Lot of optimism in this thread.

Hoping it's justified

28 minutes ago, leave it to deever said:

I definitely think Swans are underrated.

Much like us, their best on a given day is good enough to knock off the top teams.

So this will be a tough one . As good as Melksham was, we can't rely on him every week to boot four goals. And I'm guessing Fritta will be Sub but will come in much earlier this time.

Swans have several Frittas so to speak,that in form can all win a game off their own boot so here's hoping all our defenders are in top form.

Agree, and they love to play us on the G as well.

We are not in any state to be approaching any games with complacency. But I certainly think it would be misplaced here, and I have seen enough losses to them, at the G, to know how quickly it can turn against us.

We just need to keep up the belief and confidence, and bring the 4-qtr pressure that we brought against the Lions.

35 minutes ago, picket fence said:

On occasions I have been critical of his disposal, but in the weeks leading up to his concussion he was very good. I am convinced that he is pivotal to the side and he would be a definite in if fit. Unequivically he would play before Spargo!

Agreed that Viney always goes before Spargo but I think with Spargo( I'm not calling you out) not a few lately on this site have been giving him too much grief.

Aside from being out of commission via injuries for a long time he still offers a lot.

He works very hard and while some may sarcastically attribute the space he frequently "finds" himself in towards not running enough, it is in fact the very opposite

The possessions he does accumulate are often from him traversing a lot of distance to make himself free. And he's often been a good link up from chb to a little north of the middle.

I would like him closer to the goals more often as kicking beyond 35 m accurately isn't really in his bag of tricks.

But he's one of our hard workers and given his size and injuries, does very well in my humble estimation.

10 hours ago, whatwhat say what said:

helmets do nothing to protect against concussion unfortunately

This is an interesting argument WSY.

Do helmets mitigate the damage? All reports that I have read seem to support your notion, however logic suggests that a helmet would help to reduce severity.

I for one would prefer to be wearing a helmet if kneed in the head. Would it stop concussion? Possibly not, but it seems absurd to think that it could not limit severity.

Edited 7 hours ago7 hr by ManDee
Left a word out

1 minute ago, leave it to deever said:

Agreed that Viney always goes before Spargo but I think with Spargo( I'm not calling you out) not a few lately on this site have been giving him too much grief.

He's definitely in the crosshairs on here. I'm sure our wobbly start hasn't helped.

Without being mean to the fella as I do appreciate him, he's a victim of his (AFL) averageness. He's a solid player with no real explosive traits, so he comes an easy target.

He does need more goals though, can remember Chin copping a lot of flack on here in the past and he's turned people around, so there is hope for the Spargoat.

55 minutes ago, picket fence said:

On occasions I have been critical of his disposal, but in the weeks leading up to his concussion he was very good. I am convinced that he is pivotal to the side and he would be a definite in if fit. Unequivically he would play before Spargo!

They don't at all play the same roles, so then you get imbalance in the side.

9 minutes ago, roy11 said:

He's definitely in the crosshairs on here. I'm sure our wobbly start hasn't helped.

Without being mean to the fella as I do appreciate him, he's a victim of his (AFL) averageness. He's a solid player with no real explosive traits, so he comes an easy target.

He does need more goals though, can remember Chin copping a lot of flack on here in the past and he's turned people around, so there is hope for the Spargoat.

Thanks Roy11. Chin has had a good season. But he had definitely struggled to maintain consistency after an often very good start to every year . At time showing some super star skills. I've lowered my expectations since.

But 's good to seem him playing better more frequently.

But I don't think we should forget how good Spargo was in 21 and not underrate how being injured for so long would have impacted his present form. If ( Spargo,) got back to 80 percent of his best he would be an inclusion every game. ( Here come the critics😀).

I would like to see him play in the middle for a trial. He doesn't lack courage and a difficult player to tackle. Other than that to keep him in the forward pocket or a capacity to be that sneaky goalsneak that he is.

I hope he sticks it up a lot of his naysayers here.

Totally off subject....but while speaking of critics, I thought Oliver was good v the Lions. Watching the replay without the alcohol and nerves you notice seemingly small things that players do, that make a big difference. I thought Oliver did a lot of these.

19 hours ago, Watson11 said:

Agree. Not sure how anyone thinks he is a poor kick. Spargo is not back to his 2018-23 kicking level yet but he will get there. His kicking is as good as anyone playing in the forward half. His career goal average is 0.6 v Miers at 0.7. Miers has spent 17% more time on ground in his career as well. He needs more kicks but maybe we just need to accept he will be 7 kicks a game and they will be impactful. As long as he combines that with pressure he shouldn’t be dropped.

Rankine and Hill don't play the same role as Spargo. Miers is the only accurate comparison and he's an amazing player, much better than Spargo. His ability to find the ball and hit a difficult target is great, if we had him we'd be a much better team.

Edited 7 hours ago7 hr by old55

Our record against the Swans since 2021 is WLLWWL or 3-3. The win in Round 3 2023 (JVR's debut) was excellent. Sydney had come off two huge wins and looked angry and ready to atone for the 2022 GF. I loved May's huge tackle on Warner on the MCC wing in the third!

18 hours ago, Demonstone said:

My Captain sent me to see Private Parts who referred me up the chain to Corporal Punishment and I eventually ended up with a Major Headache.

Where's General Soreness? Gone AWOL?

45 minutes ago, ManDee said:

it seems absurd to think that it could not limit severity

But true. Concussion is a function of brain movement within the skull. Sloshing trauma, so to speak. External devices, hard or soft, do precisely NOTHING to influence this effect. In truth, studies show they can create a detrimental level of false confidence. As to the external head (skin and skull), headwear can obviously diminish likelihood of lacerations and fractures, so a hard helmet on a bike (any version) is a no-brainer, pun intended. None of the above is contestable in evidential science.

51 minutes ago, ManDee said:

This is an interesting argument WSY.

Do helmets mitigate the damage? All reports that I have read seem to support your notion, however logic suggests that a helmet would help to reduce severity.

I for one would prefer to be wearing a helmet if kneed in the head. Would it stop concussion? Possibly not, but it seems absurd to think that it could not limit severity.

Helmets certainly reduce the risk of skull fracture, but don’t reduce inertia, which is the cause of concussion (the brain moving inside the skull).

21 minutes ago, Mel Bourne said:

Helmets certainly reduce the risk of skull fracture, but don’t reduce inertia, which is the cause of concussion (the brain moving inside the skull).

All true. But if a helmet was a 2 metres long 'spring', wouldn't that dissipate the momentum and energy of a blow to other parts of the body?

If so (?), I wonder if it would be possible (with some yet to be discovered high tech material) to reduce the size of the 'spring' to a manageable size?

Edited 6 hours ago6 hr by sue

3 minutes ago, Webber said:

But true. Concussion is a function of brain movement within the skull. Sloshing trauma, so to speak. External devices, hard or soft, do precisely NOTHING to influence this effect. In truth, studies show they can create a detrimental level of false confidence. As to the external head (skin and skull), headwear can obviously diminish likelihood of lacerations and fractures, so a hard helmet on a bike (any version) is a no-brainer, pun intended. None of the above is contestable in evidential science.

As i understand it, there us a huge body of research on the role helmets play in concussion because of their use in gridiron.

Different sport, and obviously much greater risk of concussion because they are using helmets to literally ram in to opponents also wearing helmets.

So of course the helmets give players a totally false sense of security because whilst as you note they protect from say fractures they do nothing for the real danger- the sloshing of the brain inside the skull.

In fact because the helmets are hard shelled they likely do more damage because they don't absorb any of the impact of collisions, in fact the opposite is true. And the amplify the impact of the whiplash effect of hitting the ground (becausevthey have no give), which is where a huge amount of the concussion damage is dome in NFL (and AFL)

I wonder if the sort of helmet worn in AFL footy is slightly better in that regard (though not in terms of providing false confidence) as they are padded and so perhaps absorb a little of the contact, minimising, albeit not much, the slosh effect.

Which is the principle of where they are heading in the states with the design of gridiron iron helmets. Which is helmets that have a sort of absorbent egg carton style material padding on them (and also have smart tech that measure impact and provide real time data to support doctor's assessment of concussion).

I watched a doc on netflix about Brett favre ladt night Total [censored] hole. But of course deified as one of the greatest NFL quarter backs. He has recently diagnosed with Parkinsons. He would have taken thousands of huge hits to the heads, and countless whiplash incident when being driven into the ground.

But that's nothing compated to the number of such events offensive and defensive linesmen suffer.

Unless they sort the Its hard to see how NFL continues in say 20 years. Not because of the morap aspect of the obvious link to cte etc. But because of the financial implications of being sued.

There is already a huge number of retired NFL players with CTE. Imaginehow many more there will be in 20 years given, like all eliye sports, players now are exponentially faster stronger (and therefore are hitting each other at greater velocity) than 20 years ago.

1 hour ago, Diamond_Jim said:

Lot of optimism in this thread.

Hoping it's justified

I agree.. looks to me a very even matchup.

Odds ought to be 1.90 each imo

26 minutes ago, binman said:

I watched a doc on netflix about Brett favre ladt night Total [censored] hole. But of course deified as one of the greatest NFL quarter backs. He has recently diagnosed with Parkinsons. He would have taken thousands of huge hits to the heads, and countless whiplash incident when being driven into the ground.

But that's nothing compated to the number of such events offensive and defensive linesmen suffer.

Unless they sort the Its hard to see how NFL continues in say 20 years. Not because of the morap aspect of the obvious link to cte etc. But because of the financial implications of being sued.

There is already a huge number of retired NFL players with CTE. Imaginehow many more there will be in 20 years given, like all eliye sports, players now are exponentially faster stronger (and therefore are hitting each other at greater velocity) than 20 years ago.

Yeah, my family has had Packers season tickets since the 60s and Brett Favre has been an [censored] for years but the CTE is certainly making it worse.

My non-evidence based take as someone who grew up around and played American football as a lineman is that the hard helmets can and often do make things worse via a false sense of security and the brutal impact that one hard helmet has when it hits another. Some players in the NFL have started wearing an additional soft “guardian cap” on top of the helmet which looks an awful lot like the soft helmets used in AFL and NRL.

The NFL, of course, does not really care about player safety and has been working to protect itself from these lawsuits for years. But at the same time, there is only so much you can do in a sport where the objective is to repeatedly line up and crash into each other at full speed.

Swans have a big injury list but are underrated I feel. Think this will be a close game and hoping we can control contest and get up!

3 hours ago, leave it to deever said:

Good point re Kozzie Dd.

For me KP is there to gather possessions and boot his usual goal contribution and it's always about the opposition keeping up with him.

3 hours ago, leave it to deever said:

Agreed that Viney always goes before Spargo but I think with Spargo( I'm not calling you out) not a few lately on this site have been giving him too much grief.

Aside from being out of commission via injuries for a long time he still offers a lot.

He works very hard and while some may sarcastically attribute the space he frequently "finds" himself in towards not running enough, it is in fact the very opposite

The possessions he does accumulate are often from him traversing a lot of distance to make himself free. And he's often been a good link up from chb to a little north of the middle.

I would like him closer to the goals more often as kicking beyond 35 m accurately isn't really in his bag of tricks.

But he's one of our hard workers and given his size and injuries, does very well in my humble estimation.

Any AFL player that can t kick much beyond 35 metres is a liability and should not be playing at this level!

45 minutes ago, Lord Travis said:

Swans have a big injury list but are underrated I feel. Think this will be a close game and hoping we can control contest and get up!

Sydney are never easy to beat. For mine it could go two ways, a really tight hard fought game that could go either way or we really start to click as a team, dominate forward half and win comfortably. I’ll take any win.

50 minutes ago, Disco InTurno said:

Yeah, my family has had Packers season tickets since the 60s and Brett Favre has been an [censored] for years but the CTE is certainly making it worse.

My non-evidence based take as someone who grew up around and played American football as a lineman is that the hard helmets can and often do make things worse via a false sense of security and the brutal impact that one hard helmet has when it hits another. Some players in the NFL have started wearing an additional soft “guardian cap” on top of the helmet which looks an awful lot like the soft helmets used in AFL and NRL.

The NFL, of course, does not really care about player safety and has been working to protect itself from these lawsuits for years. But at the same time, there is only so much you can do in a sport where the objective is to repeatedly line up and crash into each other at full speed.

It reallyis an incredibly brutal sport.

I read somewhere that a linesmen who gets to the NFL, before even playing an NFL game, is likely to have had as many as 30, 000 head knocks during their high school.snd college careers (that's to say whilst the brain is still developing in the critical 12-21 year old range).

Frightening.

By the by the favre doc provides an fascinating insight into how fanatic green bay packer fans are and how important team is to Wisconsin. There was a bit about the response from many fans to favre joining the arch enemies, the Minnesota Vikings - pretty full on.

Do you still livein the states? If yes, do you go to nfl games regularly?

19oC and Sunny on Sunday!!

Bring it on

Just now, picket fence said:

Any AFL player that can t kick much beyond 35 metres is a liability and should not be playing at this level!

Sheesh, I love your passion PF but my goodness your a hard taskmaster at times. It's something he needs to improve and can....look at how far Kozzie can launch them. But for me he brings other skills that not only compensate for this defficiency (and granted, it is there), that warrant his inclusion as much as anyone.

We tolerate Max and Traccas awful set shots and sure Spargo isn't in their class, but he's a solid player especially given his size, that will find his previous form that helped secure us a flag in 21. And yea by no means the biggest contributor to that, he played a very decent part. All year in fact.

Kicking more goals than all but five others for that season and many of them at pivotal moments. So there's that.

16 minutes ago, Demon Dynasty said:

Thanks D.D.

I think.

#Demonlandadmin, can we please bring back the thinking emoji?

13 minutes ago, leave it to deever said:

Sheesh, I love your passion PF but my goodness your a hard taskmaster at times. It's something he needs to improve and can....look at how far Kozzie can launch them. But for me he brings other skills that not only compensate for this defficiency (and granted, it is there), that warrant his inclusion as much as anyone.

We tolerate Max and Traccas awful set shots and sure Spargo isn't in their class, but he's a solid player especially given his size, that will find his previous form that helped secure us a flag in 21. And yea by no means the biggest contributor to that, he played a very decent part. All year in fact.

Kicking more goals than all but five others for that season and many of them at pivotal moments. So there's that.

Fair enough, piont made!