Surfer Dee

We ran them into the ground in the second half. Used the width of the ground and took the ball out of the contest. Waited for a good handball receive and went deep instead of bombing it. Credit where it's due, this was a good coaching performance.

Were there any discernible coaching moves by Goody tonight throughout the game? Like as the game got away from us or as we were failing to capitalise on f50 entries? Genuine question.

I'd have called them the Tassie Wild. Styled in the vein of the Minnesota Wild in the NHL. Their look and jumpers would have worked perfectly. A waste.

Wasn’t too bad. Need to get Windsor and Kolt up to 20 games ASAP. Look for improvement in the back half of the season this year. Hopefully young players come on and we pop a bit. If we’re about 7-7 after 14 rounds I wouldn’t be stressing. I reckon Laurie will be a player. Need to get him to 20 games too.

We need to average two goals a game more next year imo. Assume we target accuracy every year so even though this is the most relevant way to improve I'll ignore that here. We just need a clever, crafty forward. Not a freak, just someone to kick 30-40 a year. That might be Petty... And a lock down defender. Don't panic, stay the course, keep our strengths strong, bring our forward line up to afl average or slightly better and we're golden. This team will compete for 5+ years. The window is not closing, don't burn it down, small improvements will make the difference.

Nice. But seriously, small players are dominating the comp right now. If you can step, take the game forward and have X factor around the goals then height counts for very little. Contested marking is the most overrated stat in the game. Teams must average what? Maybe 10 per game??? Pfft, give me ground level hunters with goal sense. Every. Day.

I'm something of a stats man ala Binman. I believe that, overtime, statistical dominance in key areas of the game translates to scoreboard dominance. However, the Dees have an issue. I believe that we lose more games when the expected score predicts that we should have won than any other team. I wish I had access to the predicted score database over the last few years because I would like quantify that statement but I'd be surprised if it's not the case. So, I now believe that there's something more intangible going on that the stats aren't telling us. I feel like we're the reverse Collingwood. We lose when we should win and they win when they should lose. So what's going on? I feel like there's something in our gameplan more significant than straight kicking. Our mistakes often cost us easy goals. Our full ground defensive web takes a huge amount of effort and I'm worried that it leaves us spread out too thin to run in waves on the turnover. It feels like the goals we concede are easy goals, where as ours are the result of brutally hard efforts and contest work. Teams seem content to play the game in our forward half, causing congestion and basically forcing us to kick stoppage goals. I'd love your thoughts on this. I feel like we're good enough to beat any team but we make everything harder than it needs to be. This is why these losses are so frustrating.

Massive yes to this guy. Ignore his height, it's never been less important. This kid can dance, makes a moment into something special regularly. Do people think Tom Papley is too short? Or do they hold their breath when he gets near it? The latter imo.

Gus retire? The guy will be playing in our prelim! Tougher than a cats head.

Three finals losses, all significant wins on expected score. It's wasted chances versus luck from the opposition. should have won that by 30+

The surface level critique of Trac when he was drafted was that he was arrogant. I would now describe him as self aware. Completely comfortable with talking honestly about himself - his strengths but also his weaknesses. Could there be a better personality trait for a professional athlete to help them deal with constant criticism and praise and use what they need to improve themselves? A bad misread by St kilda and it's been our great fortune ever since.

I get what you're saying but Kozi and jacko played early on in 2020 but would you call them 'ready made' plug and play talent? I reckon it was the next year before they were impact players. Have either hit their ceiling yet? Probably not. i guess what I'm saying is I want a high talent ceiling not a physical specimen that dominates against kids. They can of course play straight away and hopefully impact but that shouldn't be the priority imo.

We have a premiership calibre team today. This draft should be about getting high impact players who can start to hit their straps 2-3 years from now and help us avoid a dip as our core ages. I want high ceiling talent. I care not for AFL ready bodies. Rarely do these players look like the right choice 5 years on.

Brutal game. Insane intensity. Forget top two, that was the type of footy we need to be playing. That'll get us to a prelim (anything can happen from there). Undone by a few lucky bounces, kicks that fell short and a damn good midfielder in Cripps. Nothing to be ashamed of here, let's replay it in September.

Forget his height. Kid is an impact forward. Wins contests in the front half. Kicks goals. We crush our opponents under the weight of a brutal contested game in the midfield. We need players to take advantage of the i50 opportunities we create. Love this kid. Forward line of JVR, Jefferson, Fritsch, Kozi and Watson sounds like a handful in 2-4 years to me. If he displaces Chandler and co.??? No worries, he's depth or a trade piece. Hardly an issue to me.