21 hours ago, 58er said:

No they were only 2 goals away from making the GFinal, not winning. And Cats had been premiers in 2022 twelfth in 2023 and third in 2024.

So it can happen and I believe if we have no serious stars injured plus improved seasons from about half our players plus our youngsters take the next steps and our 2021 focus is repeated then we are a Top4 and Flag possibility. 

Correct. The way the Swans capitulated in the Gf against the lions, I think Cats would have rolled them! So there was a bright side to the Lions winning!!

On 28/01/2025 at 12:36, praha said:

I think it's fair. Preseason chatter is always about teams that finished strong + ladder position. I remember David King saying at the end of last year he expects us to return to finals. 

I think the reality is we have plugged a lot of holes but we need a gameplan change to contest. Four straight finals exits, and a capitulation towards the end of last year rightly raises doubts.

If we'd finished top 8 and won a final then I'd say we are being underrated but otherwise I'd say the ratings are about right (except the ones saying we'll be bottom 4).

No one is going to risk being ridiculed for saying we are a contender when the reality is there are far too many unknowns about how we'll perform.

We’ve only had three straight finals exits. And one was by one kick: Viney kicked it straight to a Carlton forward in the forward line for a goal to win the game. 

On 28/01/2025 at 16:59, Bring-Back-Powell said:

Yeah I think the most disturbing thing about that game (and the WC loss) was that we had a bloody strong side. I think only Lever missed the Freo debacle.

The injuries came later in the season.

The MFC players were like witches’ hats in that game. The taller Freo team absolutely ran rings around our boys who were out of position at every (non) contest. 

10 minutes ago, Antioch said:

We’ve only had three straight finals exits. And one was by one kick: Viney kicked it straight to a Carlton forward in the forward line for a goal to win the game. 

OMG I've tried to banish that Viney kick from my memory.

If his kick had a bit of elevation and less panic it would've hit a teammate and we had a very open forward line to potentially enable the sealer. The entire side lost the plot in the last quarter and it was a final we should not have lost. The other finals in 2022 and 2023 we were beaten by the better sides on the night, and yes that includes Collingwood. 

22 hours ago, Go Ds said:

Honestly I'm not sure why people want to lock their money away for something like 7 or 8 months on things like premiership and finals betting. I have bet on Melbourne before just a couple of times but I've never been compelled to automatically bet on them for the flag, finals or any particular  game.  I really don't know how many people are like this. I think I've read of one poster here betting on Melbourne to make the 8 and another to win the flag this season. Are there many others on here that always do? I would guess most on here are much keener fans than those among the general public. If most of us don't always bet on the year-long markets it's probably the case that a huge proportion of each supporter base don't either (and token 5 dollar bets are enough to satisfy the ones that do anyway)

I suspect overall the punters that bet in the hundreds or thousands across each round are the main 'formers' of the current markets. I know in horse racing overall the markets are very accurate. It's probably the same with AFL matches too BUT less so with the current finals and flag markets (there's so many extra unknowns over summer). But they wouldn't be way off either and the bookies would be careful about having any team at prices much higher than they should be. Sorry, but a team's prices will be quite different from year to year and Gold Coast or Giants won't always be longer than Collingwood.

Over recent years, our boys have provide some very profitable 'hot-favourite-bet-againsts'! 😄