At the break of Gawn

Anyone know what Tom Morris was alluding to in regards to the friction between the MFC and Trac’s family? Almost seemed once Trac got to hospital the club didn’t seem to provide the level of care or concern for him and his family that he was expecting?

Mick’s a dinosaur whose views have little credibility in this day and age. However, he does have a few valid points in this article. After a couple of our top liners, it falls away really quickly. He’s also right about Steven May, too. His inability to admit fault also is running riot at the moment without Lever there. He just points and blames other defenders even though we’ve seen him give half arsed efforts when led to the ball, and only likes it when the ball comes in long. He’s no where near the player of the last few years and his attitude is the epitome of the group at the moment. No willingness to do the hard yards and quick to pass the buck.

I absolutely hate Collingwood, but since they’ve sacked Buckley and booted McGuire they have not put a foot wrong. They’ve brought in the best head coach in waiting, grabbed some of the best assistant coaches out there, and have made really smart decisions with their recruiting. I’m not sure if it’s all of Graham Wright’s doing, but there Footy dept seems to be head and shoulders above the competition. To not lie down after being 54pts is very admirable and they’re probably the most reliable team now over the last 3 years. I absolutely hate it but it’s the painful truth.

I actually think this will help us. It’ll make them realise they need to be switched on. Also North are pretty average at the MCG.

Also think it’s funny that Langdon in ‘22 bags the Pies and they go after them and beat us. Comben says “we think they’re gettable” and North actually goes out and belts them in the first half.

Binman would be loving this! Absolutely shows if you’re not switched on, you’ll get belted by anyone. I hope our players are watching this because you can’t just go expecting to win against any side.

One thing I’m noticing at the moment is the emergence of young and fast midfielders. Sydney has Gulden and Warner. Port has Butters, Rozee and JHF. Carlton have Walsh. Hawks have a couple coming though too. We don’t have anyone emerging. Maybe that can be Tholstrup for us. The golden age of the midfield bull is over and we’ve been late to the party to notice.

I haven’t read or watched too much AFL media this week, but did anyone raise the opinion that Moore’s knee was completely unnecessary? He was trying to reach for that spoil and it just made no sense to go with the knee. He wasn’t going for a speccy, and he wasn’t protecting himself. If Moore wasn’t such an AFL media darling, I reckon there would have been a bit of a focus on careless and unnecessary knees in a marking contest.

This could really ugly for the Saints. I’m not looking forward to playing the Lions up there in a few weeks.

I think you’re too concerned with the W/L columns. Goodwin and co are more concerned about how we are playing. As per the stats at the start of the thread, our game is in terrible shape. If we get our game in good shape, the wins will come and they’ll come against good teams not just North and West Coast. The bye couldn’t have come quick enough for a reset.

Ok, so if they say AFL official it must have been an umpire because all the other AFL officials are at the interchange. Is it possible he was just calling out a nickname or calling out to a player and the umps have just misheard him? Totally bizarre.

Sounds like he’s gone for the year

I think our former captain has summed it up best. We’re not a top 4 or even a top 8 side anymore.

Umm he played his usual share in the ruck and was very effective. Goody let him be our deepest forward at times which looked good and he brought Fritsch up the ground.

Anyone listen to SEN morning with Garry & Tim? Interesting hearing that Tim Watson said he watched May quite closely and said he looked disinterested and lazy at times. He basically said he doesn’t seem to want to chase a leading player, doesn’t like playing on anyone mobile and just wants the ball in long so he can intercept. I find this really disappointing given he supposed to be a leader of this club. With Champion Data rating his season as his lowest ever, I wonder if the cliff is now for him? Anyone know when his contract expires?

Bugger. A real unnecessary knee from Moore and horrible kick forward that just sat on the players heads too.

We wouldn’t have this anger towards Maynard if the AFL had rightly suspended him for 3 weeks and he would have missed out on a premiership medal and potentially Collingwood wouldn’t have even won the flag.

Another poor performance from our midfield. I’m glad Goody acknowledged how bad we are at centre clearance and clearances in general in his presser. It makes it very difficult to play a strong territory game when you get smashed in clearances. I also think Viney is really struggling. Who knows if he’s injured or not but only 19 disposals. Only 1 clearance, went at 53% and only 20 pressure acts. I’m just not sure what we do with him. How can we overcome this clearance problem in the middle? Is it the player mix or is it more of a positioning and strategy thing?

It would take us 10 years to turn over our list to get something like Sydney has. I think Goody is a good coach. He created a defensive system that took the comp by storm and won a flag with it. I’m a big believer in bringing in fresh voices. In 2020/21 we brought in Yze, Burgess, Choco and Richardson. We gave Goody a great team of coaches. Now I think that era has past and we need fresh voices. If I was Pert, I’d be going hard after Leppitsch, Bolton, Dew and maybe a Scott Burns who’s been pretty good for Adelaide as a forwards coach.

I feel we need to go back to basics in the off-season. Take a leaf out of Collingwood’s book and bring back stern non-negotiables. We were the number 1 pressure side in 2021 and there’s no wonder we won the flag. We were an anytime, anywhere side. Now we’re so flakey, that we need perfect dry conditions, against a small club at the MCG to guarantee a win.

Pressure stats can be skewed with game style. The Pies like to get it on the outside so it makes it hard to pressure them when they take the heat out of it. On the flip side, when the ball is in contest, they swarm and are the no.1 pressure side. I [censored] hate the fact that the Pies are so well drilled. I’ve heard Fly say that at training they basically spend all their time on basic fundamentals and pressure.

I’m actually not sure if we were better at the contest this week because the Pies lose the contested possession by 20 on average each week. What disappointed me is that we didn’t make it a scrap. The Pies love the outside ball, and to lose clearances to them and let them get it to the outside was ultimately our downfall. Our centre square and stoppage positioning needs a complete overhaul. Regarding any sense of improvement from last week, I think as a fan base we just have to accept that this isn’t going to happen overnight. Maybe get some momentum against North but I can’t see us beating Brisbane at the GABBA.

I know we would have scolded Goody if we hadn’t of tagged Daicos, but tagging Daicos with AnB let them have that extra spare down back which absolutely killed our forward chances, especially early. Very poor from our mids again, especially after half time. Got belted in clearance. Bit hard to win territory when they win clearances (especially centre clearances so easily) Should have gone a hard tag from Viney if I’m honest but he doesn’t have the tank. I know he puts 100% in but he’s the opposite of a dangerous mid, he’s offering us nothing at the moment. Poor coaching again of our mids. We just have no answer to winning clearances. Poor coaching again of our forwards. I’m not sure what they’re doing with Fritsch but he doesn’t look dangerous anymore. We’re just a middle of the road side extremely down on confidence. If I were Goody, I’d use the remaining games for a launchpad for 2025.

They can’t do anything wrong and will kick goals from the 4th level. We can’t do anything right.

Carlton also 2nd on the ladder playing our exact 2023 game plan but with some better forwards. Just shows it still goes alright. Will be great to see the contest and territory game back today.