The spectre of the Neeld era looms large.

The narrative was play these last three games as a finals series. Does this mean we are headed for another straight sets exit?

Great to watch a team that play with dare and know how to dispose of a ball.
We will go nowhere in 2026 with blazing ball butchers in Viney, Oliver and Langdon.
I will also take any player sticking a tackle.

Edited August 16Aug 16 by Lil_red_fire_engine

Reset, come out hard and just win this quarter Dees.

I’m surrounded by hawks in this section. I’m Not enjoying this.

1 minute ago, Dee Zephyr said:

Mad Monday well and truly on our minds. Our last crack was last week.

don’t say that! If we get beaten soundly by the hawks then we beat the pies next week, that could knock them out of the finals! If we can’t make it, I’m happy taking someone else with us. And no better team to drag down with us than the pies! 🤣

well if you have zero gameplan changes and play the same players (whoever thought bringing back May for two irrelevant games a good idea) this is what you get.

Going to cost in a drop in membership

Why play Sharp ahead of Melky? If we had a first round pick l would suggest the whole team are tanking.

Being here at the game tracs putting in for defensive efforts. Maybe the body language talk kicked in from last week.

Also jones was having a chat to Oliver on the boundary being encouraging.

Anyway melksham in our forward line might have been handy now

Trac booking his Red Bull Austria flights at Q time?

They’ve laid down again.

The only people that can hold their head up high right now is he board.

credit to hawks, they are so bloody good ahead of the ball you have to know that Chaplin, the defensive set up is amateur hour

Langdon is past it. He’s been offering nothing for too long now.

Just now, DEE32 said:

The narrative was play these last three games as a finals series. Does this mean we are headed for another straight sets exit?

We compete hard, that's rarely the issue.

It's everything else and always has been. And now that we no longer have a dominant gamplan suited to the list. We are being found out even more.

It's really easy to see what's wrong.

Look at how difficult we make a pickup, a handball, a kick vs Hawthorn.

We have a team who for the 1000th time, all share similar weaknesses. Which is why it's rinse and repeat.

1 minute ago, Lil_red_fire_engine said:

.
We will go nowhere in 2026 with blazing ball butchers in Viney, Oliver and Langdon.
I will also take any player sticking a tackle.

And other senior players who refuse to put their body on the line like Trac.

We are going nowhere with this midfield mix

Petracca, Oliver, Langdon, May, Viney all look terrible. Trac and Oliver don’t even look like they want to be there

A 33 year old in Gunston is showing up almost our whole team

Can Clarry look enthusiastic & lay a tackle?

1 minute ago, BDA said:

I’m surrounded by hawks in this section. I’m Not enjoying this.

They're everywhere aren't they? But who'd blame them when they're going to play finals & they play like this

1 minute ago, Jjrogan said:

The only people that can hold their head up high right now is he board.

credit to hawks, they are so bloody good ahead of the ball you have to know that Chaplin, the defensive set up is amateur hour

Defence is amateur hour because every good offensively minded side know how to play us. They know a turnover is a only moments away so they are super proactive to get on the offensive which creates space, for everyone.

We are the opposite.

Edited August 16Aug 16 by Howard_Grimes

Hawthorn’s skills

Our skills.

Edited August 16Aug 16 by Ethan Tremblay

Already time to start looking for the interesting details inside the game.

So here's mine;

Max Gawn has a curious pattern of gathering a large number of hitouts in the first quarter, particularly in the first 20 minutes or so, and then it tapers to a more reasonable pace for the rest of the game.

I suspect that if his first quarters were his overall rate, he'd be averaging close to 60 hitouts per game.

What strikes me about that is that it is clearly not a matter of fatigue as his other stats tend to pick up the pace later in the game - the around the ground intercepts, marks, and general involvement all push hard.

So here's a challenge for the detailed stats experts - is this a genuine pattern or just a coincidence of a few games I noticed it in? And how does it play out on things like his @WheeloRatings figures? Does Gawn in hitout-mode outrank Gawn in around-the-ground mode?

Good to see Fritter's hair holding up well in the rain. No chance of getting roughed up, though

Geeeez, at this rate we’ll be paying someone to take McVee. Having an awful year by his standards.

Is Kosi injured? Because he looks slow. Slow. Kosi. What the hell?