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Has re-signed apparently. Manager flew to Melbourne to officially sign off. Rumours he will announce on Gus and gawny which is hilarious. I’ve now seen multiple people I trust hearing this so very confident

Meeting with Essendon will make any player re-sign with their club.

To add to this, hearing it’s either 5 or 6 years

The Doggies game was an interesting tactically because a few clear tactics were deployed by the Doggies which were the cumulative effort of a number of teams studying our tape. What was clear was that this was a departure from the usual Doggies game plan (although there midfield emphasis was still there) - so it was not as some pundits like to say "them backing in their system against ours". What becamb e clear is that our system is not perfect (which is of course impossible) - and that there are certain tradeoffs that necessarily exist, which the Doggies were able to target. Here's what I picked up, but I'd be interested in what other DL'ers (especially those at the ground) were able to glean. 1. Targeting Gawn down the line, in D50, F50: a work on for our heroic leader is his body language when under adversity. It must be deflating to not have free kicks called in your favour week after week, but it helps noones case to "plead" with the umpires as if they'll change their decision. It is also a poor leadership example for other players. The Doggies clearly targeted Max with blocking, holding and chopping at the three critical points Max tries to insert himself. In the hole, down the line, and drifting forward. Bontempelli in one hillarious example just straight up pushed Max over, while English was only penalised once for the holding, and pulling on shoulders that happened to Max all game. Some DL'ers will remember what Port Adelaide did to Max in Rd 1 2019 - and this remains a weakness for him. Either we start blocking for Max, or we watch his contested marking potency reduce. 2. Sharking the first handball: teams have worked out that Melbourne's midfield is searching for "clean" exits from stoppage - in particular out the front. The Doggies sat off Melb midfielders - and waited for the handball rather than be drawn into making the tackle and therefore creating the space. This removes Petracca and Oliver's strength in being able to offload through tackles and create outnumbers and "negative space" outside the contest. Put another way, by clogging the outer ring of the stoppage with bodies, rather than creating a "nucleus" effect, you negate our ability to exit clean from stoppage. 3. Low hard bullet kicks - the Doggies have the players to try it and the reality is it worked. If it didn't come off it created a 50/50 groundball which they were able to split. If it did it reduced our ability to have third man up, and or use our zone to create intercept opportunities. In the absence of turnover on HB, we were deprived of one of our main scoring avenues. 4. Play fast and draw Melbourne into shooutout open styles, including switching the play to "open" the corridor. Hawthorn first showed that by taking us on through the middle, you can "draw" in our zone to the centred focal point of the corridor, then creating space behind it at the edge of F50, or in more dangerous areas. The constant switching forces the hard running Melbourne players to work laterally and (because they are zoned off players) to naturally give up a corridor advantage to the fat-side of their opponent player. Bailey Dale was able to exploit this "zone" of offence on a number of occasions, and once it was centred - the Doggies were able to get deep entries into f50, and win territory. 5. Exiting d50 - our predictable exit strategy out of d50 is well and truly worked out now. As people note, predictability is not necessarily a bad thing. However, it's becoming clear that what we are really lacking is run off HB when exiting d50. Our HB line and FB line if full of very good field kicks (May brainfades excluded) - but if point 1. is not working (ie contested potenncy down the line is reduced) we should have a second method of exiting d50. If you study the way the Dogs transition from d50 to midfield and then into f50, this should provide a template for the way that the Dees can switch strategically. Run and carry from this part of the ground, may prevent defences sitting goalside of the contest down the line - attempting to create a re-entry. Ofc this will not happen (Hunt/Baker) these sort of players aren't in our squad and we prefer to maintain a structured defence - and let the ball do the hard work travelling up field.

I yelled at him to sign the contract when he was running to the interchange in the last quarter on Saturday night. That obviously tipped him over. You’re all very welcome.

Not sure if already posted by another else but word is getting around that brayshaw is all but signed on. No idea of details but someone I trust is very confident and a few people have heard the same thing.

A more important signing for me than Jackson. Make it happen already!

To be announced in the lead in to the Freo game? That would be hilarious.

Absolute rubbish. Like the complacency he showed in the 3rd qtr of last year's GF?

Some of the commentary on this thread is ridiculous. Half way through the third quarter in the GF, WTF is Hayden Young going to do? Nothing. Jackson was instrumental in the most powerful 15 minutes of football perhaps ever witnessed. That's why Freo are going all out. Anyone stupid enough now to be going, oh we should have drafted Hayden Young (who's basically only cemented his place in Freo's side this year), is kidding themselves. Jackson was the right selection every day of the week. Just because you can't handle the thought of him leaving doesn't mean you have to post nonsense. Is what Freo are planning on paying him ridiculous? Of course it is, but Luke will become a very good player and is no more inconsistent than most of our team (aside from probably Oliver) given the position he plays. It's time we got a little perspective in this thread.

There is NO way JV ignored an option to LJ because he’s leaving for Freo. Viney wants MFC to win more than anything. May and Brayshaw in robust discussion was totally fine. Brayshaw was first to May to console him after his clanger intercepted by Bont. There's no evidence of endemic cultural issues. We've got a envied culture.

Our system holds up very, very well if the players have the fitness base to execute on it. Interesting to note that if they blew the siren at 3/4 time over the last 8 rounds we’d have lost 2 games for the entire season. Not to turn every topic into a discussion about training loads - but in my opinion it proves we haven’t been ‘worked out’, we are being ‘out worked’ late in games.

Here's the rough map of how I think our loads could have looked using the 10 Percent Rule, which is the rule of thumb for improving running milage. This method is all about increasing milage (and therefore fitness) without risking injury. Like many rule of thumbs, there is a lot of conjecture about this one, especially that is is too conservative for experienced and elite runners (which AFL players would be), but it is still a useful principle to look at the method athletes use to increase performance. Round 1 to 9 (WCE) on May 15th we were in maintenance phase at whatever level was reached after our shortened preseason, with minimal (if any) increase in load. Round 10 to 13 (NMFC, Freo, Syd, Coll) - the first phase of the build, incrementally increasing the training load by 10% each week. If 100% is our maintenance week load, we would have gone 110%, 121%, 133% then 146% in the week before the Collingwood game. 9 day break with the BYE Round - Recovery phase, so reduce training amount by two-thirds of previous week, meaning we are back to 98%. Come out looking the freshest we have looked for many weeks against Brisbane. Round 16 to 19 (Adel, Cats, Port, Dogs) - Back to loading, starting with a 10% increase from our previous load week (146%) so it is 161%, 177%, 195% then 214% of our original maintence training load. Round 20, reovery week, so back down to 144%, which because of the work done over the previous 9 weeks, the players can now manage easily, meaning we come out looking fresh against Freo. Hopefully. Round 21 onwards - back to a maintenance program, which could be at the 214% level, or they might hold at a lower level given they want to maintain "peak" for 8 weeks. All of this is load is monitored using GPS (recording distance and intensity of milage), plus other metrics that ensure the individuals are reaching but not exceeding the desired fatigue levels. Using GPS monitoring in games and at training means they can better handle loads despite varied length of breaks between games etc. If the increased load AFL players can safely manage is actually say 15%, the peak week of the program outlined above would be 306% of the original starting load, which is incredible.

From a pure sports science point of view it would makes sense that our training loads would be higher this year than last for two reasons: - the same stimulus applied twice doesn’t have the same effect the second time around as the body will be starting from a higher base than when exposed the first time. As such the body is more efficient in coping with the stress and doesn’t adapt to the same degree. At the same time it can cope with more work because of said efficiency so… - applying a higher load is possible which would not have been achievable the first time round. It’s called progressive overload and used across all sports in some way shape or form so it would makes sense they have done more this year than last

Appreciate you sharing your intel mate, please don't be deterred by a doubter. Yourself and posters like @Demon3 and @goodwindees (among others) are half the reason I keep coming back everyday to hopefully get some insight into all things Melbourne. Shame about Jackson but the writing has been on the wall for a while now. Simply must get the best compensation possible. Silver lining is getting the opportunity to access high end draft talent and salary cap space to go after a quality free agent in the next year or two.

To keep everyone updated, Kalani White is currently representing Queensland in the under 15's National AFL Championships here in Lavington. The Queensland team played their first game against Victoria which Kalani played in and had another game against today against ACT. I was hoping to head down to the 1pm game today to watch but couldn't get out of a work meeting. Lavi is only a 10 minute drive from my area so I'm hoping to head down on Wednesday to watch against South Australia in the 10am game.

Not as much as we laugh at them

My understanding is that so far he's shown to be a high end talent. Still a lot of water to go under the bridge until draft time, but from what one our development coaches told me today (Murray Bushrangers), he played a pretty impressive game yesterday in the ruck and was jumping all over his opponent in the ruck.

It's an interesting one with Weid as he's clearly a bit of a whipping boy and posters on here are still having a go. While he didn't impact the game across four quarters, none of our players really did. A bit of perspective on his output might re-align expectations. He kicked 3 goals, and if he replicated his game on the weekend every week he'd win the Coleman. I'm not saying he's a superstar or had a brilliant game, but his output was decent in the scheme of things and he shouldn't be singled out from the Bulldogs match. He had a few team mates far more deserving of such focused criticism (Jackson, Harmes, Spargo to name a few).

This is the signing that matters.

Zero tackles inside 50 was the result of two things. The first is actually a positive, we were very very efficient last night when going inside 50 until late in the game. Our efficiency is what kept us ahead for most of the match, as we weren’t winning key stats. Every time we went inside 50 we were scoring. The Dogs were nearly +20 inside 50s, yet behind on the scoreboard due to our efficiency. Hard to lay a tackle when you’re scoring so well. The second is a negative, and it’s our smalls pushing further up the ground and becoming ineffective. Guys like Spargo and Nibbler were all the way up into defense at times, which meant they’re not laying tackles inside 50 or creating scoring opportunities. Kozzie was just plain ineffective last night. The balance of our gamestyle is off at present. We’re struggling to defend as well as we have previously, yet have players pushed further up the ground getting caught in no man’s land. The coaches need to address our structures and shape as we’re coming apart when under pressure. IMO Brayshaw back to defensive wing role would help. As good as he’s been down back, the team was better balanced when we had another defender like Hunt to lock down on smaller types. Gus when playing wing covered the corridor really well and teams would actively avoid going up the middle or his wing as he would intercept. In essence his presence forced them to one side of the ground and enabled us to setup behind play to counter that. Back on Weid, he did his bit last night and was not one of the problems or reasons we lost. 3 goals and a presence most of the night. Decent game from Weid.

Very sorry to see him go. On the positive side, he leaves a nice kitty in our salary cap to entice other players and help keep a few we might otherwise lose. I'm glad a decision is made now, it gives the club more time and certainty to fill our list gaps/needs.

He also set up a couple of scoring opportunities, one which Max fluffed & the other which Melksham converted after a 50m penalty. Weid was far from the problem on Saturday.

Would be a great start to a 7 game winning run for us.

Well I am regardless, these croissants and array of cheeses aren't going to eat themselves!

We'll be fine. And will be better in the long run. I want to stay up the top for a while, not be a flash in the pan side. More high end young talent and some ammo for aggressive targeting of players. Trac and Oliver are only scratching the surface.

We were a rubbish team with nothing to lose back then. We are in flag contention this year and Jackson, while not in great form currently, is an important part of our side and structure. Not to mention he gives Gawn a much needed chop out. I don’t want Gawn dead in September. Dropping him for petulant reasons could cost us a flag. So no thanks.

Votes: 8 Jamarra Ugle-Hagan (WB) 8 Marcus Bontempelli (WB) 5 Steven May (MELB) 4 Adam Treloar (WB) 2 Ryan Gardner (WB) 2 Clayton Oliver (MELB) 1 Ed Richards (WB) Amazing that Oliver, with one hand received votes! Brave as they come. Coach Split: 5/3 Ugle-Hagan, Bontempelli 4/1 May 4/0 Treloar 2/0 Gardner, Oliver 1/0 Richards Good to see May in the votes from both coaches. So much for the DL who thought he had a bad game. Just shows how differently coaches and fans see players. Leaderboard: 86 Clayton Oliver (MELB) 80 Touk Miller (GCFC) 78 Lachie Neale (BL) 75 Christian Petracca (MELB) 72 Andrew Brayshaw (FRE) 71 Patrick Cripps (CARL) 68 Connor Rozee (PORT) 67 Jeremy Cameron (GEEL) 56 Callum Mills (SYD) 54 Sam Walsh (CARL) 53 Hugh McCluggage (BL) 50 Charlie Curnow (CARL) 48 James Sicily (HAW) 48 Chad Warner (SYD) 46 Peter Wright (ESS) 45 Jack Crisp (COLL) 45 Jack Sinclair vSTK) 44 Taylor Walker (ADEL) Clarrie still on top despite a week out and playing injured this week.

Leave it to you to inject some humour about Essendon. Pretty dank.

Gees the people potting Goodwin have short term memories. If you can’t possibly cast your gold fish mind back 300 odd days to when we won the flag just take a look at the ladder and see we are second in a competition of 18. Its embarrassing some of the rubbish people spout around here. I’m embarrassed for you, and I once brought a Rick Astley album - so I know about shame.

The club or player won’t announce it until seasons end and as an interested supporter as many others are, I got the mail and was happy to pass it on. I had mentioned already that official was probably the wrong word used but I’ll choose how much info I pass on.

Thank you for pointing this out, saved me the trouble. I just shake my head at some of the drivel posted on here.

Just a side note, young Kalani gets involved on multiple Melbourne Demons Instagram pages and gets stuck into trolls bagging the club. It’s brilliant to see he is passionate and loves the MFC

To be honest I don't mind him playing even if the club knew he was going home. The bigger issue is that he's actually out of form and not really having that much of an impact. The club won't drop him due to form but the entire second half he only had 2 disposals. Disposals isn't everything with him but he was one of many who failed to stand up when we needed him too.

I wanted to say I am a firm believer in the loading and how it affects high octane athletes. I did some reading on how it is utilised in Soccer and other sports and the "fatigue" is a significant side effect during the "adaptation phase" that can not be understated and can have significant short term ramifications on performance. Not only fatigue was mentioned but also impaired decision-making, lack of skills and mental confidence i.e. fumbling as a short term negative side effect. All have been abundantly obvious within our playing group as of late. I have a question. Why were we able to beat WB and Bris in rounds 11 and 12 last year but were already appearing to be completely gassed at the same time this year against Freo and Sydney? - Is it possible we started earlier this season? and if so why haven't we started tapering earlier, imo we may have added an additional 2 weeks of training as it was so evident how much of an advantage superior fitness was last year. I only honestly have a hard time doubting any of our elite coaches and fitness staff (proving their competence last year by winning a flag) that they haven't taken everything into consideration and tried to prepare our players' fitness to the utmost level to go back to back. All the talk about us being figured out is nonsense, our gameplan is absolute finals footy and bullet proof if executed correctly. It was talked about so much "we want to do it in front of our fans", "we want to achieve sustained success". If we are truly falling off a cliff as many on here are saying than I'd have to admit those were just words and no action by the FD. I highly doubt it though, there's something brewing. Anywho I think this discussion can be put to rest by the end result of Friday nights game (or at latest the game after....) If (the way I think we will) we come out firing like we did against Brisbane in round 15 and absolutely run on top of the ground the one's who know will know. I believe the reason for your performance against Brisbane was that we had a short taper between loading phases. I actually can't wait for Friday as it will give us clarity on where we actually stand and can assess the state of our game properly.

They can with AFL permission - which would be almost a foregone conclusion.

So nobody I care about then? 😂

I think it's reasonable for mo to give some vague info this way. He has told us that it isn't an issue with our club. Indicating it's not a player rift, a coaching argument, poor facilities, poor offer from us, etc. It's good info to share to us. It's something personal for the player that mo knows and says he won't share. Which sounds pretty reasonable.

Weird because I told Jackson "Please don't go" and he now appears more likely to leave than he did before the weekend.

Mel and Steve won’t be happy, considering they just bought a house in Melbourne.

Won’t do it again but unfortunately for him, I said it first.

May Destroyed Naughton and had his best game since returning to the side post fight. Bad turnover yes, but Angus cost us more with poor turnovers.

Don't get much from anyone else these days.

Matty Lloyd just highlights two or three things that went wrong. For most of the game we did things pretty right. He could have easily had picked some mistakes the Bulldogs made earlier as well. Its all perspective. He lost me when he said Brayshaw was just just outside waiting for the easy ball (as he does) As he does???? Brayshaw is probably one the most courageous players in the whole comp!

Rapt.......an abbreviation of rapture, as in " I'm rapt!" Wrapped.....enclosed within., as in "wrapped up a parcel". Rapped....knocking, as in " rapped on the on door"

Agree 100% with this. We have had a taste of the sweet sweet nectar of smashing teams and winning it all and want more and more. As a few have mentioned in this thread also, we were absolutely blessed last year with the continuity around having our best 22 on the park - especially at the pointy end. If Lever played, I have no doubt we would have won Saturday night. Just as I feel we would have beaten the Pies if May was available. Just like all teams, you can't replace your out and out stars and it's always going to hurt when they're unavailable.

More conjecture of course, but I've often thought about this point. Loading in season is rarely executed exactly as the fitness boss would like as there are so many non-fitness goals that also come into play. One of them is team psychology and the ever elusive "belief". I think last year our team needed to prove itself against the best to cement the belief that would have been growing after the first 9 rounds. So I think despite the games you mentioned being right in the middle of the pre-bye loading phase, we perhaps deviated from the ideal training loads in those weeks to give ourselves the best shot of winning. So at that particular period of the MFC journey, the need to cement belief within the playing group trumped the need to perfectly nail the loading. Steps would have been taken to minimise the long term effect of that deviation, but it was still deviation. This year, as reigning premiers, the belief is there, and although no professional athlete or orgnisation likes to lose, the losses we had during this years loading period against other contenders would not create doubt in the team because they have rock solid evidence that at our best, we are good enough. This meant the coaching group could execute the fitness plan with less deviation from the ideal, knowing that losing would not shake the belief of the team. Grand Final day is the 24th of September, so it's less than 2 months to go to see how all this conjecture stacks up. Despite where all our views land on this, I hope we are all celebrating then.

If he's made his decision to leave and the club knows about it, then the best thing is to tell Luke to give us 8 of his best weeks and hope he does it. That is all.

Just to throw even more conjecture in I was wondering whether Selwyn Griffiths has gone even harder than Burgess did last year? I remember hearing reports on here about comments from players that the running sessions were even harder (in preseason I think) so perhaps that's continued through the season. Will be interesting to see how this plays out over the next 4 weeks. I nervously expect an uptick in performance starting Friday against Freo but while my head is telling me yeah it makes sense my stomach is in a knot of doubt.