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Jake Melksham has been suspended for two matches (reduced to one for an early plea) by the VFL Match Review Panel for a striking offence against a Werribee player in the fourth quarter of the match on Saturday.

Early in the season I know, but I think we should have a crack at him. Free Agent at the end of the year. Same age bracket as Trac, Clarry, Gus, Salo, Lever etc. (Core). Won't cost draft capital, he's not going to command crazy money and whilst he's been a little inconsistent over the journey, he has all the attributes we need as that key post plus he's 100 x better at ground level when compared to T Mac and Brown. It still allows Jefferson to develop his body and game at VFL level and he'll help us stay within contention whilst we still have Gawn and May. I think it's a no brainer for us. We can't afford the million dollar catch and I believe he'd thrive in a fresh environment, at a Melbourne club and at a club that is still in the window. If we landed Nate Caddy from the draft who displays very similar traits to Curnow, it'd go a long way to solving our forwardline woes. Himmelberg, Caddy and Roo is a much better sounding front line than any combination we currently have. Unfortunately for us, nothing has changed regarding our entries going forward which just doesn't help an ageing Brown or T Mac. Himmelberg is a cat on the ground, Caddy is unbelievabley agile and athletic at ground level and we know the pressure Roo brings. Means Petty can go back, (where he should be). He is sorely missed in defence imo and I'd say Lever and May would feel similar. I don't care that we're halfway through the season. This list won't stay young forever and our forward line has struggled far more often than it has thrived. (regardless of the out of whack stats some posters will no doubt throw up). We've struggled when facing any contending side and our forwards just don't instill fear in the oppo. Another aggressive trade and Free Agency post season is needed. Operation Himmelberg is on the agenda. Show us something this Friday night Melbourne.

Yet Hunter who stood his ground went! WHAT A FRIGGEN CORRUPT SYSTEM!

Only needs 2 more AFL games to reach 100 for MFC……gee I hope he gets there.

I didn't realise that Steven May was playing for Werribee.

As a lawyer, if I do any more criminal matters, my clients will be dressed in Carlton jumpers, because then you clearly can’t be guilty. Seriously, I said in another post that this guy simply makes it up. Pin arms, don’t pin arms, injury, no injury, hit head, don’t hit head, sling, don’t sling, drive into ground, don’t drive into ground, duty of care, no duty of care, possibility of injury, reasonable player, no reasonable player, aggressive action, not aggressive action and tonight’s new reason, long hair of the victim makes it look worse than it is. How can you not ridicule this system and the people running it.

The word "corrupt" is used a lot. I don't believe the system is corrupt - It is just totally brocken. [censored] is a far more appropriate description ... but I'm not allowed to use that word. I'm not just talking reports and the MRO, it's also the umpiring and inconsistency in paying free kicks within games. I certainly no longer have a clue as to what's going on - I don't think I'm alone. During the JVR stupidity, I quoted Jordan Lewis' comments on 360. I believe they are still the best summary of the current [censored] up in our game , so I'll restate them - " The AFL is making up the rules as they go"

Harry McKay, you say?

I don't know that this latest development proves anything one way or the other apart from the AFL being very keen on sweeping potentially embarrassing matters under the rug and protecting their brand. Suspect we haven't heard the last of this and there is still more to be played out.

Its a disgrace for Clarkson and Fagan had their names dragged through the mud (primarily by Football media) in the first place.

Words fail.. AFL is a bunch of [censored] This is what we're dealing with. Seriously losing interest in the game Bunch of [censored]

The poor form of Langdon this season has hurt us more than I think we've realised.

Good? He kicked the penultimate goal then fed the ball out to Kozzie who kicked the winner. Yeah, he was good.

You bet! 4 goals and a punch on to Pickett for the winning goal in the final seconds of the game.

I really don't think the problem is that complicated. Historically our DNA is stoppage and contest, we have played predictably up the left wing for a number of years, counting on Gawn to mark or bring the ball to ground. We let the opposition make the ground small and congest it and count on our contest and defensive structure to either win it at the source or win it back on exit. Last year and now this year teams setup well to counter that, bringing extra numbers to the contest (they know exactly where it is going to be) and chaining the ball out via handball until they can get a controlled pass. At the beginning of the year it looked like we had solved for that, mixing in less predictable exit strategies from the D50 and using lateral and 45 kicks to spread the ground and force teams to defend more of it. This opened up fast play opportunities and that is what gave us the scoring dominance. My gut feeling is that this play style is not yet fully embedded and under pressure we are reverting to what we know. I suspect that our stoppage numbers are not actually the real problem. The problem is that we are making the ground too small and that means that teams can more easily bring extra numbers to the stoppage because even if they lose, they know where the ball is going. Clearly there is a lot of supposition and opinion in the above, make of it what you will.

We had a perfectly good and near impenetrable backline...that wasn't broken... But we fixed it anyway......

Out of all the players that left last year it's Hunty the one that I feel for the most. Baker or Weids I couldn't give a stuff about. Had he not done his ankle we would be talking about a premiership player. Unfortunately he's now playing for a trash WAFL club which to me just doesn't look or feel right after all the [censored] years he went through.

So you want to replace our entire forward line with what? Casey’s forward line, so you can then complain about them? Seems unlikely to be a successful decision.

I thought this was going to be about a supporter base that has been so starved of success for 57 years that has now flipped and expects to win every flag in the next five years. An inability to deal with success humbly, rationally and logically.

From AFL website: The Tribunal panel, led by chairman Jeff Gleeson, found it wasn't a dangerous tackle. "Cerra only has a light grip on Hickey's arms. They are not truly pinned," Gleeson said. "Hickey could use one or both of his arms." Tom Sparrow’s tackle did not pin Day’s arms. Day could have used one or both of his arms. But it was deemed a dangerous action being a sling. Sparrow is not the only one. A large group of players have been suspended for similar actions when arms were not pinned. But suddenly it’s now a relevant, if not determining, factor. And what happened to the infamous duty of care this time around? It’s really hard to have any faith in this system. I’d go one step further and say it’s a blight on the game that there is no consistency and certain players/clubs seem to get treated differently.

And the same thing happened to 10+ other players this season who did not get off on appeal and missed games. But somehow, miraculously, a Carlton player is let off. The Parker ban was upheld. Same week. Same tackle. Different jumper.

Insane that Cerra got off and the 17 others didn’t. Some with less dangerous tackles too. This season in general has been ****house. Not only has the tribunal and umpiring been poor, but the quality of football and general excitement from watching games has been rock bottom. Can’t remember a less interesting season. Great job AFL.

Wasn’t Sparrows tackle identical? I mean no arms pinned as well? This a utter BS but we all knew it would happen. Right hand vs Left hand, hair doesn’t doesn’t touch the ground etc. It the AFL doesn’t appeal, they are complicit.

You don’t understand how the tribunal works if you think their rulings are based on consistency 🙄😂

Parker upheld for a lesser tackle. Cerra is no chance of getting off..

Hopefully Petty is back then too - critical to our team structure.

No from me. Tom Mac size. We need a Lynch type. 12 possession average this year. 28 start of next season and will will want a long contract at big money.

I feel like a lot of people don't watch Himmelberg play. We don't need nice moving slightly undersized key forwards, we already have the likes of JVR and McDonald. Imagine that you bring in Himmelberg (along with Brown, McDonald/JVR) and that you're playing against a defence of May, Lever and Hibberd - then try to work out who plays on which forward. Unless you confidently say 'May has to go to Himmelberg' then what's the point of brining him in? If it were me, I'd probably play May on Brown, Lever on McDonald, and Hibberd on Himmelberg ... and if that's the case then what's the point? We need a big forward that the opposition has to pay respect to first against the long ball. We're fine when the ball moves quickly with our range of mobile forwards, which is more of Himmelberg's game. In other words, we're not lacking the skill that he brings so why bother chasing him (or a player like him)?

Yesterday i couldnt understand why no dees player had been suspended. Then suddenly Christian yelled out' hold my beer!! f#*#%&###k

Could've been a useful sub option.

This game has disaster written all over it (for the MFC). Carlton are really under the spotlight and are under huge amounts of pressure to perform. If the playing group is united, we are in for one hell of a fight. Even with their big outs.

That's this week's changes out the window then

Jesus.. even at VFL the MRP are still out to get us.

I don't doubt that for a second!

I reckon our salary cap is already chockers.

This makes more sense to me than a Mckay or Ben King suggestion. Himmelberg has proven to be a really handy swingman and we are crying out for another Petty type. Two have those two and even possibly alternate them back and forward would keep teams guessing. It would depend on how much he's asking and our backline system takes time to learn but I think he'd be one of the better fit free agents out there.

Without commenting on our game plan, players out of form and injury issues, I think our problem is our inability to adapt to change in game. We have this unshakeable faith in backing our system, but it's quite easy to dislodge, then our structure falls apart in-game. This can be done by savvy coaches throwing curveballs at our system - eg Brad Scott with their tall timber makeshift forward line - we couldn't adapt. Eg. Hinkley with Port. Dimma did it too but this is the only game where we could overcome the curveball - because Tiges not good enough for long enough. Secondly, the loss of key players throws our system out and we can't adapt. When Gawn went down with the knee injury earlier in the year, we immediately fell apart. The players couldn't adapt to Grundy as the sole ruck in-game (Grundy probably also wasn't match-fit enough to carry the whole can). Clarry, the same! There are also systemic shifts we're still trying to adapt to - two key defenders. It has worked at times but with Petty out and the forward line dysfunctional, it can fall to pieces too. It's all well and good saying we back our system on repeat but it's really quite shakable.

We won the last quarter against Freo and had we kicked straight would of win the game.

I like him, can play either end, hits the contest hard and brings it to ground if he doesn’t win it

@A F I'd like to see us adjusting this set up as part of better implementation of tempo footy and in response to our on field structures. If the backline is working, it's intercepting and looks comfortable, if we have the match ups right (no. of talls, etc.) then the attacking option is good. But in games that isn't always the case. Sometimes the back 6 has spent a few minutes under intense pressure. Perhaps the interchange and match ups put us at a weaker point. Perhaps the opposition have scored a couple in a row. In those cases, I'd really like to see us take a more defensive posture at the clearances, to take the pressure off and regroup. I think we have tried to "fight through it" at times this year, but the pressure of the game (at that specific moment) combined with adding "pressure to score" has resulted in us being more fumbly. We are at our best when we are able to play the game on our terms. We become devasting, making smart decisions, and using the ball well. When confidence is up they back themselves in. So I think we need to find a better way to control the game tempo, to wrestle back control, and get the confidence up again.

Michael Juice Newton averaged a goal a game as well, but!!

The club usually look at these things a few years ahead. I wonder if we have interest in him. Well worth a look I would have thought.

You forgot Picket has NFI

They aren’t experiments they have shown enough, maybe they need tests but both of them have had impacts across their lines

We didn't play very well with way too many below their best. Skills below par and not nearly enough corridor football. Forward line pressure again not up to standard In other areas of the ground they offloaded the ball very quickly to good effect and subsequently, we weren't able to pressure them The good news is that we can play a lot better, hopefully beginning next Friday evening

Dear Demonlanders, Valé Frank Vearing - 21.11.1943 - 25.05.2023 Post made in respect to a M.F.C player, to his family, friends and former teammates. Melbourne Football Club: 1965-1966. Played as a rover, wore #26. Games: 11 Goals: 5. Two x Melbourne Football Club Reserves Best and Fairest 1965 and 1966. Career highlights and stats - http://demonwiki.org/Frank+Vearing Best game was a 15 disposal, 5 marks, 3 goals 1 behind effort in a 30 point loss, during a round 4 1966 MCG match against South Melbourne - https://afltables.com/afl/stats/games/1966/111619660514.html Started and finished his career with Epping before a leg injury ended his career. One may even argue another great career highlight was turning down an invitation from Collingwood. Personally, Frank was a nice, kind, humble man and thank him as one of the people to influence me to barrack for the Demons. Best memory with Frank, when I was a kid watching the 2000 qualifying final against Carlton. Despite all of my family writing them off at half time, Frank calmly said, "We'll come back." The rest is history as we all know. Lastly, I'm so happy he got to see the Dees win a flag before he left us. As far as I am aware, the M.F.C has been contacted in regards to his passing. Valé Frank Vearing, may you rest in peace.

Jeez pf we could have won both games with an ounce of luck or some decent umpiring you can’t write off the whole team. Also based on Casey form the only three deserving players on the weekend were Tomlinson, Schache and Brown.!!!

I agree, we’ll win all 3. We’re about to come into some ripping form.