Demonland

In keeping with our tough draw theme, Week 3 sees Melbourne take on flag favourites, North Melbourne, at Casey Fields this Sunday at 1:05pm. The weather forecast looks dry, a coolish 14 degrees and will be characteristically gusty. Remember when Casey Fields was considered our fortress? The Demons have lost two of their past three matches at the Field of Dreams, so opposition teams commute down the Princes Highway with more optimism these days. The Dees held the highest all-time win/loss ratio until last week. Adelaide now leads with 72.8%, from Melbourne 72.7%, Brisbane 67.9% and North 66.7%. Long term injuries to stars such as Liv Purcell, Tayla Harris, and Lauren Pearce plus speedster Aimee Mackin are not helping our prospects this season. Supporters need to be patient as the team integrates nine new players, having traded 4 or 5 regulars to other clubs. North is a formidable team this year led by three superstars of the competition: defensive general Emma Kearney, theleague-leading possession winner Ash Riddell and Jasmine Garner, the 2024 captain’s choice competition’s best player. Mick Stinear often sends the diminutive Shelley Heath to run with Garner. He did not send anyone to Ally Anderson last week and publicly rued that decision. Ally dominated the game andearned 10 coaches’ votes. Meggs was at Arden Street last Sunday to witness the power of work that Ash Riddell does. She was awesome and earned 8 coaches votes. Our superstar Kate Hore was well tagged by Bre Koenen last week resulting in only 10 disposals and a late consolation goal. The North coaching team will have gone to school on this. Congratulations to Paxy on her 75th game! She has settled well as our halfback general, and her experience will be vital against the Roos. Selection this week Thankfully no new injuries to report at the time of writing. In addition to the 21 players selected last week, we have only 4 additional players available. They are tall forward Georgia Gall, halfback Lily Johnson, key back Delany Madigan and utility Denby Taylor. Pisano did well last week, could we see another debutant? Lily Johnson impressed in VFLW with her pace, courage and good kicking skills. North Melbourne will make a couple of changes this week: Irish speedster Erika O’Shea is listed as a test. If playing, she matches up well on Banno. Goal-sneak Alice O’Loughlin will return from her one-week suspension. Meggs view Expect North Melbourne to be too strong across the ground. A very settled team with no major injuries. Demons’ rucks Georgia Campbell and Rhi Watt will be fully tested. North has Emma King, 187cm tall, and support from Kim Rennie. A midfield of Garner, Riddell, the classy Bruton and bull Mia King will make life very difficult. Expect Mick to play Goldrick and Lampard though the middle again with Hore at times. Heathy will likely run with Ash or Jazz. It has been a tough initiation for cross-coder Grace Beasley, and she improves with each week. Our main hope for winning is freeing up Tyla Hanks, as her ball movement and creativity is elite. Amy Smith, daughter of Shaun, executes tagging roles well for North and may go to Hanksy. Geelong looked dangerous last week when using speed to break from the contest. We need to do this to win. Blaithin Mackin is playing her career best footy and making a real impact from her wing. Eliza McNamara has begun season in great form too. Zanker had her best quarters last year against Adelaide and Geelong. How about monstering your old mate Libby and kicking a bag, Edo If we can garner strength this week with 4-quarters of pressure footy at home, maybe we can surprise in a closely fought contest. Go Dees! North Melbourne by 4 points THE GAME Round 3: Melbourne v North Melbourne, Sunday 15 September 2024 at 1:05pm (Melbourne time) Casey Fields, Melbourne - Wurundjeri/ Boon Wurrung HEAD TO HEAD Overall Melbourne 6 wins North Melbourne 2 wins At Casey Fields Melbourne 3 wins North Melbourne 1 win The Coaches Stinear 5 wins Crocker 1 win MEDIA TV - Fox Footy, Kayo. Mobile – AFL Live Official App Radio – Casey Radio. THE LAST TIME THEY MET - Season 8 Qualifying Final at Ikon Park, 4 November 2023 MELBOURNE 0.1 0.1 0.2 1.3 (9) NORTH MELBOURNE 1.4 2.4 5.6 7.8 (50) GOALS MELBOURNE Bannan NORTH MELBOURNE Randall 3, Eddey 2, O'Loughlin, E. King BEST MELBOURNE Hanks, Purcell, Hore, Goldrick, Gay, Gillard NORTH MELBOURNE Garner, Riddell, Kearney, Randall, Wright, Pullar INJURIES MELBOURNE Nil NORTH MELBOURNE Shierlaw (head knock) CROWD 5,431 at Ikon Park Darren Crocker, the North coach, highlighted in the post-match press conference that ‘how to beat Melbourne’ was no secret following their recent losses to the top 3 teams. North was brilliant on the day. Far more aggressive, laid 104 tackles and forced Melbourne into skill errors which ended up being the Dees 2nd biggest loss in history. Experienced forward Tahlia Randall had a field day kicking 3 goals. She and her mate Kate Shierlaw well and truly outbodied and outsprinted their now new teammate Libby Birch. There were rumours that an illness had swept through the Demon camp which helped explain the underwhelming performance. There were no such excuses from Mick Stinear. His team had finished second during the home and away season, earned the second chance but sadly, lost the next week to be out of the finals in straight sets. THE TEAMS MELBOURNE B Colvin Gillard HB Chaplin Heath Paxman C McNamara Lampard Mackin HF Bannan Mithen Goldrick F Zanker Gall FOLL Campbell Hanks Hore I/C (from) Beasley Fitzsimon Hill Johnson Pisano Taylor Watt Wotherspoon IN Gall Johnson Taylor OUT NORTH MELBOURNE B Birch Ferguson HB Kearney Wright Bresnehan C Gatt Garner Smith HF Eddey O'Loughlin Bruton F Randall Shierlaw FOLL Rennie King Riddell I/C (from) Burke Craven King Martin McGrath O'Shea Tripodi Wall IN McGrath O'Loughlin O'Shea OUT Injury List: Round 2 Melbourne Jemma Rigoni Groin 2-3 weeks Saraid Taylor Calf 3-4 weeks Lauren Pearce Wrist 6 weeks Olivia Purcell Face TBC Tayla Harris Shoulder Season Jacinta Hose ACL Season Aimee Mackin ACL Season North Melbourne Erika O’Shea Knee Test Lula Pullar Calf 1-2 weeks Eliza Shannon Ankle 1-2 weeks Georgia Stubs Ankle Season

No surprises that we're not in the conversation anymore.

Impressive.

Is there an echo in here? Happy to hear this. Need all the leadership we can get.

I see him at many non Sabbath games (Thursday/Sunday/perhaps Saturday nights) in the Premium Members section with a couple other younger family members so unless he's being given tickets by the club then he is a paid up Premium Member.

What else did the club offer Trac to make that statement the other day? 😜

Carlton will be very busy this trade period.

2024 AFL CLUB MEMBERSHIP LADDER (asterisk denotes club membership record this year) 1. Collingwood* 110,628 (2023 tally: 106,470) 2. Carlton* 106,345 (2023 tally: 95,277) 3. West Coast 103,498 (2023 tally: 103,275) 4. Richmond 98,489 (2023 tally: 101,349) 5. Geelong* 90,798 (2023 tally: 82,155) 6. Hawthorn* 83,823 (2023 tally: 80,698) 7. Essendon 83,664 (2023 tally: 86,274) 8. Adelaide* 75,477 (2023 tally: 68,536) 9. Sydney* 73,757 (2023 tally: 65,332) 10. Port Adelaide* 66,015 (2023 tally: 64,041) 11. Melbourne 65,479 (2023 tally: 70,785) 12. Brisbane* 63,268 (2023 tally: 54,676) 13. Western Bulldogs* 62,328 (2023 tally: 56,302) 14. Fremantle* 62,237 (2023 tally: 62,064) 15. St Kilda* 60,467 (2023 tally: 60,239) 16. North Melbourne 50,628 (2023 tally: 51,084) 17. GWS* 36,629 (2023 tally: 33,036) 18. Gold Coast* 26,157 (2023 tally: 23,359)

Dear Members, There is no shying away from the fact that the 2024 AFL season has been a disappointing one for our football club. Our expectation was that we had the program and talent to be contending at the pointy end of the AFL season and we fell well short of this. In addition, we have again faced our challenges off the field and these events take their toll on our people, including our members. While it hurts to be watching the on-field action at this time of year, we must quickly switch our mindset towards moving forward, both on and off the field, to ensure our AFL team climbs back up the ladder in 2025. With this in mind, the club is conducting two separate reviews: one of its Board and one of its men’s football program. The Board review follows the recent transition from Kate Roffey to Brad Green in the role of President. As is common practice, the review is being led by an external independent expert, involves the President and all current Directors, and will benchmark the Board against best practice. The review of the men’s football department is focusing on the operations and overarching environment of the AFL program. This review is being conducted by President Brad Green, CEO Gary Pert and external consultant Darren Shand. For more than two decades, Darren served as the All Blacks Manager and was a crucial driver in creating and maintaining the environment which shaped the New Zealand All Blacks into the world’s most successful international sports team. Throughout his time as All Blacks Manager, the team won back-to-back World Cup tournaments in 2011 and 2015, and also won the Tri Nations and subsequent Rugby Championship six times. Darren is already familiar with our program, having spent time in the club earlier this year observing all elements of the men’s football program. While it will identify areas in which we need to get better, we believe it will also highlight many positive elements of our AFL program, and why we should head into next season with well-founded optimism about what we can achieve. The ambition of both review processes is to strive for excellence and to ensure, that as our game demands, we evolve to achieve sustained success. This ambition can only be achieved with alignment and commitment to our values of trust, respect, unity and excellence. The reviews of both the AFL program and the Board will be completed in October and the priorities identified will be communicated to our members. Your Board, CEO Gary Pert and the club’s leaders are committed to doing all we can to make the members of this great club proud to belong and we are confident these reviews will bring key insights to assist us in delivering on this commitment. The Melbourne Football Club Board

The Quote within the post contained the abbreviation which requires moderator approval for other reasons not relating to Green Bay.

Yeah the software doesn’t like the quotes and also doesn’t like posts that have the bad words edited out.

Guys perhaps write Green Bay. The abbreviation is being held up for moderation.

He’ll 100% end up at Carlton. Don’t know what they have to give but they always get their man. Except for Petracca (for now).