ArtificialWisdom

Of course, he is a talent. He is out of form and still picked up 25 in an "ok" performance in the VFL. I'm sure after a longish stint in the VFL he will build up the consistant form to push back into the 22. Not saying it will haven in a couple of weeks, but I expect him to be back in the side later in the year. Idk about you but I'd take Brayshaw's best over ANB's best. Unfortunatly Gus isnt producing his best at the minute.

I think the club wants to all keep the cards close to their chest much like with the "will Watts play round 1" debate. We all knew Watts would play and we all know Spence will play. Max just let slip the blatantly obvious then quickly tried to play it off. I dont really know why they are doing this, Spencer is the obvious option Freo would be preparing for him, no amount of clever/not very clever use of words is going to change that. The only surprise would be not picking him. Which i think one would refer to as shooting themselves in the foot, repeatedly.

I have to say I thought their decision come round 1 to pick ANB was bizzare I didn't think he was worth playing, particularly as a forward. But despite my continued doubts, it is undeniable that ANB has been among the best in rounds 1 and 3. I can't help but think he will be on thin ice in a months time with Brayshaw in the 2s who will inevitably demand a spot back, but for the time being ANB has secured his spot, and good on him! Hard earned.

what?? what on earth would make you think that? If its 12 weeks then he would be back with like 7 rounds to go... maybe if there was only 1/2 rounds to go and we were out of contention they wouldnt risk it but with 7 left he will play.

The forwardline/midfield structure completely fell apart in that period, both goals came from down the line turnovers where there were not enough at the contest to force a stopage. Defenders had nowhere to kick but straight back to geelong. But your final comment is the one I'm running with. We will still be right in with favourable chances in the next 4 games.

Way I see it: We have Freo, Adelaide, North and Collingwood in that period, Spencer will have a real challenge with their main men. However, all the other sides we play in that time lack a really high quality ruckman so Spencer should be more than capable against them. Hopefully he does well. Hope is not lost... yet

Spot on. Play like that every week and we will win more than we lose.

I think our sport cops it more than most just due to the way we record near a miss. But looking at other elite sports the scoring isnt much better. Just look at the likes of soccer they struggle to score at all a keeper makes it difficult but theres alot of shots that are just off target. Basketball if you get 50% they say you're shooting well. Rugby and NFL sure have pretty high conversion rates but both are similar scenarios. I'm sure that if we got to designate Watts to kick every shot our conversion rate would probably be pretty high too. I'm not excusing the woefull kicking on Saturday because it was abnormally bad, but the thought overall that we are wildly inaccurate compared to other sports I've always thought is a bit unfair. As a club though, we have been among the top accuracy for the best part of the past 2 years... I'm not going to panic after 1 really bad day.

I saw enough in that 3rd quarter to know we are more than capable of winning without Max. Of course he makes it easier in the middle but with watts breaking even we were fine against a fairly good midfield. Yeah he was spent come the 4th and they got ontop but with Spencil breaking even for the most part with the occasional win and also Watts still as 2nd ruck we should be fine. Just gotta take our chances up forward. On the bright side is this should give Max the time to get his wrist and back niggles right as well. If he comes back as late as round 15/16 fully fit we should still have enough wins in the bank to make a finals run. If somone told me we would lose Max for as much as 12 weeks this is the time of year I'd pick, better than round 13/14 when it would be season over. We have gotten the start to the season we wanted. Just gotta keep chalking up wins along the way while he is out.

Structure over player. We did that on the weekend: 3 like for like changes and it worked perfectly from a gameplan and stucture point of view... well, excluding the missed shots. I expect the same to happen, Spence for Gawn will happen dont stress

Out: Gawn In: Spencer No need to make any other changes they played well, hell we dominated for 2 quarters and finished with 32 scoring shots... Cant do much more than that from a team stand point. Just unfortunate we didn't slot some of those. If any of us knew we were going to have that many scoring shots before the game we would have been ecstatic. Today was an outlier, wont lose many when they control the game like that. ON the actual change, its Spence's time to shine! Gonna be a real challenge first up against the walking mountain in Sandilands. Gawn will just be shattered he isn't playing up against him.

I hope it's a close match, but i fear sydney might blow it right out before qtr time. I'd rather see an ugly close game than a clean blowout. Although regardless seeing collingwood 0-3 would be great

I hope so, because if it's a tight game against the cats, no doubt an experienced team like them will start pushing the buttons of the Vince's, Viney's and such who wont back down and then the remainder will want to fly the flag. Heads will need to be in the game from start to finish to give us any chance.

Yeah but your still looking at that through the eyes of a melbourne supporter angry at the concussion being used against us. I feel that anger too, being delayed concussion there is no way to conclusivly prove it was Hogan's slap that caused it and not any of the 100 other bumps Rowe had through the game, im fuming that anyone from the MRP could accept that as fact. But looking at the injury itself for a bit and given it was only a minor concussion. If he felt bad after the game and on monday its not unreasonable to think he could then train lightly on tuesday and thursday and then play.

Putting aside the cause of the injuries... Why is them playing making people assume they are non exsistant? If Viney got hit in the face with a baseball bat he would probably still front up the next week... why are you all so conserned that the carlton blokes have fronted up? Dusty is playing for Richmond as well.

Part of what I like about him is he just knows where he sits. He has stuck around on the list and seems very happy to play that backup role. Doesnt pout when he goes out of the team and always gives as good as he gets when he comes into the team. It takes a good character to do that.

Disappointed you're assuming we'll lose our qualifying final

Look at the following 4 matches at the sudden realistic possibility that we could/should be 6-1 maybe even 7-0 going into the game in Adelaide

So this whole week theres been alot of debate around who deserves/doesn't deseve to go out. So lets break it down a bit. This is the way I think most of us see it at this stage (assuming the rumor that smith is in is true): Vince for Lewis, Smith for Hogan and Kent is best 22, but who goes out? Kent is primarily a small forward who can spend some short stints in the midfield. That means he could play any of the following players role: Garlett Petracca ANB Hannan Brayshaw Harmes I think we all agree Garlett and Petracca are as good as 0 risk of being dropped. So out of the remaining 4 who is most at risk? Harmes has only played 1 of the 2 games and the last in, first out model is likely how the club would have looked at it if they had all been brilliant, he was essentially just filling in for Salem while he played Vince's role. But IMO his performance was 2nd only to Garlett on the above list. Brayshaw had a shocker there's no denying it. But of the 4 most at risk has the biggest upside and the club likely thinks he needs more game time, particularly given his injury struggles last year. ANB is arguably the least talented player on this list but has twice gotten praise for his defencive efforts and is second only to Oliver in tackles. Given Oliver stands side by side with his man at most contests and ANB doesnt, his numbers are great. Geelong's defencive retirement village could really be troubled by his pressure. That leaves Hannan. This bloke was a rather shock inclusion, played beyond expectations in round 1 then was quiet but tried hard in round 2. He has shown that he could maybe be a player, but despite his best efforts he really struggled to have an impact in round 2. I'm glad I'm not the one actually making this decision, there is a reasonable case for any one of them to stay or to go. Personally I think that you have to go in with the most talented side available and that would mean ANB goes out. However I suspect the club wont go with that approach. I think the club will most likely drop Hannan. Most important thing here regardless of who goes out: There's no need to panic! they will still get plenty of opportunities throughout the rest of the year. Form/injury/suspension something will give them another chance. Any of the guys that stay in will be on thin ice and have alot of pressure to perform on any given week. Fact of the matter is Hogan, Lewis and Hibbard are walk up starts when available almost regardless of others form. If we play well in the next couple of weeks, these selection decisions are only going to get harder. And this whole post hasn't even mentioned Buggy who was apparently BOG or close to it at Casey

Oliver looks buggered after he runs through the banner, doesnt stop him having an influence. If they think Smith can have an influence on the game then they will play him.

We will go into each game this year with a realistic chance of winning for the first time in the better part of a decade. Yes winning this week will be tough but there is every chance we will win. Overall when we put wins and losses aside, it's the performances we dish up that matters most this year. If we play well on Saturday and get beaten by a top 8 quality side then yes we can take the good out of the game move onto the following week with a good feeling about our finals hopes season, but don't be so fast to dismiss the 2017 Dees outright. We wont win every game but dont for a second think we cant win any game.

Yeah that's fine to say they spend more time on the ground but if we play 1 tall short you're not just asking them to play longer but longer at a higher intensity because they cant rotate the roles they way they are conditioned to do.

His point is that not replacing Hogan would require us completely changing our structure. Our gameplan is built around having the 3 talls rotating around in the forwardline. That means we need to replace hogan with someone who can play his role. Neither of Pedo or Smith are going to be able to play the role as well as Hoges does, but they just need someone there to have an impact.

40m or 4m I dont care as long as we end up with the ball