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I'm a doctor with experience managing these injuries. I thought I'd make a few comments to quell speculation. SEN reported Petracca had surgery. That wouldn't be for a "small punctured lung" (that's treated with a tube inserted between the ribs to inflate the lung) or four fractured ribs, so I assume it was for the spleen. It's uncommon these days to need to operate on splenic injuries as our interventional radiology colleagues are excellent at performing a minimal invasive procedure (angioembolisation) to stop the bleeding. That Petracca needed surgery suggests this was nothing short of a life-threatening situation. Surgery in this case is usually via a long incision in the midline of the abdomen. That in itself takes a long time to recover from (eg no heavy lifting for six weeks). Then there is the time needed to re-again AFL-level fitness. As a young and fit person, I'm sure Petracca will be fine in time but it wouldn't surprise me if this was the end of his 2024 season.

I’m getting so sick of the desperate pile on the club has been subjected to from everyone outside, and seemingly many others inside the club… the furore around him getting put back on the field is the next example. The AFL community, and especially the media, have been death riding Melbourne since the finals last year.. starting with the exit, continuing with May’s Collingwood comments and for just about every week thereafter. Should Petracca have gone back on? No with hindsight… was a single person saying that when he ran back on? No.. it was, how brave.. Do you really think they would’ve just tapped his chest a few times and said, “you’ll be right son, off you go”. I have no doubt due process was followed, as the club will no doubt be forced in to saying in a statement of reply. Don’t get sucked in by the garbage media commentary.. This is your Dees. Stick by them.

Take a look at the incident carefully and I don't think there is much doubt that Moore deliberately put his knee "hard" into tracs back.

Incorrect. My friend who is a doctor saw him sucking in the air on TV and immediately said “he punctured a lung or bleeding internally” If they didn’t know the extent of the injuries, they should have taken the right precautions and sent him to hospital immediately, given the risk of internal injuries was very high. Imagine if he got hit again after being sent back on the ground. This is not a hamstring or a knee, the risk is not worth it. Much like we take no risks with head injuries.

Dr Peter Brukner, a professor of sports medicine at La Trobe University who has been a club doctor for Collingwood and Melbourne, defended the Demons’ decision to allow Petracca to return to the field after his initial assessment. “Initially these things may not seem too bad because you often get bruised ribs -- that’s something some people can play with,” Brukner said. “He [Petracca] would be pushing: ‘Let me see how I go’ sort of thing. As I said, sometimes it takes a little bit of time for the breathing difficulties and the bleeding to manifest itself. It’s probably not that unusual that he went back on. But I think they quickly realised he wasn’t right. Then he started to complain about feeling worse, and they quickly went into action.” Brukner, who was at the game and spoke with Melbourne’s club doctors in the dressing room afterwards, said the Demons had done well to send Petracca to hospital as quickly as they had. “You can miss these and ignore them and just say, ‘He is in pain.’ But I think they did very well to get him off to hospital as quickly as they did,” Brukner said. “He would have had a tube inserted into his lung to expand the lung, and sedation and painkillers because the fractured ribs are very painful. And then they would just be observing the spleen side of things to make sure he was not continuing to bleed, which, in rare cases, they have to take the spleen out if that’s the only way to stop the bleeding. Usually, the bleeding just settles down by itself. “You can imagine, there is a cut on the spleen … and it just stops bleeding after a while. It just depends how severe that laceration was. A horrible injury.” (The Age, 11 June)

And this is what is scaring a lot of us. I couldn't give a stuff about the season right now I just hope like hell the guy is alright and there aren't any complications.

Yes that’s the footy department that wins inside 50s count for 3 years as a team but has constant “forward of centre” issues with scoring and conversions and says we are working on it uses James Jordon as a sub for 11 times in a season and refuses to give him game time and queries why he departs when his contract expires recruits Grundy and after 9 weeks says that’s enough, experiment over recruits Shane McAdam as an injury riddled 28 year old after 50 games in 8 years recruits Hunter and Billings as ineffective,butter like, small non physical players to assist the salary dump from other clubs signs Laurie up for a 2yr extension as he shows nothing for 3 years and is way off becoming a league player alienates Tomlinson by playing him for one game, he plays well and gets dropped whilst others have 6-7 weeks of poor form and stay in alienates Woey jnr by playing him as a sub for 5/6 weeks and then dropping him whilst others are worse and keep getting games (Chandler, Billings, Hunter) pushes Tom Sparrow up as a next gen midfielder but his skills and ballhandling and run is deteriorating Pursues Petty as a key forward despite him being a premiership key defender Turning young Turner from a competent defender into a flawed forward option Keeping an aged Ben Brown on one leg and a dodgy back for another year Thank god we don’t have a voice at the footy department!!!

To think he went back on the field too. What a champion.

We have had a very brief window of success and we have underachieved and it seems obvious that window has closed. Obvious deficits in our list have not been addressed. Key forwards, ruck support and midfield depth are glaring weaknesses. The forwards/rucks we have recruited are uncompetitive and unphysical- Schache, Fullarton, Jefferson for example. We could not keep hold of Jackson and completely mismanaged Grundy (who will be a premiership ruckman in 2024). Midfield- Billing’s, Hunter and?…..who have we recruited as tough hard fast or skilful midfielders? We’ve left it all to Oliver who is underperforming, Petracca who looks exhausted by the load and Viney who is at the end. Sparrow is mediocre and we couldn’t hold onto Jordon, Bedford and Hermes who at least provided support. Jordon will be a premiership midfielder in 2024! i could go on forever. Where is the development of our young players? Overall we are not physical enough, have no forwards that consistently kick goals, have no ruck support for Max, are not fast enough and have poor delivery by foot and hand. Add to this rhe game plan, whatever it is, does not work and the team looks unmotivated and disillusioned. And I haven’t even mentioned all the co start rumours and off field issues…

Nobody will ever convince you of anything though.

Plenty of people have played on with rib injuries. I know we're all [censored] off because the season is effectively done and dusted and the future ain't looking to bright but are we going to start a witch-hunt of the medical staff as well as the coaching team?

It's quite obvious that the 2024 season is done from a premiership perspective, whether we sneak into finals probably doesn't matter other than from a draft pick number. I'm hoping to see the following changes v the Roos and for the remainder of the year: - Fullarton to come in as our ruck/forward and Turner out. Let JVR focus on being the full forward and what a player he will be from next year onwards. Enough with rucking him other than as the forward ruck like a Tom Hawkins. - Trac is obviously injured so time to play the Kolt through the middle for the remainder of the year to get him ready for 2025 - Petty to go back to the backline to either up his trade value if he wants to leave, or get him ready for 2025 and the coming years. He's not a good forward. - Move Rivers to the midfield and see if AMW can make it at half back - Brown should maybe retire mid-season to enable Jefferson, Verrall and Kentfield to be the main talls at Casey for the remainder of the year so their development isn't stunted. I would keep Brown at the club though to help with the forward line coaching, as god knows we need it! In regards to the off-season, we will likely have a top 10 pick which will enable us to pick another high class midfielder. Knowing the way we operate we will also probably try trade up for another top 20 pick as well. We need to go very very hard at some ready made, HIGH QUALITY players in the age bracket of 23-25. We will have the salary cap space with all of our delisting/retirements, so using free agency and future picks will be key. And please for the love of god find some quick, high pressure players for our forward line. Chandler just isn't able to do it. 2024 could be a blessing in disguise if we can get our off-season right and get more out of our young players next year. Oh and Clarry please get a full pre-season into you and come back a man with a point to prove.

give him the rest of the season off. We're F'd anyway. Should not have been allowed back on the ground.

That would be akin to appointing a ruckman as a forward line coach.

The lack of football knowledge on this site is embarrassing. Football is a really tough game, accidents & collisions do happen & in this case causing a really nasty injury. Sure Moore went hard at the contest, but it’s within the rules, l just wish our boys played with the same physicality And to all the budding doctors out there, leave it the experts. Get we’ll Trac that was beyond brave

Leave off on Moore, by the way. There aren't many fairer players in the game. Just look at how he deals with Maynard whenever that d/h loses his head on field. If you think Moore is at fault, then you have to hate Brad Miller too given what happened to Tom Lonergan.

a) Players clearly shot confidence wise, Goody ain’t going to come out and slate them in the press conference just to twist the confidence knife b) The players got a fair rev up after the west coast performance, it doesn’t work repeatedly c)A 6 goal win based on what exactly players out, have you watched Collingwood since Round 3 it’s a game plan they are invested into it’s not about who is in or out it’s a process and backing it d) We tried to change how we play because the FD hit the panic button after 2 finals straight set exits, they threw the baby out with the bathwater and went to far away from our DNA, and IMO players lost confidence in that style of play being to foreign from what they were used to. There’s also the other issues of Smith, Oliver and Brayshaw’s retirement. I think we got an early them against us boost from Oliver returning but that well has dried up

Get well Trac your health and full recovery is all that concerns me and all demon supporters Our fingers are crossed you make a full and speedy recovery

It's our inability to execute forward of centre IN HIGH PRESSURE GAMES that's our biggest weakness. Every side has games where they can't kick straight and their opponent can't miss. It happens regularly and it's happened to us many times. The issue is that when we are under pressure, we seem to totally lose composure forward of centre. Our entries are putrid, and our goal kicking is not much better. We lost an elimination final last year because two of our most experienced players missed absolute sodas. That's mental, and that's a problem. The issue this year however, is that when things go against us, we completely drop our heads. We've been in many games in the past where things have gone wrong, and we've always been able to arrest momentum and claw our way back. We've rarely ever been out of games, until this year. And that has nothing to do with our forward mix, and everything to do with our midfield getting regularly smacked. We didn't lose yesterday because the Pies kicked a couple of miracle goals, or because our forwardline was worse than theirs on paper. We lost yesterday because our pressure rating was abysmal, we got smashed in clearance again, and we were severely punished on turnovers. JVR, Kosi and Fritta are better forwards than all 6 of the forwards the Pies had on the field yesterday combined. Only Hill is a really quality forward. Edit: I also want to be clear that our forwardline is absolutely a problem, and we desperately need Petty to pull himself together, or to find a quality tall to help JVR. No arguments here. But no forwardline, no matter how good, can play good football if their midfield can't execute a 2m handball.

Given Tracs prognosis, 2024 is firmly shaping up as a failure. I am at peace with this. Once all the Melbourne bashing is done this week - as it will be the focus of the media 100% - it will be easier to move on. There is no need to fight this year. I mean what’s the point? Tank and tank hard. Get those surgeries done now, play the youth to work out who has AFL potential. We should finish bottom 6-8 which will give us a top 10 pick. Trade Petty and/or Oliver to give us another 1-2 1st rounders. This will restock our team prior to the Tassie pooshow that will envelop the comp in a few years time. At the same time we need to work out how we want to play. Are we going to be a ball movement team or a forward half territory team. Both though need to focus on turnover efficiency, which means having 1-2 good kickers, speed and agility on all lines. This l, I think will determine the fate of players like Oliver, Sparrow, Petty et al. Where teams have gone wrong is cutting too deep too quickly but I think we have the leadership in Trac, Lever and Gawn to get us through the tough times. 2025 will not be much better and we’ll add in another 1-2 1st rounders. The other option is to try and extend the window by bringing FAs but run the risk of falling off a cliff during Tassie related compromised draft.

I feel for Trac, the lacerated spleen is a concern and more like a car crash injury and he would have been in some serious pain and I cannot believe he actually went back out to play. I would be surprised if it wasn't season-ending. And before you jump on me, I have years of experience working in a trauma setting. Without knowing the medical notes all I can say is the spleen is tricky and a serious injury. It contains lots of blood and its healing time varies and it is slow to repair. From a reputable medical journal "Avoid strenuous activities that could re-injure your spleen. These include lifting, jogging, aerobic exercise, and contact sports. Get plenty of rest for 2-3 months." Let him rest and fully recover and time to blood some kids.

You obviously haven’t served have you. Out of respect for those that have, please stop with this absolute rubbish.

No matter what happens between now and the remainder of the year, I plead with the supporters to continue to rock up to games. The only way we will be able to attract free agents and talent is if we consolidate the success of this generation and do not go back to the dark days of 13, 14, 15k crowds at the MCG. Let's continue to get around the group that have brought us so much happiness over the last 3 seasons, and nurture the young guys coming up.

The one thing you can do even when you're not playing well is bring pressure Kings birthday, 85,000 people and we play our lowest pressure game for the year No one can sugarcoat that. Not even the Pollyannas on here Something is drastically wrong. The players aren't listening to Goodwin There is no heart. No pride. The time for tinkering is over. Max is a great player, one of our best ever but he's almost a liability now the way we continually dump kick it to him even when other players are free. Even if gets it the players up the ground are static. They are clueless about what to do, where to run, how to tackle, how to kick. Times up Simon

I think Windsor is going to be a real player, even on days where he’s below par, he still puts in and his presence is more than his slight frame should allow.

There is value, in that it makes supporters feel like they’re not going insane. The delusional, cliche-ridden nonsense that Goodwin coughed up at the presser provided much less “value” than the truth-bombs Schwarz was dropping.

Is our forwardline great? No. Is it the reason we are losing? No. Who the hell was playing in Collingwood's forwardline yesterday? Absolute nobodies, that's who. Still managed to pile on 14 goals.

Jvr gives me some hope. He's going to be a very influential and long term player for us.

https://www.sen.com.au/news/2024/06/11/ive-never-been-more-disappointed-melbourne-great-rips-into-former-club/?

Thats the season done. Rest up and recover Trac. Your health is the priority. Time to perfect more recipes apart from just meatballs.

That footage of may and Oliver shaking hands with him is a supporter killer for this supporter. if the players don’t care why should we i can think of better places to send my money - that image is a membership killer for me

It's so painful to see us kick 6:15 and that hateful team kick 14:5. Poor old Petty with twelve touches and zero score. We've carried him for weeks for some reason I can't fathom and effectively been a man down all game. It's starting to look like cruelty. Then you have Billings, Chandler, Laurie all 0.0. and Turner 0.1. I think our coaches think they're tactical geniuses who can do stuff that's never historically worked for anyone else and somehow make it work for us. The Grundy thing was wishful thinking, but the recurring effort to turn alright full backs into key forwards is just bizarre. Why do we persist with the forward coaching setup that is clearly not delivering? Many of our players are poor kicks but great competitors so why suddenly try to have them avoid all contest and force them to play some over elaborate version of the beautiful game? All around the field we keep kicking or handpassing the ball to opposition players and killing ourselves with demoralising turnover goals. The past couple of years we just needed to stop butchering the ball out of midfield and bombing it long to outnumbered contests. I thought we could keep most of the rest of the game and just lower our eyes to players who should be making leads - like natural forwards would do instinctively unlike converts from full back. I don't rate Longmuir as a coach and think he often looks out of his depth but then I look at the humiliation he engineered for us last week. What does that say about our coach. I was never convinced about the merits of our coach, but I think he's an absolute liability since Yze went. 22 and 23 were hard years watching us play, even during the games we won, but there's no tactical nous or in-game strategic responses. I wish we'd elevated Yze (or someone else) instead, because SG was a known quantity and apart from the flag I always felt he underperformed. At the moment we're not even competitive we're embarassing. I'm a fair person and don't like having a go at the man, but as a competitor you have to hope he'd be honest enough to admit he's not doing a great job, or that he's not going about it the right way. I'm pessimistic about the rest of the season and future years under him. At least if the coaching situation changed we could try to restore some spirit and pride in the team and play some enjoyable competitive football, rather than repeating the same mistakes. I fear there will be an exodus of players through retirement and frustration. From my background playing Gaelic Football, Rugby and even over 35s over here I feel like some players are lacking team spirit and pride right now. I'm not sure the cause and I know they're professionals and it's a small community, but I think we're too soft and gentlemanly. Stuff like the unnecessary friendliness to the Scumbag with the Skunk haircut doesn't sit well with me, nor does the failure to stick up for Max clearly getting belted. And before people have crack at me I am a redleg and go to almost every home and Marvel based game subject to occasional young family circumstances. I really want us to improve and turn it around because honestly apart from a flag I watched on my couch in the company of some friends on skype screens there has been a lot of frustration in recent years, such as 2019 (I know injuries etc,) Straight sets and now West Coast, Freo Collingwood and I'm dreading what we'll dish up next. Those losses and almost games were tolerable when we were being competitive, but that's hardly how I'd describe our recent form. Sigh.

Ahhhh the images. Tracc emerging from the race full pace, knocking over all the doctors in his way trying to stop him, they’re all crying ‘Christian, please NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO’

“Ok so it looks like you’ve got broken ribs, are you feeling faint” ”No” ”Are you feeling nauseous” ”No” ”Coughing up any blood, breathing ok” ”No, yep” ”Ok well like I said we think you’ve got broken ribs, it doesn’t seem like there is any other involvement, so it’s up to you. We can give you a jab, but you’ll be very uncomfortable?” ”Understood, I want to try” Tries, fails, gets taken off and sent to hospital. Obviously I have no idea if that was the exchange.. but it seems logical and reasonable, and in my view entirely appropriate.

Thank you Trac, really appreciate your effort. Get well soon.

I think we’ve reached the point where we’ve had enough injuries and players with rubbish pre-seasons to say the season is done. So there’s no point rushing him back. Got to get around Trac and give him all the time he needs to heal.

No coincidence that JVR played his best game of the year WITHOUT being in the ruck. He is good at it, but he looked so much better just settled in the one position and not burning tickets playing through there. Surely we want him focusing on being the best forward he can through the week at training and not having to worry about ruck craft too?

Glad someone responded to the announcement over the DL radio for a doctor.

Bugger... All the best for a full and speedy recovery. Lool after yourself Trac. Don't worry about the footy so much for this year. Take care.

It's an interesting side note that earlier this season one of the young East African players (I've forgotten the name) was copping all kinds of [censored] comments about how he 'didn't understand the game' and would get someone injured with his totally unacceptable habit of having the knee out directly into the backs of opponents as he went up for spoils and marks. I present to the jury, son of two-time Brownlow medallist, co-captain of Carey Grammar, premiership captain of the Oakleigh under-18s, 2-time all-Australian centre-half-back, Collingwood Captain and all-round 'good bloke' with 163 games' expertience, Darcy Moore. Guess it wasn't a Sudan problem.

Every decent defender should be making their opponent feel it in a marking contest, it's exactly the same thing Maysie does whenever he gets the chance, and rightly so. It's just really unfortunate that Moore's knee caught Trac in the worst possible spot.

Nope, but you don't appear to be either with your internet diagnosis. A lacerated spleen <> ruptured spleen! So, before you go all dougie howser on my comment, he's in hospital, they will make the call with our medical staff and bring him back when he's ready. I'm not saying he will play, and I still won't be surprised if he does, but tell me where I said we should risk him or his health? Also I call bollocks on your last comment. Burgo would have NOTHING to do with assessing player injuries in a game. He was high performance manager, and fitness, not the doctor! so pull your head in before attacking other people! EDIT: I also didn't make any reference to whether he should have played on, he obviously shouldn't have.

Yep - the difference between the Pies body language coming up the race vs ours was stark. Forget stats, loading etc. - the team is not having fun and playing like a team, and being there for each other. Confidence and team culture can be difficult to build but easily lost. We’ve definitely lost it.

Gee, this place has gone mad. Everyone wants to burn the place down. It was only 3 weeks ago that we were sitting fourth. Yes, we have had a bad month, just like the previous three years at this time of year, although admittedly, not as severe. It happens with every club at some stage during the season. Look at Geelong. 7 zip and have lost 5 of the last 6. GWS were 6 and 1 after 7 rounds and were co-premiership favourites. They have lost 5 of their last 6 as well. Look at Carlton last year, they were sitting 15th after round 13 and ended up in the Prelim final. The only real downer for me was Petracca getting injured. I will throw you all some more red meat. I thought Goody's presser was encouraging. There, I said it.

He's a liability. Forget past individual awards but he's killing us in games because he's a turnover merchant who coughs the ball way too easily by stupid dump kicks. He's playing like a sub par VFL standard footballer with the rubbish he's trotting out each week. He's also in poor condition and it shows in games. Other then the doggies game this year he's been incredibly poor all year.

You've clearly never played competitive sports if you still think square ups in this day and age matter. This club just came off the worst loss we've had in years and the answer was apparently to lose sight of what needed to be done today for the sake of a [censored] square up? Get real. I've never been a fan of picking opposition players up off the ground, I want to be competitive and flying the flag can be important at times but save your dinosaur BS for the stone age and maybe check yourself into a nursing home if you still think this is the way to win football games. How the hell would today have been any better if we lost and roughed him up? Seriously? Staying out of this thread now. You can all fight over it to your heart's content, or start following bare knuckle boxing if you want to see a fight that bad.

I'm ashamed of the club today. We've played like trash for weeks now, but not not stand up on a big day like today was so disheartening. Letting Maynard get through a full match of footy without giving him any physical attention after what he did to a beloved demon was shameful. One of the worst things I've say through as a diehard supporter of this club, and I've say through decades of [censored] at this point. Mentally weak. Shameful. Disappointing. Our premiership window ends with a whimper while that thug runs around like he's at training.

Starting to feel that this is the year we fall back to renew our list for a push in 2025. Sort of like our 2019 or pies 2021. A year of learning tweaks to a game plan, a year of development for key players in JvR, Windsor, Jefferson, Tholstrup and Adams. A year to add to our group with a top end draft pick. A year where we might finally have some salary cap relief and be able to afford higher quality free agents, perhaps bringing in Battle, Moyle and some mid depth. The key problem. We're running out of time with a few of our players we're so reliant on in May, Gawn and Viney all getting on and, bar Gawn, showing a sign of decreasing performance. 2025 is perhaps the last time we can seriously challenge with the current list at our disposal. We need to start getting all our decisions right from here.

Let me get this straight.... you want to let OUR BEST PLAYER Over the last 5 years go coz he is having and working through some issues, just let me remind you, 4 times B & F , Multiple All Australian, Coaches award winner x 2 AND YOU WANNA FLICK HIM????