G'day punters. 

There won't be a Demonland pod this week due to the site reboot that has absorbed 99% of the boss' time, energy and focus in the last week (the other 1% was spent with his family, who had started asking each other 'where's pappa Demonland' trying reassure them he hadn't up and left - and yes that's what they call him).

Thanks for all your work skipper, ditto Nasher.

Massive thanks also to Mrs Demonland and Demonland juniors for your patience - pappa will be home soon.

The Demonland pod will return next Monday night at 7:30am to dissect our game against the Giants.

In the next couple of days I'll post in this thread my preview of the match.

7 hours ago, binman said:

where's pappa Demonland

It's hard being a father. So credit given Binners.

We are so often the least in the pecking order.

Footy is the one big refuse we get in today's hectic plethora of demands of bills, car services, lawns mowed, gutters cleaned, tax returns and a growing list of other demands.

But footy really comes into its own when it can be shared with our better halves and our kids and their kids.

How awesome to share our passion of our club with the loves of our lives.

It even makes up for all the losses we take.

 

Edited March 12Mar 12 by leave it to deever

ninefax has a an article about fan podcasts, in which demonland is mentioned (but the deebrief gets the commentary): https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/the-people-behind-football-s-new-media-who-probably-know-more-about-your-club-than-the-experts-20250307-p5lhw7.html

I love the Deebrief ..in fact along with the Demonland podcast I think as supporters we are very lucky…

Interesting that the highlighted quote about The Deebrief focuses on emotions as a highlight.  After a while this is what turned me off their podcast, the banter and emotiveness (think gameday thread).

I now focus solely on the Demonland podcast because of how insightful it is (while still allowing space for some humour and fellow feeling).

SSShhh! Keep it quiet Binman.

We don't want Roost it Far to get wind of this. All hell will break loose. You know what he's like when a training report isn't on time!

Thanks for the update, hope all is well with Field Marshall Demonland

Demonland podcast is my MFCSS spirit animal 

2 hours ago, whatwhat say what said:

Demonland podcast is my MFCSS spirit animal 

As an interstate member, Demonland, and it’s much celebrated Pod, are my lifelines to  the AFL and our beloved Dees.

11 hours ago, whatwhat say what said:

ninefax has a an article about fan podcasts, in which demonland is mentioned (but the deebrief gets the commentary): https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/the-people-behind-football-s-new-media-who-probably-know-more-about-your-club-than-the-experts-20250307-p5lhw7.html

Great Stuff. Those who don’t think this site is dissected by many, just don’t get it 

Binman's match preview:

After another ridiculous OR played in the northern heat and humidity, most of round one has been played in similarly uncomfortable conditions.

But as the rain thumps down here in Melbourne on Sunday, it feels like a proper footy day for the start of the Demons 2025 campaign.

I can't recall feeling as excited, and unsure of what to expect, at the start of a new season for many years.

With the tweaks to our game plan, five players playing their first AFL games, including two mature age players, Sharp making his Demon debut, the weather and the Giants having played already there's any number of factors which makes this a really hard game to get a handle on.

So I'll  just focus on some of the key things exercising my mind.

Weather:

Looking at the radar my best guess is the rain will clear by game time. The MCG drains well, but it's still likely to be slippery.

Tactics 

It's a myth that wet conditions is a leveller in terms of skills - so the giants' superior foot skills means  the weather advantages them on that front.

The weather also really favours the giants in terms of their fleet of small to medium forwards. 

Unfortunately a weakness of ours is covering such players, exacerbated today by no Mcveee.

And we also lack such players in our forward line - and no koz makes that a huge problem for us.

Together those factors present a huge challenge for us.

Our ability to meet that challenge will, in my view, decide our fortunes.

On the plus side there'll be more stoppages, which definitely plays to our strengths - particularly in terms of how many midfield bulls we have. 

Tracc, Clarry, VIney, Langford and Sparrow will love these conditions.  

And with Briggs not playing we have an advantage in the ruck so i expect us to win the clearance battle.

However the key, as always, is not winning the clearance count, but winning the scores from clearances.

Slippery conditions also mean the fast transition game the giants like to play will be harder to implement - kicks become harder to hit, more marks get dropped and those super quick handball chains break down more often.

The conditions mean presure, contest and territory become critical. Even though they are also a strong contest side, that sort of footy is in our DNA.

Look for us to focus on repeat inside-50s, creating stoppages, getting it inside 50 and keeping it there.

Like most coaches, Goodwin backs his system. But I have a feeling that part of the tactical retooling  goody has been working on since the 2024 preseason has been developing different modes of playing, including methods that mitigate the strength of our opponents.

Just like we did against Freo in the practice game, I expect that we'll look to chip the ball around the back half until we can get a good opening up the ground to move the ball.

One, that minimizes turnovers, because we're not being territory for territory's sake and blindly dumping it down the line

Two, it keeps it out of their hands, and it means that they're less able to get it on the outside and use their relative leg speed advantage to hurt us.

I'm really fascinated by our defensive system and it seems this is a real work in progress.

Two preseason games is a small sample size, but tactically i see this year as an extension of last year, not a completely new model.

We are still using a zone defence of course but not setting our anchor defender as deep as we did in 2020-2023. 

And we seem to be pushing our defensive line up higher (as is now standard). Though as evidence of goody using different modes in different circumstances it seems how aggressive we press up is circumstance dependent.

I think with the conditions, and their leg speed and ability to transition, whilst we'll be looking to trap it in our front half our press won't be overly aggressive and like he did against freo, May will play pretty deep as the anchor (with Petty helping out).

Key stats

For us to win I think we'll need a positive differential in the following stats:

Pressure - the most important stat in football. Only the pies in 2023 regularly won games with a negative pressure differential

Scores from turnover - killed us last year. We simply can't afford to lose that stat.

Scores from stoppages - we simply have to take advantage of our likely clearance dominance

Scores from defensive half - the giants smashed the pies for this syar last week. We can't let that happen today.

Uncontested marks - we can't let the giants pull us apart with heaps of uncontested marks. 

Tackles inside D50 - will be critical on today's conditions.

Telstra tracker - fitness is critical. There is a paucity of data that can help evidence fitness. The best is top 5 distances covered, repeat sprints and speed. When at our fittest we dominate these numbers.

Accuracy - need I say more?

Prediction

As always, my heart says the dees.

But my head says the Giants are the more probable winner. 

But hope springs external and I can't wait to watch the mighty dees smash in tgis afternoon.

Go redlegs.

Edited March 16Mar 16 by binman

Great summary as always Binman. I think GWS will be up there at the pointy end of the season so a win is hard to envisage even for the optimistic like yourself.

Beyond the win/loss result of today's match I do hope the debutants show something and they are not 1. Overawed or 2. Injured. If we see positive signs from the youngsters in the team that will be enough when we are "building into the season" as Goody says. Go Dees

 

On 13/03/2025 at 06:32, DeelightfulPlay said:

Interesting that the highlighted quote about The Deebrief focuses on emotions as a highlight.  After a while this is what turned me off their podcast, the banter and emotiveness (think gameday thread).

I now focus solely on the Demonland podcast because of how insightful it is (while still allowing space for some humour and fellow feeling).

Turned it off after 10 mins this week, when one of the guests was saying Blake Howes should go nowhere near a football field again, calling him an athlete not a footballer, writing the kid off completely. Hate that type of emotional "analysis" and feel 2nd hand embarrassment that while they get great guests provided from the club, they simultaenously do a lot of [censored]-canning of our fringe players throughout the year via "banter"

Edited March 18Mar 18 by John Demonic

1 hour ago, John Demonic said:

Turned it off after 10 mins this week, when one of the guests was saying Blake Howes should go nowhere near a football field again, calling him an athlete not a footballer, writing the kid off completely. Hate that type of emotional "analysis" and feel 2nd hand embarrassment that while they get great guests provided from the club, they simultaenously do a lot of [censored]-canning of our fringe players throughout the year via "banter"

Ever since I first started going to the footy regularly (11 year old, mostly by myself coz no one was into footy in my family and no one I knew barracked for the dees) I've really hated it when fans (dees and opponents) slag off players in their own team at games (and I'm no fan of slagging of of oppo players either).

Still hate it  - particularly at games but also in other contexts., like on footy forums or social media.

1 hour ago, John Demonic said:

Turned it off after 10 mins this week, when one of the guests was saying Blake Howes should go nowhere near a football field again, calling him an athlete not a footballer, writing the kid off completely. Hate that type of emotional "analysis" and feel 2nd hand embarrassment that while they get great guests provided from the club, they simultaenously do a lot of [censored]-canning of our fringe players throughout the year via "banter"

Yes, it is a bit embarrassing!  I like a laugh but find the banter often involves punching down and I'm not interested in that, especially as a fan.  Some of the interviews are good, as there's camaraderie with less banter - and I find the AFLW Deebrief pod is more measured and analysis driven. 

Some of the emotion works, when it occurs in a poignant manner, such as when talking about Gus' retirement.  But the ladsy stuff is not my cup of tea

1 minute ago, binman said:

Ever since I first started going to the footy regularly (11 year old, mostly by myself coz no one was into footy in my family and no one I knew barracked for the dees) I've really hated it when fans (dees and opponents) slag off players in their own team at games (and I'm no fan of slagging of of oppo players either).

Still hate it  - particularly at games but also in other contexts., like on footy forums or social media.

Completely - I can't watch footy at the G with my mum because she's very passionate but becomes overwhelming negative about our players (intense MFCSS strikes).  She's fine in front of a TV though haha