Wiseblood

I'm hoping this is the outcome, more so about having just two talls in the forward half than anything else. Will they have the guts to drop T Mac? Or will they say they are giving Jackson a rest and give Tom another crack.? Either way, as long as they go back to two talls up forward, I'll be happy. We could all see we were too top heavy against Port.

Fair call. I wouldn't classify it as a 'big' win either, but it does show we've got the capability of doing it. I would be surprised if we lost this weekend. I really would be. I'm very nervous about the game, but I think we will give the right response to the Port Adelaide game and the shellacking from the media (which was justified). I'd be disappointed if we struggled over the line, but a win would be good for our confidence, although it would do little else, especially for the fan base.

We didn't do too badly against the Hawks three weeks ago. Feels like a long time ago.

That's a fair assessment. Falling over the line against the Crows won't do anything for us as supporters. I'll take a win over a loss any day of the week, but it won't give us much joy as we know we should be doing better, and it will be more of a negative outcome than a positive one. Are you capable of giving them a spanking? Probably. Confidence would be pretty low right now, but a big win will do wonders in that regard going forward.

Couldn't agree more, bin. One thing that drafting contested ball winners has done to the club as a whole, is that it has limited what we can do game plan wise. I was happy to back Goody at the time, and in some ways I still do, as it was good to see a coach back himself in a shape the list to the game style he wanted to play. But he's probably gone a little too far with it, and now if he wants to make a few tweaks, it doesn't leave him with many options. Even though we added Langdon and Tomlinson to address our wings and the need for more outside run, we don't really have much else to do it, and it shows. Viney, Trac, Oliver, Harmes, Salem, Jones, Gus etc - none of them are outside runners. They are more comfortable being at the coal face than getting the ball on the outside, or being the link chain. So if Goody wants that outside run, he doesn't have many options, and the ones he might have are either not up to scratch or still developing (eg. Jordon, Baker, Rivers etc) The Port example is a good one. All those you mentioned bring different things to their side. While if you look back at ours, we've clearly focused on one thing and added a few things around it. But this is the list we've got, and we've got to hope that Goody can turn it around in the coming weeks. This article highlights that solid foundation and that we DO have something good to work with. It's the link from game plan to end product that is hurting us.

To be fair, he did say 'almost' never helped us win. I'll never forget the Queen's Birthday winner. One of my favourite Melbourne memories. But we need blokes with good skills who impact games more often than he did. I think that's clear. I know some bemoan moving Watts on due to his skills, but not having him is not even close to our problems. I'm not saying that you're suggesting that bin, but if Clayton Oliver had Jack Watts' kicking skills, we'd be on the right path.

Terrific article. Well written and fairly balanced. No surprise that the author is a Melbourne supporter! The quote that stuck out to me was around how we have a certain way of playing, and we do little to deviate from that on game day. If this is something journalists can see, and that we can see, then you can be damn sure that the opposition see it too. I can recall that Goodwin and the coaching team were going to make changes, especially around how we use the ball forward, in the off season. Even though you can see that we tried to do that at the draft, especially with Pickett, it seems as though not a whole lot has changed. Goody strikes me as that kid in primary school who takes his writing up to the teacher, who says it's good but could be better with changes. The kid goes back to his seat, pretends to make changes for five minutes, and then hands it again, knowing that they have changed nothing other than a capital letter or full stop. It just seems to me that we talked the talk, but to this point, we haven't walked the walk. The stat he provided is proof of that - 4th in inside 50s, but we are just 14th for tackles inside 50. And we know our conversion is even worse. That was very similar to last year. I agree with him that we have some solid foundations to build on with our list. Is Goodwin the one to build on that? I'm not so sure right now. Unless we totally drop our bundle I think he will see out the season and possibly get one last crack in 2021, although Bartlett might want to swing the axe sooner if we miss out on finals, which is highly likely.

Agreed. And, as titan added earlier, I think we need to give Preuss a crack. We got him to the club for this very thing and we know that he can go okay. O'Brien is no slouch and I think having the bigger body there around the contest would be a positive for us.

I vote that Saty is sent up as the guest referee.

Eagles are going to roll the Cats which is great, but this last quarter has been fantastic. Both clubs going hard at it. It's been great to watch. Kennedy is really turning back the clock here. Has kicked three in the last to get them over the line.

Possibly, but half of what he posted was around trading, which Jason Taylor would have very little to do with. All I could see someone like Mahoney doing is saying 'we are trading our first rounder, do you think we can get this type in the second round and so forth'. While he might have missed on a few over the years, can any recruiter claim to have hits 100% of the time? Not a chance. At the moment you could regard a selection of someone like Weideman as a miss, as we would have hoped to see more from him to this point. The same could be said for Brayshaw. Both picks inside the top 10. But he was the recruiter who went with both Petracca and Oliver, both clear wins for us. He was part of the 'mini draft' trade/selection that allowed us to nab Hogan before he hit the draft. I'm not going to sit here and say he is perfect - far from it. But for every perceived 'miss', he has had some hits along the way.

Says the bloke who started a 'Sack Jason Taylor' thread.

Don't let the facts get in the way of a rip roaring thread, Doc. Just wait till next week when we roll Adelaide and we praise Jason Taylor for drafting Ed Langdon and Steven May.

So after a couple of games you've written him off due to a rushed kick? I would assume then that you've written off practically the whole list as most are guilty of doing this a few times a game?

We can't plan for 2021 just yet. We aren't Adelaide. Alright, last night was horrible and I'm still trying to get the taste out of my mouth, but we aren't that far down the path just yet. Roll Adelaide (which we should do and is no real cause for celebration) and we're 4-5. Again, I'm not suggesting we are finals bound by any stretch, but I don't think we should be focusing on next year purely off the back of last night. Lose to Adelaide in 5 days and it would be hard to argue with though.

I'm a bit confused with Tomlinson. Okay, he wasn't setting the world alight, but they were pretty quick to drop him, even though there were probably others ahead of him who deserved to be. Now, he can't get back into the side. Hopefully they see a bit of sense and get him back this week against the Crows. I think he has something more to offer, and he can get dropped off the form he had, then there would be 10 others who could get dropped this week.

I'd say we continue to play our absolute best side and we approach every game as winnable. That is the culture we want to set, so we need to go with. One thing I'd like to see them do more of is make sure players are earning their spots. If they aren't, then they need a spell and earn their way back, although that is a little difficult without proper reserves games at the minute. With a few players terribly out of form - Gus, Salem, Harmes, Tom Mac are the main examples - do we drop them and give others a run and send the right message? Or do they continue to play them in the hope their form turns? Throwing the positions around sounds good on paper, and might work for a couple, but it's not going to change a whole lot right now. I say we push harder to make players earn their spots, and put the best 22 on the park that we can muster every week.

There would have been a few fierce moments in lounge rooms last night. It's a shame they can't highlight those instead.

That video you reference re: our skills is a two minute horror show. The Oliver kick in the middle of the ground really is the crowning turd in the water pipe.

I feel slightly vindicated right now. Cheers grape.

If I didn't have him on ignore.

And the homework wouldn't take too long. Stop them at clearances, limit their contested possession game and wait for the turnover = beating Melbourne. Even we can see it happening. The talent on our list is there, but going by last night, it is out of whack with what Goodwin is trying to do. He needs to understand that what worked in 2018 isn't working as much in 2020 and look to make the necessary changes. 2018 worked as we were the hunters. As soon as we became the hunted we wilted.

@dazzledavey36 - it's not a long bow to draw when you look at the long term contracts they received and how they have played since then. While there are bigger issues than this, it's worth looking at. When you consider our centre square set up, and the players who run through there, we have low skilled players. That's not news to anyone here. Petracca can be good at times, but he, Viney, Oliver, Gus, Harmes etc are all average users of the footy at best. So what do we do? The three we generally go with are Viney, Oliver and Trac. Does that need to change? Chucking Gus or Harmes in there isn't going to make much of a difference, so do we look to offload one of them to help us get a different type of mid that we can run through there. We could look to experiment, but guys most of our mids can't really play in other possies. I'd love to see us try and centre square set up of, say, Trac, Melksham and Salem to see how it goes, but I don't know if we will really get the opportunity to do so. Either way, those contracts aren't looking flash at present.

His post was conjecture. So if you see two married people walking along the street, not holding hands, you instantly assume they have conflict or internal issue? And by the way, it's not inconceivable. I never said that. You are absolutely superb at putting words in people's mouths, and you love to jump down my throat any chance you get. I never said there wasn't conflict. I just said that what he posted was based off watching a few things on the field, and then even speculating about what's going on in the rooms. He isn't there. So it's conjecture. Unless he is there it can't be anything but. So, mum, I'll respond how I see fit when people post that stuff. You don't like then you can jog on for a change. Cheers.

If anything, this thread shows that we as a club, both from the club itself and us as supporters, are far too quick to praise players when they play a few good games. I'll admit - his return to the side coincided with a short run of good form, and he played some good footy, and I was happy to praise his performance But it's almost as if the club knows that he is a maligned player, so the moment he played a good game of footy they put out a video of his highlights as if they want to stick it right up the supporters. What he played in those past few weeks is what he should be doing each and every week. Why we needed to highlight it straight away is beyond me, and I'm guilty of falling for it myself. It works both ways though. The moment a player has a bad game we've got the bottom feeders starting threads to pot them. Then they play a good game and we're all jumping back on. What's next? Nibbler comes back, kicks a few goals from 10 disposals and we're starting an appreciation thread for him? Then the next week he misses a few shots and we're all wishing that he never plays another AFL game again. Give me a spell. Oscar is far from the problem with our side at present, but jumping on or off him based on one or two games is madness.