I am sick of losing to these [censored] pieces of [censored]. I thought I didn't care at this point with the season gone, but losing this after being in a winning position has infuriated me. I genuinely hate them.

Edited August 22Aug 22 by Standard Deviation

2 minutes ago, Nasher said:

our inability to win when we’re in a position to

Not just this year, but goes back to the 2023 finals. Lack of on-field leadership, maturity and cool heads, coupled with too many on the list who are not all that smart with ball in hand and/or understand what they should do but don't have the skills to execute.

People can say all they want about a new coach, but unless we can fix this we're not going very far. Some improvement can come from within through the younger players, but in itself that's not going to be enough.

Clarry is almost back 💪🏻. Great game from him.

2 minutes ago, Bang Bang Bang said:

1 touch and It was dead set the worst handball you’ll ever see too. The guy sucks. Sorry but he does. One of the great mysteries how he keeps getting games.

Looked so out of place on the field when he came on

1 minute ago, Dragon 9 said:

May is not up to it anymore. Trac is disinterested and lacked effort tonight. We lack soul and a bit of mongrel. Clarrie will be better next year and Langdon will be a gun

I must have been watching another game. May made some shocking errors but overall was good. Petracca was everywhere trying to get us over the line in the last. Maybe it looked different on TV for me.

Few here are clearly tired and emotional. Fair enough.

Bucks has a lot to work with here. We are a few tweaks away from being good again. We’ve seen plenty from the young brigade to leave me hopeful after what was obviously a very frustrating season.

Langdon is going to be a star.

Just glad it's over and I can ignore football for 6 months now. I appreciate that the players only lost to a degree that wasn't going to pour more fuel on the fire of how hard it'll be to convince someone to coach us. Shame it's come to this again but such is the MFC.

Some are going to want out...and we must demand compensation based on what they are likely to deliver for their new club (i.e. how much those clubs want them and what they are capable of), not based on what they've produced for us over the last few seasons. We shouldn't be punished by these guys twice.

Edited August 22Aug 22 by rufus

Rivers. Must. Play. Midfield

6 minutes ago, dees189227 said:

OK positives

Langford what a game

Max again just gave everything

Daicos probably didn't get any brownlow votes

We've probably kicked the pies out of top 4

Negatives

1 goal 5 in the final quarter

Rivers blazing away for goal

May, enough said

Again another close loss

Sparrow disappointing

Losing all composure again

Good summation. Bang on.

2 minutes ago, Bates Mate said:

Looked so out of place on the field when he came on

Give me Billings any day.

Horrible last 15 minutes, yet another game chucked away….but peppered with some very promising football at this stage I don’t know if we are a bad good side or a good bad side

We [censored] the bed again. What's new?

On a less emotional note, we seemed unable to adjust once they started kicking straight up the middle. I'd kill for coaches and onfield leadership that can make the adjustment to stop something like this, they kept it going for long enough to overtake out margin, then they tweaked it to be a bit more defensive. We needed to force them wide and slow them down, and couldn't.

This is pretty much what I want most from the incoming coach - teaching the team, or building a team, that can adapt.

Harvey Langford going at 92% for his 26 possessions. We have a superstar on our hands.

Brilliant new idea - supporter free agency

once you’ve done your time supporting a heartbreaking club you get to pick one of the AFL golden children and spend your retirement years enjoying success. 40 years is the cut off (I’m currently at 38 consecutive years of MFC membership) 😂

Jokes but Jesus we are a frustrating club

21 minutes ago, Tom Dyson said:

Guys it isnt all bad, Jeremy Howe got injured!!

That’s a great outcome in my book!

Pity it wasn’t G Healy !

Really disappointing but yet so predictable, we are not a basket case but we have a lot to improve on.

List management is going to be crucial and sadly I don’t really trust the club to get that right.

HL possibly the best first year player I have seen for Melbourne, hope we get a contract extension this offseason for him. Oliver has been improving over the last few weeks and I would be reluctant to trade him this offseason. Definitely others I would be moving before him.

Thank goodness the year is over.

Just now, monoccular said:

Thanks for a bit of positivity.

I hate losing of course, but our games v finalists Footscray and Colonwood showed glimpses of hope with great ball movement. Now we need to tweak skills

Looking forward to a far better 2026 (unless Neeld comes back to coach

1 minute ago, Red But Mostly Blue said:

Yeah we lost and yeah it was in our usual predictable way fizzing out and missing shots and yeah it was against this team that we just can’t beat and yeah we had our chances…

But there were brief glimpses of the team I want to see more of.

2025 can, and will, get right in the bin, but as a diehard Dee, I’m conditioned to look to next year. And I will.

We have a lot of things to fix and some holes to plug. Big holes. But if we start making some good decisions, and work on our basics, we can be right in it again.

I hate those mugs. Must work on knowing how to win and taking chances.

Go dees, bring on 2026

😮🙄)

21 minutes ago, praha said:

Let's look at this game in isolation.

It showed how both Petracca and Oliver are built for high pressure, finals like matches. I am back and forth on whether we keep both. But boy do they love games like this.

Salem, Bowey and May all had good games. May bounced back after a shocking start.

I am super impressed by this performance tonight. We bloody took it to them. Pies had more to play for.

Langford is a gun.

I am bullish on what this squad can do. I hope it doesn't break up too much.

We should be playing finals. We're not.

Reboot. Get a new coach in.

And then do to Collingwood in finals what we did to Geelong in 2021.

Petracca, you have got be kidding.

P$#@ him off

Dumbarse coach should have picked AJ or Kentfield to play forward. So many wasted entries again with Petty useless as usual.

We've been their little bunny rabbits since 2023 and long before that to be honest. No amount of hating the filth or 'that thug Maynard' will change that.

Let's just accept the losers that we are and that if nothing changes, nothing changes.

8 minutes ago, titan_uranus said:

This is what I want to think.

The Demonland consensus pre-game was that we were no chance and going to be belted. They kicked 2 quick early goals and I'm sure the Game Day thread assumed a 10-goal loss was on its way.

So we clearly did well to exceed those expectations (by a lot) and play what was at times really strong football that suggests we ought to be in the top 9, not the bottom 6.

But then of course I see us lose yet another close game. I see us lose yet another fourth quarter. Yet another late lead squandered. 5 behinds in the first three quarters but then 5 behind in the fourth when we just needed someone to find a goal. Pressure goes up and we revert to consistent long kicks to the hot spot over, and over, and over. Gawn tries to do it all himself.

So the fourth quarter was the "perfect" end to this disaster of a season. It encapsulated almost everything that's wrong with us, the more so because it came off the back of 2.5 quarters of really good footy.

Agree with nearly everything said.

Last Qtrs require confidence and our younger brigade need learning .

I reckon Oliver & Petracca have been pretty good the last few weeks. Tracc is getting confidence back in his body and Clarrie is kicking better and LESS bombing. Seems fitter and happier. Provides a good base for next year and bring Rivers (after improving decision making) Langford , Lindsay and Windsor with another pre season under their belts back AND maturing bodies

Feel confident.

JVR puts in, and WILL make a very good player.

We were beaten by a side who are well drilled, experienced and have an extra umpire (the crowd).

I wonder how many posters on this thread and on the game day thread actually at the game. I was. One thing was completely clear, at least after quarter time: there was a very big advantage kicking into the city end. I'm not surprised or ashamed that Collingwood outscored us in the last quarter. What was good was that we were able to use it very much to our advantage in a third quarter. And our effort was unquestionable throughout the game. Some of the extraordinarily rude comments about players are disgraceful from people who would call themselves supporters but very much are not.

3 minutes ago, praha said:

100%. But we are close. I think we need to be really careful with our list decisions because some polish, some refinements turn those six-ish games by less than 10 points into wins. I get the feeling there is a push internally to make changes regarding Oliver and Petracca... I don't know where I sit. We have lost far more close games than we've won... that can turn quickly. We haven't been the same since the 2023 finals series but tonight was as close as we've gotten to that team that year. We have too many guns to be where we are. I just feel like tonight was more a positive than a negative for us.

I get it. I liked a lot of what I saw too.

But I think there's significant danger in the "some polish, some refinements" argument. Just tweaking and hoping the same core group is going to fix the close losses is IMO not right.

We went 0-6 in games decided by less than 10 points this year.

Going back to last year we're now on an 0-9 run in these games, and 3-10 overall. Going back another season it's 7-16, including the two finals in 2023.

This year was the worst year for close losses, but it's not a new problem, and going into 2026 trying to hold onto as much of the 2021 premiership side as we can and tweaking around the edges is IMO likely to lead to too much more of the same.

Look at them celebrating like they’ve won the flag.

Barely could beat 14th, that’s your last win for the year pretenders.