titan_uranus

That would be a helpful side effect of the Monday night timeslot. Critical game, this. Win it and we're two-thirds of the way there (just have to beat Adelaide...shudder). But if we lose, we'll be on a six-day break (but almost really a five-day break, given we don't finish in Perth until 10.40pm Melbourne time) into a must-win game, followed by an almost-certain second straight six-day break as you'd assume the AFL will want our Geelong game on at least a Saturday.

We've had no development on this front for years. We get at least a step in the right direction and half of Demonland complains about it. At absolute worst it is a positive because it is more than we previously had. At best, as many have said, it is a sign of more to come: I would find it very difficult to accept that the AFL and the government would all stand there today to call a press conference with the MFC to announce these changes, and the MFC would tip in half a million of its own money, if there was even a small possibility we'd long term end up elsewhere.

No it's $500,000 each from us and the AFL. Explain your disappointment.

Whilst it's mathematically possible, top 2 may as well be considered impossible unless we go 3-0. If we only go 2-1, one of the Dogs and Geelong will need to go 1-2 for us to pass them, and the prospect of that happening is pretty close to 0% at this point (best chance is Geelong drops the GWS or St Kilda game, and then we beat them in the final round). Sydney have a very easy final three games but they've been up for five weeks now and away from home that whole time. A cliff might be coming - write it down as one of the greatest flags if not, though, because their best is capable of beating anyone.

11-11 is almost certainly going to be the requirement for 8th - all of Essendon, Richmond and Carlton are alive for that reason, as none can get to 12-10 (technically St Kilda also alive). It's also possible that 10-12 does it, shockingly. West Coast is also no certainty to stay in the top 8 - if they lose to us, they'll have to beat Fremantle to just get to 11 and then will need to beat Brisbane away from Perth to get to 12. Their percentage is worse than Essendon's and Richmond's, and barely better than Carlton's, so if they go 1-2 and one of those other sides goes 3-0, it's very possible West Coast slips out.

If we go 2-1, we'll likely finish 3rd - would require Port to beat the Dogs in the final round to pass us and push us down to 4th, or would require one of the Dogs and Geelong to go 1-2 for us to pass them and move up. You'd expect both the Dogs and Geelong to go 3-0 from here which means 2-1 lands us Geelong, unless they make up the 9.4% gap to the Dogs. 3-0 likely gets us Geelong too, as we'd pass them, likely finishing 2nd with them 3rd.

You're kidding, right? For one, Weid's best football this year has been playing a role more like TMac than Brown, so he'd IMO be more suited to playing alongside Brown than alongside TMac. For another, Smith's been playing defence all season. For a third, why the [censored] would we experiment this boldly in our most important game of the year so far?

Press conference currently underway $3M funding to upgrade Gosch's Paddock to "AFL size" (presumably that's MCG equivalent)? $2M from MOPT, $500k from the AFL and MFC.

Before the last lockdown the crowd limit was something like 50% but capped at the MCG at 25,000. If a similar cap is used for finals and the MCG's max crowd isn't much more than whatever GMHBA can hold, that's where the pressure will hit. Geelong will ask for it and the usual defence of "too many fans will be locked out" won't be as strong as normal.

The pressure will come if there is a cap at the MCG that is less than GMHBA's capacity. Geelong kicked up a big fuss last week for their Richmond game - laying the foundations IMO. Best thing we can do is take the option off the table by going 3-0.

To temper that, the Dogs, Geelong, Port and Sydney all won (as did Carlton, who are now just a win out of the top 8, and they have a better percentage than Fremantle too).

So do you expect us to lose the last three games?

Didn't you say last week we were "gone"?

And if you're wondering, had we beaten Hawthorn then the key difference would be that one win would make us much closer to guaranteeing top 4 - Sydney would have to win all three games and make up 13.5% to pass us on percentage. That large percentage buffer over Sydney is useless because of the Hawthorn draw.

I'm not arguing Harmes needs to be as good as Petracca or Oliver, I'm arguing he needs to be better than he is right now. He makes too many mistakes, he turns it over too much as a proportion of his time on ground and ball he wins, and he repeats his mistakes (three set shots all missing to the near side, taking on tacklers and getting caught, not taking the first option, missing targets by foot). We absolutely need defensive mids to complement Petracca and Oliver, and Harmes at his best can be that player, but right now he's a long, long way from his best, and IMO he's not playing well enough. He's talking about the return match, where Greene had 7 disposals, 2 marks and no tackles.

So the status is this: Three more wins guarantees top 2 Two more wins guarantees top 4 One more win is not enough for top 4 unless and until Sydney loses a game (or Port loses twice)

12.2 in the second half to Sydney. They just can't miss, and Essendon can't stop them. Sydney are a huge threat for our top 4 spot. The way they're playing it's hard to see them losing to St Kilda, North or the Gold Coast.

Seeing Franklin play well today really irritates me - he 100% should be suspended and sitting in the stands.

After today Sydney finish with St Kilda, North and Gold Coast. If they win today they'll have won 5 straight against 5 sides better than those three (West Coast, Dogs, GWS, Fremantle, Essendon if they win). They are the threat right now. If they win today we still need another two to be sure of holding them off.

Jordon's shown all year he's capable of working within our side, particularly when we had Harmes in and Viney out. Would be a return to that sort of midfield if we swapped Jordon for Harmes. Otherwise vandenBerg may be a very similar sort of player but at some point we have to put our foot down with Harmes' poor performances. Turnovers need to be in context. Oliver had 35 and Petracca 32, with more disposals comes more turnovers. Oliver had 12 clearances and Petracca 6 (Harmes 3). And Petracca and Oliver were on the park for 89% and 88% of the game respectively, but Harmes only 76%. So he's racking up errors despite getting less of the ball and being on the field for less of the time. And of course, Oliver and Petracca hit the scoreboard but Harmes kick 0.3 from three gettable set shots. Defensively his game was fine, but that applied to the entire side today. But when he picks up the ball Harmes makes too many errors.

Not yet. We still need at least one win to ensure Brisbane can't pass us, and at least two if Sydney beat Essendon (regardless of the result of GWS v Port, too).

Nah not today, @Nasher. A big win does not always mean a flawless 22. I'll happily debate anyone who argues Harmes played well today.

Hawthorn leading Brisbane by 30 halfway through the second. Remember, if Brisbane lose even once for the rest of the year, we only need one more win to ensure they cannot pass us. So if they drop this game and Essendon can get up over Sydney (I can't see either happening but still), then one more win will lock us into top 4.

6 - Oliver 5 - Petracca 4 - Brown 3 - Lever 2 - Jackson 1 - May

If Salem's even remotely sore he should absolutely not play next week - the Eagles game is critical to our season but Salem's fitness for the games beyond it is far more important. Hibberd a more than adequate replacement.