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Rehab: Chandler, left knee heavily bandaged, Verral, k.Turner. Light duties: Fritta, McVee, Hibbo. Salem out early being put through his paces, joined the main group for drills. 40 players in the main group, including Salem, J.Smith, plenty of noise, fun and some competitive warm-ups and drills. They finished up with organised goal kicking. Salem and Spargo still running after the squad left. Chandler finished his short session with a moderate speed, jog of the oval.

The mood is gloomy resignation. Not dissimilar to the Ess mood a few weeks ago. From Bigfooty. * me, can we just forfeit? This could genuinely be 100+. Play all the kids, anyone over 28 except Ziebell can be dropped. Looks like we'll be running out there with about 5 players but at least they should all be AFL quality. lol does it really matter? We’re gonna get done by 100+ no matter whos in BBB will come back from injury and kick 9 At least if we bring in some youth and inexperience they bring some fight We’re about to get smashed by well over ten goals, no point debuting anyone.. As a north supporter I feel like pain is our middle nameFritz will have an absolute field day. Lever and May to combine for 20 intercept marks Whatever the record is, they’ll beat it. That’s just the first quarter right? feel like it’s as good a time to get the dees…Off a short break, tough close game against tigers should have them sore Sounds logical... Dees by 60. Frisky had a quiet game tonight - red alert in our back 6 It’s going to be a blood bath Really? I don't think we will win by that much but I will take your word for it. We were neck and neck with them until time-on in Q3 and lost by 48 points last year. Despite everything, I refuse to believe we’re worse than we were back then. If Dees don't turn up we lose by 60+, if they do turn up 100+ My Favourites: McKay to full forward. If he is going to be a statue be a statue in our goal square so it frees up Larkey This Tarryn Thomas fella looks a player. Seems a class bloke too. Reward his effort with a stint in the ones I think He can't play right now. He needs to finish his homework. Footnote: each sub indented comment is a response to the point immediately above it. Always wary of a Clarkson coached team and Cunnington always plays well against us. Dees by 3-6 goals.. just to keep our % ticking over nicely.

I remember watching Kade after our Granny win hugging Jake Lever, he was crying and I remember thinking jeez this kid is really invested, he played a pearler in the Casey Granny and is now producing the goods at AFL level. If he can maintain his current form he will be an automatic lock in the 23, he is young and relatively inexperienced but you wouldn’t know it. He helped keep us in the game Monday night, really starting to like this kid. Go Kade Chandler.!!!

I'm just all round happy for the guy. He's someone who has not been handed anything to him and worked his butt off. His ability to chase, tackle and get scoring opportunities was a big part of what kept us in this game. His goals were all quality goals when it mattered, those moments needed someone who would step up and take responsibility which he did. Good small forwards do damage with few opportunities.

To put our travel and the current 5-day break in perspective. A poster on North's bigfooty noted about their travel: We started at home at Marvel, next to Perth at Optus, followed by Hawthorn at UTas Stadium, then at home at Marvel against Carlton, back on the road to Adelaide for Gather Round and on Sunday to the Gold Coast. We had: MCG, Gabba, MCG, Perth, Adelaide, MCG, On the 5-day break. This week North have a 6-day break and had to fly back from Qld on Sunday night or Monday morning.. Overall, I don't see our travel and short break a disadvantage.

We don’t need a few good players tho. We need A+ graders otherwise they won’t get a game and they’ll leave. We need another Oliver or Trac. Not another Laurie… absolutely no offense to Laurie I’m just using him as an example.

We played West Coast in Perth in the (relative) heat. So far the only other non-WA side to play West Coast in Perth is GWS, who lost. Comparing our game vs Sydney to Geelong’s is foolish. When we played them all of McCartin, McCartin, Rampe, Franklin and Amartey played. None of them played against Geelong. Two markedly different Sydney sides.

Thanks... again... for your work Luci. Losing is not an option

May is usually incredible 1v1, but when the ball hits the deck, he panics big time. He always has. His lack of calm in those moments usually flows onto his team mates. I think he's carrying an injury at the moment, because he's not great 1v1 and he's trying to zone off far too much. Part of this could actually be the move of Petty forward unsettling May and creating this psychological do I zone or play 1v1? I'd look at getting Turner into the team and keeping Petty forward. Turner will free up May and/or Lever.

I wouldn't give up 3 first round picks for any player who is only an injury away from being a bust. This is supposed to be a strong draft. Spread the investment lads.

I think that JVR will develop into a very good forward for us over the next few years but I would be vey careful in placing him in a position of being the No. 1 target in the forward 50 in the near future. I think we saw exactly what would happen if we did that this season in the game against Richmond. he had the Tigers no. 1 defender on him for 3 quarters and did very little. it was not until Balta was moved into the ruck that he had the chance to get off the leash a bit. I would like to see him get support of an experienced tall forward next to him to take off the pressure. Brown would be my first choice for that role as I think the opposition would need to have their best defender on him. TMac? not really going to attract the best defender every week and he is looking very limited at the moment. Might be time to give Schache a run there to see if he can fill the role. We need to support the development of JVR and the best way to do that is to make sure he ha the correct support up forward.

So the old boys club continues.

Taranto is the least damaging player in the AFL. I did not even know he was playing.

Grundy stood up in my book when JVR got the knees in the back after taking the mark of the day. Always loved that in players i coached.

Howe has had multiple pings at Melbourne since leaving and I hope he never wins a flag.

I think Fritter was on light duties on Monday night

Ignorant peasants; don't they know that we go skiing in Japan late Feb /early March.

Beware of the “easy” games. I’m not confident at all that this will be a smashing.

That’s the worry. He has missed a lot of footy, both high intensity training and matches. We need him back but we need him back all guns blazing and playing 4Q of footy. Half fit or limited game time is not what the team needs. I would rather go with a fully fit alternative defender like a Turner than a player not 100 percent ready.

Really loved Grundy going in and sticking up for van Rooyen when the tigers player dropped his knees (albeit gently) into him after his first big mark in the last quarter.

If we move Petty to defence this week then IMO it’s defence for the year for him. I don’t want us to keep flipping him from week to week. Whether it’s forward or back, he needs to get stability with May/Lever or JVR/whoever. Flipping him around is giving me Brad Miller vibes - never got settled and never got to his potential as a result. If he’s a forward then leave him there. If not, move him back and get Brown back into the side.

Shows how silly they are - too early for snow!!

It was about as good a decision as the deliberate paid against him in round 23 2021. We did win both games though, so cheers umps.

I just rewatched that passage of play. It was a desperate, full stretch dive by Gus to reach the ball and deny a Richmond player taking possession. That was his sole objective. There is no way he had any further designs on the direction or distance the ball travelled after that. All he wanted to do was deny easy possession for his opponent. The rule is not there for that sort of thing. 13:05 remaining on the clock in the second quarter if anyone wants to watch again.

Idk about Duxy’s footy skills but what I do know is that everyone loves him. And everyone knows him. He and I were at a closed training session at Gosch’s one time, behind the goals. Every time a player came to fetch the ball without exception they’d say “hey Duxy” and this also happened at Ikon when we were at the fence watching Casey warmups. Last year I walked with Duxy from the Pineapple Hotel to the ‘Gabba towards an entrance where Perty, Richo, Kate, Stafford and Ooze among others were mingling. Every single one of them addressed him by name and asked after his family etc. He’s a stalwart of the Club. ❤️💙

Lovely movement and skills, full training.

Set shots have greatly improved this year since choco took over goal kicking coaching.

Spargo is going nowhere. He’s our best pressure forward by a mile according to all the champion data stats and kicked 6 goals in 4 games prior to his concussion. We can play the 3 smalls as one will push up the ground, it worked prior to last week. Laurie would probably make way for him and potentially could be a sub to get him back into the team

I get it. Honour the returned service people, remember the fallen from dusk to dawn, march and offer the silence. Anzac Day became less popular from the 1960s to the 1980s as fewer people thought war should be commemorated. I am part of this generation. My family feel the same way. Though instead of not honouring the military we discussed the horrors of war, the futility, the destruction and collapse of state. From this movement came the push to adjust narrative. But, we have this one sided pro-military stand and very little of what the broader community offer. The alternative views are now drowned out by comments similar to yours. If it doesn't match the institutional narrative then you get no voice, as the blind followers cannot see history or the other. Our world is making more division, as grey is no longer. Only black and white. Hey, Beelze have you made the pilgrimage to Turkey? If not I highly recommend it. Do you get it, narratives move, just as culture, in constant change. At the movement the institutions are powerful, with there PR to push us where they want. The individual has a hard time expressing the alternatives. Poor @DutchDemons had no chance. Me well, what was it, "That ....", well done, your voice wins. Anzac day stills remains for me, futility of war, a moment that was nation building and a deep sadness of the consequences of military actions. I remain greatly moved for those who don't return, for those who are physically and emotionally maimed, including the civilians and for those serving now, I am a bit bewildered by their motivations.

Happy with the four premiership points the rest is just fluff.

Yes, there are a few notable comments. At least they have mostly kept their sense of humour through the gloom. I think it is finding those gems that keeps me doing these threads - waded through 10 pages of bigfooty to find enough of interest for an opening post...

My favourite by a long way. 😂😂

I saw it as a 50-50 contest with an attempt to deny possession. If there were other realistic options then it would be a different story but other than not committing for the ball I don't know what other option there was. The other thing is that this Twitter guy completely made up a rule that once the ball hit the ground it's no longer a spoil from a marking contest and therefore a qualifier for insufficient intent. This is no-where to be found in the laws of the game charter.

Good intensity, much more than the usual stretch it out runs. The drills were compact, with 4 stations, and then they all joined together for kick and run through before the goal kicking. Best thing was the joy. Lasted about 50 minutes No contact, nor anything close to sims.

JVR is exceptional at pack marking. We saw it at Casey and we are seeing it now at senior level. Next step is for him to work on his leading patterns so he can take those 'easier' chest marks. That is easier to teach than contested marking anyway, but it's definitely the next part of his game he needs to get better at. Which he will with more time in the forwardline and working together with the other forwards.

I had the same problem, try this:

This is how I read the issuing of those votes. Interesting, the coaches are generally a bit closer together than this. The 3 and 2 votes are interchangeable. Hardwick Goodwin 9 Tim Taranto (RICH) 5 4 6 Jack Viney (MELB) 1 5 4 Michael Hibberd (MELB) 4 3 Jack Riewoldt (RICH) 3 3 Max Gawn (MELB) 3 2 Clayton Oliver (MELB) 2 2 Jayden Short (RICH) 2 1 Christian Petracca (MELB) 1

Yes, I couldn't attend. I had a VERY big problem with it 😔

Kynan has a younger brother coming through by the name of Jake who would be around 16 years of age. Another to watch put for in a couple of years. Marley Davey has just turned 13 this year so expect his name to start coming up over the next few years. My understanding is that he's a very handy young footballer up in Cairns that'll start integrating into junior development squads.

May had 11 intercept possessions against Richmond and for a fair part of the game I thought he played very well. Our zone system asks May to stay back inside 50 and let his man go up and mark outside 50. Largely that has served us well. By the time a forward marks around 60m out someone comes and takes the mark, others fill in the spaces and May nullifies the corridor meaning teams can’t get high quality shots on goal. The issue is teams have identified the 40-50m zone as an area where May will still drop back and surrender leads in to. This is still a low percentage shot on goal but it’s a bit higher than I’d like to give up! Personally I think May plays his best games where he’s given a dangerous one on one match up and told not worry about the zone. But when he’s not playing on Buddy or Naughton and especially when he doesn’t have full faith in the other defenders he will default to zoning. When the zone works with upfield pressure you end up with teams kicking long to May by himself inside d50. That doesn’t end well for them. I’m not buying the injury excuse. He looks fine when he’s coming up at contests with confidence. He’s always been a little iffy when forced to attack the ball on the ground and he’s 31 now. There’s a couple of tweaks I’d like in our zone, the first been for May to trust the deep defenders a touch more and see if he can win contests around the 50m arc. He had one such big win in the 3rd with an aggressive spoil that started a chain of possessions for a goal. The second one is just more communication with Brayshaw, Rivers, McVee etc when he’s going to let his man come free outside 50. I don’t necessarily think we have to go taller (short term) but the flankers have to be more aware of the handover. And especially for Grundy when he’s the ruck who often takes that handover.

I've been a fan of Chandler for a while now (when many others at least on here were not). While I'm not super surprised with his inside 50 tackles stats (6th in the league) or his goal assists (3rd in the league) I didn't expect him to be so reliable in front of goal. Chandler is playing one of the most important and difficult roles in the team and couldn't be going much better. Good story of persistence - he has one injury away from being a premiership player in 2021 and then Bedford had his nose in front last year. I'm so glad we hung on to him and he stayed on!

I watched the game yesterday and Collingwood struggled with Essendon run and carry game for 3 Quarters I was surprised how efficient the bummers were in terms of their disposal and their ability to block Collingwood running through the midfield - their main weapon Last quarter pies went full pressure and the bummers wilted terribly and the dam wall burst Pressure on the ball carrier wins most games - our problem is we seem to struggle to present that every quarter and every game. Our disposal not only in terms of decision making but also effectiveness is also below what it should be atm - hopefully that can change. Lost count in our game against tigers the number of 1. dumb 2 metre handballs that achieved nothing 2. dumb high bombs out of trouble and into more trouble My sense watching at times was the players just wanted to get rid of the ball and let someone else have the problem of finding a target Maybe it’s a lack of confidence because when we are playing well that isn’t what I see

I’m excited by JVR but it looked like he was well beaten by Balta for the first three quarters. Was it only after Balta moved forward or was perhaps rested and a much younger player was on JVR that he found his space and groove? The fact that JVR didn’t hang his head and grabbed the opportunity says a lot - he’ll learn to play on more experienced defence but it’s that attitude that excites me most.

I don't think this is our year either, and I could do a lengthy post about our lack of backline run and kicking skills, our midfield looking one paced and being unable to hit the side of a barn and how I'd like our forward line to have both another dangerous small as well as a pair of high quality talls. But I don't understand criticising the coaches for not sticking with the same ageing talls who haven't done much of anything since 2021 whilst also saying things are similar to last year. BBB and Tommy combined for 1.7 in the VFL. JVR kicked 3 in the last quarter to win the match. Gawn was instrumental in the 3rd quarter. And whilst Petty hasn't set the world on fire up forward he has got first hands on the footy a fair bit and his ability to change direction and chase is a mile better than Brown and T Mc.

Max’s kick for goal last game v Cats 2021 showing 5 Cats players within the protected area of the man on the mark. No 50m of course.