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get my wife to cook a steak

I assume Kade Kolodjashnij’s career is over, just like Angus Brayshaw’s was.

I see nothing in Hore that screams he will make it. Poor decision if he is in the side.

Maybe he’s hiding behind Charlie.

Honesty

That's a bit rich, you calling someone else sarcastic. If I were you, I would just continue reading your 36,681 posts.

Weid should be good in the Sydney grass.

Agree. It's all very strange. I thought the big take away from last year was all players had 'bought in'. They were a 'brotherhood', united as one yada yada yada. Now after 3 rounds players are not on board and we need an honesty session? Hezus, we need a win this week. Or i'll struggle to buy in i telz ya

I love Jonesy and always will. But Goodwin's decision to replace Tyson with another true contested midfielder on a WING highlights his stubbornness. He is refusing to adapt and is reminding me of Dimma when he was trying to be Clarko with the wrong cattle. Goody plays contested ball players on a wing and at half-forward and we will continue to be exploited in those areas until we make a list adjustment going into 2020. I don't care what instruction Jones or ANB are given.. It is in their nature to gravitate to the contest.

May has been treated harsher than any player so far this year for the incident he was in. Braced like Cox, but didn't run across off his line to block the player like Cox did.. No concussion or injury suffered, despite what Christian said, which was later corrected at the Tribunal. New grading brought in at the Tribunal that "it could have been worse", but not applied to Dusty or anyone else. Was not off the ball like Dusty but in play. Was a block, not an elbow to the side of the head, which has always been considered a low act. Yes once again we cop the worst of it. Note that Gerard Whateley and other commentators have said the umpiring at our game was very poor and guess who copped the worst of it? Yes we seem to do very well with the AFL.

This is not the first time in the past few weeks that we've heard referencing to buying in. We’re now at year 6 of the Roos/Goodwin build or year 3 of Goodwins tenure. We should be well passed the stage of having to ‘buy in’. What has happened over the offseason to fracture the club? Is it player level? Coaching level? Something has happened if we’ve reverted back to the level of needing people to buy in!

Why is it that every article these days is looked at as a 'puff piece', or we have a plethora of posters asking the players to 'shut up' when they are being interviewed? When are people going to realise that this is part of football now? Articles will be written and players will speak with the media, regardless of whether or not we're 3-0 or 0-3. It's going to happen. Trotting out the 'blah blah all talk, I want action on the field' is all well and good, but it's going to happen. If you don't like the talk, don't listen to it. Seriously. If you don't like 'puff pieces' then don't [censored] read them. As for this one - there is merit in it. Stats show we have been struggling from stoppages, and who spends most of their time in there? We all know who. We need everyone pulling their weight, and while some players are finding the ball enough, they aren't then trying to ensure that the opposition doesn't have it.

We win the next 3 straight and become favourite for the flag. As long as the umpires don’t crucify us every time we look like getting a run on.

There is PLENTY to be gained by this year, even if we don't make finals, provided we re-gain fitness and competitiveness. Lever and May need game time to gel in the backline. Lever is not going to come back and dominate straight away. It's going to take him time. Getting games into Weideman who started this season with 20(!) games. A full season under his belt will do him no end of good. Hannan to come back and get more game time. Lewis to come back and marshall the troops. AVB to get more games under his belt. The improvement of Joel Smith. Same with our (many) other inexperienced players.

There is something about Jack Martin that doesn't sit right with me. Perhaps it's his consistency. He has this seemingly limitless potential but never produces week to week.

Maybe, but there isn't much else at Casey to replace them with for the minute. We can only go with what we have.

And others might hold off on the declarations of career ending concussions for that very reason - that was my smarmily sarcastic point.

Good luck Big Fella!

I just hope they try something different.Why not give Preuss a go in the ruck and start Max forward. If we go with stock standard plans we will lose. Requires something out of the box.

I knew I'd regret opening this thread. Don't ever change.

Can't believe Jeff was not on the plane! He is the only one with a bit of x factor and knows where the goals are. His defensive skills can't be any worse than anyone else in the team. He was out injured for just a few weeks so how many games at Casey does he need? Instead we take an undersized, underdeveloped kid who was dropped after one game and recovering from a broken jaw. Just don't understand our selection criteria anymore. Fear his card has been stamped.

Have the drink. Unlike the footy club, it won't let you down.

All those saying players aren't buying into the game plan even though it's existed for 3+ years seems a bit off the mark to me. The game changed quite significantly with 666, and our game plan had to change to suit that. Our game plan is literally 3 rounds old, not 3+ years. Good example of this is that when we win clearances now, we rely on the midfield to deliver the footy into F50 more simply because our sweeping back flankers cant get there in time anymore. This is a good reason why connection has arguably gone backwards. Having said that, if players are going rogue and not "buying in" then that is more than a worry than the 3 losses themselves. Way to fill us with confidence demons. If by "not buying in" means not adhering to the game plan, then that's really bloody bad at this point of the teams development, and at odds with the perceived excellent relationships between players and coach. Alternatively, if by "not buying in" they simply mean putting in the work required to execute the game plan, then that's fixable. Hope not lost yet. A loss tomorrow will be really hard to swallow though. Frost needs to play out of his skin and shut down buddy otherwise we are in quite a bit of trouble.

He got dropped and then had his jaw broken in his VFL match. He got dropped for a reason and hasn’t had time to rectify the cause of his dropping and build form to return to AFL level. If he plays, it’s poor decision making by the coaching staff.

Steven May, Braces himself from a player running into him gets one week Martin elbows a guy, it's ok dustbin can i shine your boots.. The AFL is a joke?

Well, now we know the AFL is not serious about ridding the game of actions like Martin's. They pay lip service to the idea of the safety of players' heads. They say they are going to come down hard on hits to the head, but they don't. What kind of message are they sending to the young kids playing football out there now? It's ok to elbow your player in the head 100 meters off the ball when he/she is not expecting it. Just great AFL. A player like Martin who is idolized by hundreds of these kids should be punished so they can see not even he can get away with such actions. But no, we get the opposite result. He receives leniency because of his popularity. WRONG MESSAGE.

a screaming Hore - well i never.

Well written article by Ryan I would have thought. Our midfield for whatever reason have become lazy, they are downhill skiers at the moment. The other big problem and probably the main reason we are getting scored against so much from stoppages is that they are not playing as a unit. I include Max in this, he's a key part of that unit. It's every man for himself... Viney is always problematic, it's his nature to see ball get ball and then try and break tackles. It's not always (most often) the best option...he needs to be a team player and hopefully this was pointed out to him in the "circle of truth"... Harmes can be a bit selfish with the ball particularly around goal... So currently we have a lazy, selfish and disorganised midfield, a virtually non existent forward line and a VFL level defence. It's no wonder we a 0-3. Turning around the midfield will go a long way to making that 1-4...

This sounds like the first line of a country and western song.

I wouldn't get too worked up about what the coach says to the media. He said injury and fitness is not an issue before the match to bolster some confidence with supporters though he knew what he said afterwards was the truth (or at least part of it). I'm hoping players have enough sense to only listen to what they are told within the club. What is said publicly is all fugazi and trite nonsense just to keep the AFL in the public eye.

View your membership fee as a charitable donation every year and you will be much happier.

With the Sydney ground’s surface in a dangerously poor condition, would it be in the club’s interest to demand the game be abandoned and the 4 points shared ?

Last year I would have agreed, but this year I don't think our problem is width that much. As in, I don't think we're being broken down defensively because we can't spread wide. IMO if we play like we did in Rounds 1-3 we'll get opened up on any ground, narrow or wide. One possible benefit to the SCG is that its shorter in length. We love pressing up into our forward half and at the SCG I suppose that doesn't leave as much space out the back as it does at the G or at GMHBA, for example. So maybe there's less space behind us to defend and we won't get caught out as much?

I’ve heard from a reliable source that only Oscar and Frosty attended- both pointed the finger at each other and left..

“Once everyone starts buying in and we start defending well we’ll start playing a lot better football” James Harmes. https://www.melbournefc.com.au/news/2019-04-09/we-can-turn-it-around-harmes

The value of honesty sessions is often who facilitates them and who attends. Ideally, it would be an external facilitator (are we still using Leading Teams?) who is experienced in setting the right tone so everyone feels comfortable in participating and can manage the dynamics. Sometimes without coaches, players can give honest feedbackabout game plan, role, demands etc to an external person if they can't say tehm directly to a coach. Doesn't need to be a sinister reason, could be opportunity, experience etc. Player only meetings have another benefit - they take ownership of the issues and commit to each other a course of action/behaviours. Remember after our first final Lewis took only the players aside to say 'well done but we've done nothing yet'. They went out the following week and knocked off the Hawks. AFL 360 with Lewis might make interesting viewing tonight.

Change could also mean the players executing the game plan, which managed to get us a a prelim final last year. If we take Goodwin at his word along with what Viney, Brayshaw etc are saying its that we are not performing because the players are not executing as instructed. Our performance this season closely resembles last season (although we did manage an early win or two) and the club turned things around to win 6 in a row, before dropping off again after the bye only to come storming back, beat WCE and GWS and win 2 finals. We are a young side and have started slowly but on history I'm backing the coaches and players to turn things around.

The reason that the PF keeps getting mentioned is that it is the coach himself who said that he did not discuss the match with the players due to the fact that the result was due to the team not playing our brand of footy. Simply put, the defeat was due to the team not executing its game plan rather than our game plan being exploited. Many have quite justifiably questioned this assessment. In all matches this year, opposing coaches have done the same thing as the Eagles. Other factors may be at play as well such as 6/6/6, injuries, unavailability and poor form, but rightly the game plan is being seriously questioned and discussed. I agree that the final judgment will come at year end. Bagging individual players or the coach is poor form, but most posters have objectively tried to comment on what they have seen to-date. Some go overboard but that's human nature. Most of us were anticipating great things this year. Perhaps we had unrealistic expectations, but it is understandable that supporters are very disappointed with the results so far and the way we have played. And this website is a vehicle for comment and discussion.

If there is 1 player pulling their weigh it is Salem.

Why stop there? Why not add in something about the coaching staff, medical staff, dieticians and psychs? Our first tier midfield (Broliver) has been carrying the side. Full-stop. Gawn has had a decent 2 weeks, with Scott admitting he pantsed Stanley. As Barassi would say "give me GPS and I will shut up'. The media and many posters just look at the scoreboard and then conclude that A, B & C are lazy selfish and disorganised. The media and many posters look at 0-3 and THEN start questioning recruiting and selection. Generals after the war is just lazy with non-existent thinking. The figures don't back you up at all; but I would say our 2nd tier midfield utilities (ANB etc...) could be seen as lazy with a preference of being first to the front half having a shot at goal, at the expense of implementing instant defence and running hard back to help and fill dangerous space. Any criticism of Broliver in the media and here is a joke. 44 hard-earned possessions aint enough in hostile territory against the hottest side in the comp?

Apart from Jones ... Harmes, Melksham, Petracca, T-Mac, Jetta, Hibberd & Viney aren't doing anywhere near enough as well Salem & Gawn can play better too. That is 10 senior/best players not playing up to scratch. In a nutshell, that is the issue. 3 other automatics are injured ... Lever, May & Lewis ... thus creating undue pressure on an undermanned defence. Our defence is also under seige because of our issues further afield.

It doesn't automatically follow that points from stoppages is indicative of laziness on behalf of our midfield core. We are still the number one clearance team in the competition but have dropped from 2nd to 17th in contested marking and from 1st to 11th in inside 50 marks. Scores from stoppages against could just as much an indicator of opposition efficient ball use as it is a black mark against the work ethic of the midfielders. Of course that could be an ingredient.

Just because it's pointing out some truths about our best players, doesn't mean it's wrong. At least one area we should be able to clean up our stoppage leakage pretty quickly, but that's put too much pressure on the defense which is getting a hiding from everyone on here. This has been mentioned in the midfield thread but the article gets it 100% right and is backed up with the stats: Talented with the ball in hand and tough inside the contest, opponents have begun to realise that Clayton Oliver, Angus Brayshaw, James Harmes and Jack Viney don't seem to want to work as hard this season as they did at the end of last year to help out a defence that has begun to leak like a colander held under a waterfall. Melbourne are the worst team in the competition in relation to scores from stoppages so far this season having conceded 25 more points from stoppages than they have scored in the first three rounds.

It's bizarre in that Tom Morris from 3AW specifically stated that the AFL will play the game at the SCG regardless of how dangerous the turf is, as they don't have a contingency plan. Hard to believe it in this day in age of OH&S.

He's been 'Trengoved'

Looks like a great opportunity to me. Bring it on!

It's quite extraordinary to me that the word ''he's'' has become ''his''. I see it everywhere.

Most of our good players aren't playing very well or aren't playing ... that is what the meeting would be about (IMO) More so the form rather than the availability of talent. But keep it in house ... we've got a tough game away on Thursday and Sydney will bring their best now (again, IMO) I just don't believe in giving a sucker an even break ... agree with the honesty session/crisis talks though. We have to get our year going.

We will win this and change the tragectory of the season. Small grounds suit us, until we adapt to the 6-6-6 rule. We were better on smaller grounds last year before the AFL changed the rules and unfairly lessened our recruitment strategy of competitive beasts.

Every single club can say the same about a stack of different players. McInerny last through to pick 37 in the rookie draft, so every club passed on him over 100 times. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.