SaberFang

I had a good laugh hearing Hardwick in his press conference ticking off other 'top 8' teams they've defeated as proof they aren't pretenders, including us. What absolute [censored] -- he knows they only won against us because we were two down on rotations and got supremely lucky with injuries. They are finally getting found out and it's fantastic.

Fox must be licking their lips with all these idiotic scheduling decisions made by the brains trust at Seven; consistently choosing dud games as their free-to-air offering.

That was my exact thinking. God knows what an opposition club sniper would do in a final if push came to shove...

Well, we can kiss finals goodbye, that much is clear. You can't have losses against Richmond and Fremantle (teams we beat last year) and expect to play finals. Yeah, we registered wins against St Kilda and Carlton (Port flogged them by ~100 points whereas we barely fell over the line), but it remains two steps forward and two steps backwards. I can't wait to see all the optimism going into next week's match only to lose, again, through inaccuracy in front of goal (despite dominating in all stats). Oh yeah, hope you feel like [censored], Jordan. Three games lost from a lack of leadership; we could easily have been 5-0 with you on the ground.

How bad a senior coach do you need to be to continually lose close games when you're in front in the dying minutes? Just flood the [censored] forward line you dolt!

HAHAHAHAHAH NORF!

Hardly surprising, it's practically tradition for our team to lose those games. We've made a habit of it and it's so predictable it's not funny.

It's not looking great right now. Just hitting form by the looks of things.

Bad accuracy in front of goal seems to be a theme this year. Freo kicking themselves out of the game with 12 behinds, GWS with 15 (though with a comfortable enough lead it doesn't matter).

Any chance, if you get that truth, you won't broadcast it all over the internet for opposition teams to discover and take advantage of? You do realise players and clubs keep the specifics of injuries secret for good reason, right?

Hard to believe any sane person who would knock that percentage back, especially in this climate. The stumbling block is that 20% in the first year is fine but 1% in successive years isn't enough because of CPI. As with most pay increases, a total percentage is usually determined (in this case ~25%) and then divided into the years of contract. By getting the vast majority of the increase upfront, it has financial benefits to players. What would you prefer, 20% + 1% + 1% + 1% + 2% or 5% + 5% + 5% + 5% + 5%? I'd feel more sympathy for the AFLPA if the stumbling block was increasing the base salary for rookies, or to introduce post-career care for concussion sufferers, or care for badly injured players who needed to retire prematurely. Unfortunately, their goal seems to just be guaranteeing even more money for the 0.1% at the top, while the median salary would hardly change. Why not get some perspective from lesser-known players on sub-$100K rather than those trying to purchase their 4th house?

3.7.25 to 3.7.25! Well, both teams' supporters can sulk about missed opportunities together!

Missing from 15m after that free kick was a disgrace. When you get those opportunities you CANNOT miss them.

How any MFC supporter can still make posts like this is beyond me. How many times do we need to learn the same lesson?

How are GWS going to pay all these players with contracts ballooning to that size?

How the hell did St Kilda end up with Hawthorn's first rounder? What an absolute coup; I don't remember them losing anything substantial in the last draft/trade period.

Not a great look I admit, but we also don't know the circumstances of what's going through Jesse's head right now. For all we know he's absolutely filthy at himself for the suspension, and coupling that guilt with the condition of father at the same time might be really stressing him out?

Richmond can forget about ever having success if Schache, Martin and Prestia are taking up 25% of their salary cap.

Agree, I think we'll make Carlton regret their little games with these medical reports, which were clearly falsified/manipulated to suit their agenda.

He would slot straight in, he's going to be a special player. Wish we'd found a way to get him back in his draft.

I'm glad we won but, geez, today's obsession with endless handballs in circles to teammates under pressure, until an inevitable turnover, nearly did my f***ing head in. Especially when, time and time again, we saw Carlton breaking the lines with kicking chains from D50 to F50 in the space of 2 kicks. Definitely a case of another team bringing us down to their level (identical to Brisbane last year) but ultimately our list is still young and they need to learn how opposition coaches will strategise against us when they don't have the cattle to match us; this only comes from experience. The obvious positive is that we are still winning these ugly games!

As soon as 'On the Couch' highlighted this game plan, I knew other teams would immediately work out a way to nullify it. I'm surprised we actually went into today's game attempting it; it would've been smarter to try something unexpected and catch Bolton off guard?

Every game is in HD on Fox, even the Seven ones.

I didn't want the Saints to win but they were seriously [censored] over by the umpires. That free kick count, just like the one last night, shows the pathetic bias by umpires towards certain teams. Enough already!

Seven never pass up an opportunity to broadcast a game with Essendon, Collingwood, Richmond, Hawthorn, Carlton or Geelong playing. Interstate clubs and smaller Vic clubs are like lepers to Seven.