
Peter Ryan - 11th
Jon Pierik - 13th
Andrew Wu - 6th
Marc McGowan - 9th
Sam McClure - 11th
Caroline Wilson - 4th
Emma Kearney - 12th
Libby Birch  - 13th
Bob Murphy - 11th
Mathew Stokes - 13th
Scott Spits - 7th

Caro - 4th. Interesting.

OK, so that's The Age and The Herald Sun.

Looking forward now to The Saturday Paper, The New York Times, Pravda and The Asahi Shimbun predictors.

Striving for more certainty.

 
On 15/01/2025 at 16:36, Whispering_Jack said:

Quite. But at the end of Round 6, every club will have played six games and it’s a good time to reflect on how the season’s going.

I’m picking us to win our opening game at home vs GWS Giants. Geelong at the Cattery will be tough and if we beat the Dockers we should be well set towards a top four finish. 

I am however, still going to take things one week at a time.

Interesting to note that GWS will already have played one game. You'd have to think thats an advantage

The Herald Sun 'experts':

  • CHRIS CAVANAGH: Missing finals
  • LAUREN WOOD: Missing finals
  • JON RALPH: Missing finals
  • ELIZA REILLY: Missing finals
  • LACHLAN MCKIRDY: Bottom four
  • ED BOURKE: Missing finals
  • CALLUM DICK: Missing finals
  • SIMEON THOMAS-WILSON: Missing finals
  • Consensus prediction: 14th

2 hours ago, jnrmac said:

The Herald Sun 'experts':

  • CHRIS CAVANAGH: Missing finals
  • LAUREN WOOD: Missing finals
  • JON RALPH: Missing finals
  • ELIZA REILLY: Missing finals
  • LACHLAN MCKIRDY: Bottom four
  • ED BOURKE: Missing finals
  • CALLUM DICK: Missing finals
  • SIMEON THOMAS-WILSON: Missing finals
  • Consensus prediction: 14th

The Herald Sun 'experts' : missing talent and integrity 

The Hawthorn hype from the media is ridiculous. Pre-season doco and all. What a [censored]. Hope they finish 9th but all them high tackle frees in forward 50 will get them in.

Tim Watson. SEN. 

1st Cats

2 Swans 

3 Crows !!! 

4 Lions

5 Blues

6 Pies

7 Freo

8 Demons 

missing the 8 … Hawks, Giants, Power, Bombers, Suns & Bulldogs. 

hard to tip a top 8 when 14 teams could easily be nominated to make it and 7-8 teams would seriously have claims for a top 4 finish 

wow … Crows at 3.  That’s Crazy!!! 

On 27/12/2024 at 19:22, Rab D Nesbitt said:

If we have a good run with injuries I'm confident we'll finish top 4 and have another tilt at a flag. I couldn't care less where anyone else finishes although Pies and Blues missing finals would be nice I guess. 

Nice! Nice! That would be like heaven on Earth. Oh please, please, let me live in that Universe.


On 04/03/2025 at 06:44, Whispering_Jack said:

The Herald Sun “experts” are less than impressed. They have us remaining static in 14th place. IMG_9002.thumb.jpeg.5f8ba9ae365c8f5f24eccc4ae02dd31c.jpeg

It’s worth bookmarking this …

These things are so boring:

 

Same GF

3 of 4 PF sides the same 

Hawthorn, Carlton, Freo jump up slightly 

the second last premier back into the 8 ( another team improving slightly)

A good GWS dropping a little after a horror end of year period.

WB with injuries dropping down

And slight readjustments among the bottom 7

*Yawn* I don't expect them to a North vs Sun GF and Sydney coming 11th. But this is boring and plenty will be wrong.

32 minutes ago, spirit of norm smith said:

Tim Watson. SEN. 

1st Cats

2 Swans 

3 Crows !!! 

4 Lions

5 Blues

6 Pies

7 Freo

8 Demons 

missing the 8 … Hawks, Giants, Power, Bombers, Suns & Bulldogs. 

hard to tip a top 8 when 14 teams could easily be nominated to make it and 7-8 teams would seriously have claims for a top 4 finish 

wow … Crows at 3.  That’s Crazy!!! 

There will be surprises. It sounds like in recent years a team well out if the eight make the prelims the year after. So it might be Crows. But it might be plenty of the others too.

1 hour ago, Clintosaurus said:

The Hawthorn hype from the media is ridiculous. Pre-season doco and all. What a [censored]. Hope they finish 9th but all them high tackle frees in forward 50 will get them in.

I don't see the justification for it either. I think people are picking them purely on gamestyle as it stood in the latter part of last year. 

There's nothing stopping them from doing a Collingwood in 2023 and going strength to strength but I can just as easily see them being worked out and lacking when the pressure is on.

https://www.3aw.com.au/rory-sloane-thinks-demons-will-respond-massively-in-2025/

3aw Season Preview with lloyd and Rory Sloane. Demons from around 18:46

3AW Football’s Rory Sloane has praised Melbourne’s “incredibly driven” superstars, as they look to feature in September action in 2025.

The former Adelaide Crows captain is confident Simon Goodwin’s side will get back to their best footy and make a big climb up the ladder.

“It’s scary playing against those guys,” Sloane said on the 3AW Football pre-season podcast.

“It excited me working with that midfield group, a lot of them are incredibly driven.”

Edited by jnrmac

Thought this was a thread from March 2021 for a second

Most likely to be sacked?  Goodwin

Won a flag

Staggering how the media don't learn from history.

But I love it.  Stick it right up them Demons!


A team with a tall fwd line of Chol won’t be winning the flag

@WheeloRatings

The ABC have rightly given you credit in this article:

unpredictable-afl-season-2025-set-to-be-most-open-in-years

It was remarkably accurate in 2024 wins eg Hawks, Swans, Pies and Dees rises and falls.  Their respective 2023 wins were 7, 12, 18 and 16.   The actual for 2024 is in the table below.  The 'draw strength' must have been statistically very significant.

Does  the 'Pythagorean' thing have much statistical credibility?  

Accounting for underlying team strength (Pythagorean expectation) and draw strength

image.png.4017372df7ede380d23535d1437b86ea.png

 

The 11 predicted wins for us surprises me given we have a statistically easy draw.

If 'Pythagorean' does have cred then 2025 doesn't look too good for us. 

Think I'll ignore their 'logic' and continue to dream ...

... still confident that 2025 will atone 2023 ...

Edited by Lucifers Hero

 

the thing with the footy maths is that at the start of the year its not taking into account returns from injury, trades, big preseasons etc. so getting trac and oliver at their best back into that team probably adds a win or two by itself...

2 hours ago, biggestred said:

the thing with the footy maths is that at the start of the year its not taking into account returns from injury, trades, big preseasons etc. so getting trac and oliver at their best back into that team probably adds a win or two by itself...

Take another look at the table in my post and look at their predictions for 2024 and how they panned out. 

As I mentioned it was surprising how accurate the number of wins were for Hawks, Swans, Pies and Dees, even before a ball was bounced. 

No doubt having fewer injuries will help but maybe injuries pan out across the league to the point where they aren't statistically significant ...  I just hope the dees prediction for this year is horribly wrong.

Edited by Lucifers Hero


Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

Featured Content

  • REPORT: Hawthorn

    There was a time during the current Melbourne cycle that goes back to before the premiership when the club was the toughest to beat in the fourth quarter. The Demons were not only hard to beat at any time but it was virtually impossible to get the better them when scores were close at three quarter time. It was only three or four years ago but they were fit, strong and resilient in body and mind. Sadly, those days are over. This has been the case since the club fell off its pedestal about 12 months ago after it beat Geelong and then lost to Carlton. In both instances, Melbourne put together strong, stirring final quarters, one that resulted in victory, the other, in defeat. Since then, the drop off has been dramatic to the point where it can neither pull off victory in close matches, nor can it even go down in defeat  gallantly.

    • 0 replies
    Demonland
  • CASEY: Footscray

    At twenty-four minutes into the third term of the game between the Casey Demons and Footscray VFL at Whitten Oval, the visitors were coasting. They were winning all over the ground, had the ascendancy in the ruck battles and held a 26 point lead on a day perfect for football. What could go wrong? Everything. The Bulldogs moved into overdrive in the last five minutes of the term and booted three straight goals to reduce the margin to a highly retrievable eight points at the last break. Bouyed by that effort, their confidence was on a high level during the interval and they ran all over the despondent Demons and kicked another five goals to lead by a comfortable margin of four goals deep into the final term before Paddy Cross kicked a couple of too late goals for a despondent Casey. A testament to their lack of pressure in the latter stages of the game was the fact that Footscray’s last ten scoring shots were nine goals and one rushed behind. Things might have been different for the Demons who went into the game after last week’s bye with 12 AFL listed players. Blake Howes was held over for the AFL game but two others, Jack Billings and Taj Woewodin (not officially listed as injured) were also missing and they could have been handy at the end. Another mystery of the current VFL system.

    • 0 replies
    Demonland
  • PREGAME: Brisbane

    The Demons head back out on the road in Round 10 when they travel to Queensland to take on the reigning Premiers and the top of the table Lions who look very formidable. Can the Dees cause a massive upset? Who comes in and who goes out?

    • 119 replies
    Demonland
  • PODCAST: Hawthorn

    The Demonland Podcast will air LIVE on Monday, 12th May @ 8:00pm. Join Binman, George & I as we dissect the Demons loss to the Hawks. Your questions and comments are a huge part of our podcast so please post anything you want to ask or say below and we'll give you a shout out on the show. If you would like to leave us a voicemail please call 03 9016 3666 and don't worry no body answers so you don't have to talk to a human.

      • Clap
      • Thanks
      • Like
    • 49 replies
    Demonland
  • POSTGAME: Hawthorn

    Wayward kicking for goal, dump kicks inside 50 and some baffling umpiring all contributed to the Dees not getting out to an an early lead that may have impacted the result. At the end of the day the Demons were just not good enough and let the Hawks run away with their first win against the Demons in 7 years.

      • Thanks
      • Like
    • 350 replies
    Demonland
  • VOTES: Hawthorn

    After 3 fantastic week Max Gawn has a massive lead in the Demonland Player of the Year award from Jake Bowey, Christian Petracca, Kade Chandler and Ed Langdon who round out the Top Five. Your votes please. 6, 5, 4, 3, 2 & 1.

      • Like
    • 34 replies
    Demonland