DistrACTION Jackson

Thought Pickett was a bit unlucky with his dangerous tackle last night, there wasn't a lot in it. Hopefully he learns from it though, as I love his aggression and just needs to learn when to back off a little.

Really flat after yesterday's loss. Some key areas that were extremely frustrating. - Fritsch's discipline was disgraceful and I hope Goody called it out in the post game meeting. - The ARC review was a terrible call by the umpire and the AFL need to look at this. If it isn't related to a goal being kicked then surely they can check while play is on-going? Lever actually ran through the goal square so if it was a behind it would've been play on anyway. Just really poor umpiring and match awareness. - Missing set shots and goals from 20m out. Our composure was shocking and it isn't a new issue. When other teams don't pressure like the Hawks we can play champagne football. Once the better sides put on pressure we fall into old habits. One other point is the state of the game is just a mess, and this isn't only referring to our game. I'm getting pretty tired of watching the rugby like scrum game after game, the completely shocking umpire interpretations and the constant frees being paid for tiny infringements which for some reason aren't paid in finals. In my view the game has gone backwards under Gil and Hocking's watch and I'm becoming less and less interested in it.

Gee Franklin is getting paid well to be injured! No real surprises in our list for me. Gawn obviously our best player of the last 4-5 years and deserves to be highest paid, as well as being captain of the club. I would expect his next contract will be on a reduced number so as to get our side together as much as possible over the next 5 years. Clarry already a 2 time B&F winner and all-Australian so enough said. Lever & Mar yet to justify their salaries, though they are trending in the right direction.

I think we should go Tomlinson if it is to play the wing role. This is too important a game to be experimenting in the hope it works.

The thing I love about him is there is no BS with Gawny and he looks to genuinely care about his teammates. I believe the culture and team first nature at the club is the best it has been since I started barracking back in the late nineties. I think it's just taking time for this to translate onto the field, though hopefully it is starting to now.

I think injury lists are going to play a huge part the rest of this season. Teams with larger lists are going to really struggle to rotate their players to keep them fresh, which may result in additional injuries due to fatigue. Port and Adelaide have similar lists to us, however both North and Collingwood are really struggling on the injury front. We really need to take advantage of this period. Anything less than 3 wins in the next 5 games will be a fail in my mind. Looking through the injury lists of sides we will be playing during this condensed fixture period and they are as follows: Port Adelaide Adelaide North Melbourne Collingwood

The other point to note is I believe we currently have Hawks 2nd round pick. This pick could very possibly start in the 22-25 range.

So glad I claimed that name....

Sicily won't play on Brown or Jackson. He's only 186cm so would get monstered. He typically plays on the 3rd or 4th tall and they use him as a distributor. I'd like to see Melksham go to him in a negating role. I'd say Frawley will get Weideman and Frost will get Brown/Jackson for the majority of the game.

We've really been f'ed around the most so far. Games cancelled, moved to NSW and then to Qld. Hopefully we can still win enough games to make finals and then who knows what will happen given the only teams that will play home finals will likely be Qld, SA and WA based teams.

Hawks will come out hot early on given the criticism. We will need to weather the storm and if we play to our strengths should get up by 4-5 goals.

If he doesn't get up I think we should play Brown. Like for like. Unless they want to give Jackson another taste, which I'm not opposed to.

I've heard that argument and my response is we already have an uneven season, so the concern that weather affects a few games is really a mute point.

I'm all for that as well. I guess the idea is by adding an incentive to score, coaches will focus on the attacking side more than defending.

I think both him and OMac are starting to build the bodies required to compete consistently at AFL level. Let's not forget they are 24 & 23 years old and this is usually when KPPs start to become more dominant.

Let's be honest, Campbell Brown is about as switched on as a Trump supporter. His choices are baffling.

Brayshaw is doing his job. I saw him get a few key takeaways from centre bounces and he plays a bit more on the wing than others. We don't need everyone racking up huge possessions, though it seems some Demonlanders would like 22 players with 30 touches each....

Don't get hung up on possessions, the only thing they are good for is fantasy football. I like to review a player's supercoach score, as this is often a good indicator of their impact on the game. Hannan scored 93 & Pickett 72 from 8 touches each. To put this in context, Melksham had 14 touches and a goal and only scores 66. What this tells me is that they are both having a much greater impact on the game, even though they have less touches.

I brought this up in another thread. Beggars belief really.

If we don't pick both of them this week then I will spew up..... I'd also prefer ANB to Hunt at this point. Incredibly, is probably a better disposer of the ball.

100% agree. WTF is this club doing with it's forward coaching? I am so disappointed in the club as a whole, not just Goodwin. Mahoney and the board need to take more responsibility for this mess.

After thinking about this since the weekend I really feel the FD should do the following: 1. Bring in Weid as full forward/second ruck for Vandenberg who has been pretty much unsighted in 2 games. Please Goody it's now or never for him. I prefer Weid as I think he is more suited to a pack crashing role than Brown who is more a 2nd/3rd tall. 2. Drop Hunt for Bennell. No brainer 3. Rivers out for Jetta. I love what the future may hold for Rivers but he is stuggling a bit at the moment and we need Jetta's experience back. 4. Drop Smith for Omac. Oscar to stand Ben King and May to stand Sam Day. Allows Lever to be the third tall interceptor. B: Jetta O McDonald Hibberd HB: Lever May Salem ? Langdon Viney Tomlinson HF: Hannan T McDonald Bennell F: Pickett Weideman Melksham R: Gawn Harmes Petracca Int: Brayshaw Lockhart Fritsch Oliver Viney - please play within your capabilities and look for smart options. Oliver - please stop hand-balling to players in a worse position. Petracca - please keep doing what you're doing.

I don't think a full rebuild is required, just a few tweaks.

Yeah I agree. Hindsight is always a wonderful thing, but at the end of 2018 we thought we had the best attack, however our defence leaked like a sieve. That campaign wasn't helped by Lever hurting his knee right when he started to hit some form. I understand why the club went and got May after 2018, but unfortunately it has been a fail so far. I think we must make a call on one of Viney, Brayshaw or Oliver. I think we need to inject some more leg speed and skillful ball use into the mix, think a Jared Polec or Brad Hill. I would prefer we keep Brayshaw and Oliver, however I think it's unlikely we get rid of Viney unless he decides to leave.

Surely one of the most important aspects is to get our forwards running patterns that open up the forward line and make it easier to score. Yes our midfield is currently deplorable with their skill level, but also how often do we have 3 guys or standing together blocking up the area and making it almost impossible to score?