titan_uranus

This seems to be the AFL's position. Don't have a bye if the games can go ahead. If Port-Collingwood and Adelaide-Hawthorn can proceed in Melbourne, then they should proceed. Save the bye for a week where it's impossible, rather than just difficult The problem is that the harder it gets, the more unfair the solutions become. Having Fremantle host Carlton at the MCG is unfair. Ditto Port hosting Collingwood. Both are instances of one side getting two home games in one season against a particular opponent, with Carlton already having hosted Fremantle in Melbourne and Collingwood the same with Port. The AFL will say who cares, just play, but it's becoming harder and harder to justify that.

The concern I have isn't losing to teams outside the 8, it's specifically against the four clear bottom 4 sides of 2021: Adelaide, Collingwood, Hawthorn and North. I can't off the top of my head think of any top 8 side with a record as poor as our 2-1-3 record against those four sides. I'm not suggesting that good sides should never lose to bottom 10 sides: that's unrealistic. And ultimately if we're going to lose games it is less damaging to lose them to bottom sides than our competitors around us. But to be at less than 50% against bottom 4 sides says to me that we don't prepare for those particular games, where we are overwhelming favourites and there is an expectation we'll walk it in.

But most of these stats were the same when we were 11-1. We've been mid-table for hit outs to advantage and clearances all season, it's not like we were dominant and have fallen away. So the two areas that are of real concern IMO are pressure and transition, and for mine pressure takes the cake - it's elite when we're the hunters, against a strong side, etc., but it's nowhere near as good when we're the hunted and our lesser opponent throws caution to the wind. I don't consider our ball movement to be a big concern - we're generating plenty of inside 50s, marks inside 50 and shots on goal, and if we were nailing our easier set shots we'd probably have beaten GWS and Hawthorn. By leaving 10 out of 12 premiership points on the table vs Adelaide, Collingwood and Hawthorn, we're forcing ourselves to bring elite pressure every time we play a top 8 side, including again this week. I have faith we can do it, but one slip up vs the Dogs, West Coast or Geelong and we could well lose our top 4 spot.

Last time they belted us in clearances 36-27 (including 25-14 at stoppages), had 54 more disposals, 6 more inside 50s and, despite having more of the ball, they had 11 more tackles (57-46). But we still won. The confidence I take from that is that they got on top in areas they usually get on top in, but couldn't work out how to turn that into an effective method of scoring.

I agree re: Martin. In our game last year English rucked the first half and we led at half time. Beveridge was so angry at the ruck situation he swapped English and Bruce. Bruce ended up doing better than English in the ruck (was a low bar to cross) and English kicked 2-3 goals and helped win them the game. They're a better side with Martin first ruck and Naughton, Bruce and English in their forward line. They're close to getting Libba, Wood and Vandermeer back from injury. I'm not 100% sure if Wood and Vandermeer are best 22 but I would have thought so. But Martin's not ready this week. Presumably they'll stick with a Naughton, Bruce and Ugle-Hagan forward line.

This is happening literally every week. There's merit to your argument that the AFL has better things to think about than this, but it's not that much of a strain on the AFL to move this game. And if the shoe was on our foot, there's no way you'd call it a "minor inconvenience". I mean, look at how we reacted to being asked to play in Darwin.

Here is some statistical comparisons (on averages) for this season between Viney, Petracca, Oliver, Jordon and Harmes: Tackles: Viney 7.4, Oliver 5.2, Harmes 5.2, Jordon 5.1, Petracca 4.1 Tackles inside 50: Viney 1.4, Jordon 1.1, Harmes 0.7, Oliver 0.5, Petracca 0.4 Pressure acts: Viney 26.7, Harmes 24.2, Oliver 23, Petracca 22.1, Jordon 18.2 Score involvements: Petracca 7.8, Oliver 7.4, Viney 4.6, Harmes 3.9, Jordon 3.7 Goal assists: Oliver 0.5, Petracca 0.5, Harmes 0.3, Jordon 0.3, Viney 0 Inside 50s: Petracca 7.3, Oliver 5.2, Viney 4.2, Harmes 3.4, Jordon 2.4 Clearances: Oliver 7.5, Petracca 6.3, Viney 4.4, Harmes 3.1, Jordon 1.7 Centre clearances: Oliver 2.9, Petracca 2.9, Viney 1.6, Harmes 1.1, Jordon 0.3 Stoppage clearances: Oliver 4.6, Petracca 3.4, Viney 2.9, Harmes 2.0, Jordon 1.4 Contested possessions: Oliver 16.6, Petracca 14.1, Viney 10.8, Harmes 9.8, Jordon 6.1 Turnovers: Petracca 6.9, Oliver 5.2, Viney 4.9, Harmes 3.7, Jordon 3.4 Clangers: Petracca 5.3, Oliver 5.1, Harmes 4.0, Viney 3.9, Jordon 2.5 Ground ball gets: Oliver 10.5, Petracca 9.5, Harmes 7.4, Viney 6.1, Jordon 4.8 Metres gained: Petracca 545.1, Oliver 420.5, Viney 274.8, Oliver 243.2, Harmes 231.2 Marks: Petracca 5.3, Oliver 4.1, Harmes 3.3, Jordon 2.9, Viney 2.2 Viney rates top for some defensive stats (tackles and pressure acts) but mid-table for offensive stats. Which makes sense, tbh.

I wouldn't have expected us to be favourites in the betting market but: The game is at the MCG, where the Dogs are 1-1 this year, with a run of the mill win vs Collingwood and then a second-half trouncing by Richmond, and they haven't played there since Round 7 The Dogs aren't really in form - they're 4-3 over their last 7 games (we're 4-2-1 by comparison) and the only one of their 4 wins in that stretch of note was vs West Coast, who aren't in any form to speak of themselves (and there was no crowd at their game in Perth) - remaining wins were vs Fremantle, North and Gold Coast Each of the last two weeks they've only generated 20 scoring shots (equal third-lowest they've had all year) and each of the last three weeks they've conceded 24 scoring shots (second-worst they've had all year) They scored 100+ points in 6 of their first 10 games but since Round 11 (losing to us) they've only reached 100 once We've already comprehensively outplayed them once this year

It's unbelievably bad luck that the AFL has had two 1 v 2 games this year and both of them have occurred during lockdowns. This is now three of (you'd expect) our top four most profitable home games lost due to COVID (Brisbane, Queen's Birthday and this, with the fourth being ANZAC Eve). We also lost a home game vs Hawthorn, a larger Victorian club. Even if we get a crowd vs Adelaide, the best we'll do this year is to finish with six home games at the MCG in front of crowds for the season, and of those games four will have been against interstate sides. I have no idea how that stacks up against other clubs but I'd be surprised if many clubs had a worse set of home game crowds. Edit: I missed the Carlton game. So it's a bit better - crowds at 6 home games, 7 if we get Adelaide.

It's very simple and brought about by some very lucky fixturing. Melbourne, the Dogs, GC, Adelaide, Hawthorn and Brisbane all play each other in the original Round 19 fixture, and the original Round 20 fixture. So the three games are flipped, because they can be, and it doesn't affect any of the other clubs or games. So GC now plays Brisbane this week instead of next week, and Adelaide now plays Hawthorn this week instead of next week. That allows us to play the Dogs this week, and then next week we return to GC v Melb, Hawthorn v Brisbane and Bulldogs v Adelaide.

Except none of this was apparent last week vs Port. The playing like individuals thing seems only to show up when we struggle against bottom 10 sides - i.e. I think the struggles kick in first, and then those players you've mentioned return to pre-2021 form and start trying to be the hero. The root cause of that, IMO, is that we don't prepare properly for bottom 10 opponents (i.e. the ruthlessness and intensity we show vs top 8 sides is missing from the first bounce). So whether it's a bad start (Collingwood, GWS) or it's getting a lead and then feeling too comfortable (Adelaide, Hawthorn), we let bad teams fight back and get belief, and when the pressure of "oh no we're going to lose this game when we're not supposed to" sets in, our players deviate from the system that has won us 13 games. What about our draw is a positive? Repeat games against the Bulldogs and Geelong, the two best sides in it. As much travel as any other Victorian side, including two trips to Adelaide, a trip to Perth, a trip to Geelong, and a possible trip to Darwin. At least three games after this week without a crowd (Dogs x 2, Hawthorn), and a further two home games in front of almost no Melbourne supporters (Brisbane, Collingwood). Whilst I'm supportive of the argument that we have an attitude problem in these games, I actually think too much is being made of the Oliver-Spargo thing. I'm not entirely sure Oliver was all that angry, and it's possible Spargo ignored Oliver's call or something like that. Oliver was also fresh off running the length of the field to make that option, so it's not as if he wasn't doing the team thing to get there. In-game stuff like that is not as big IMO as stuff like laughing at half time, or Gawn smiling on the bench - stuff like that IMO shows me what's really going through our players' heads by way of preparation and thought. Selwood's a good example - I can't imagine he'd ever be laughing at HT of any match, but on field does anyone whinge at the umpires more than him?

The AFL loves the flexibility associated with moving the repeat games around, so I'm not sure they'll immediately go for the first 17 games being 17 opponents. It surely won't happen. We'll likely be in lockdown until the end of this week at the earliest, and I can't see the NT allowing anyone who has been in Victoria this weekend (which we will be, when we play the Dogs) to enter the NT next week. Surely the game has to be moved to Queensland. Why? Finals are still just under two months away. Last time things got dire in Victoria was a similar time period ago, and we'd recovered to the point of having decent-ish crowds back by last week.

Tom Morris reporting that we're playing the Dogs on Saturday night: Friday Port Adelaide v Collingwood (Adelaide Oval) Saturday Carlton v North Melbourne (Marvel Stadium) Gold Coast v Brisbane (GABBA) West Coast v St Kilda (Optus Stadium) Adelaide v Hawthorn (Adelaide Oval) Melbourne v Western Bulldogs (MCG) Sunday Sydney v Fremantle (Metricon Stadium) Geelong v Richmond (MCG) Essendon v GWS (Metricon Stadium)

Jon Ralph also tweeted that the AFL wants Port v Collingwood to stay on Friday night but if it can't go ahead due to SA's requirements, our game vs the Dogs will replace it. So I guess we have to prepare for a six-day break into the Friday night game at this point?

I suspect we're not saved the Darwin trip, not yet anyway. My gut tells me the whole reason they're making these moves is because the NT won't let us in this week, so they want to delay it a further week to see if the NT will let us in next week. I can't see why these three games need to be moved otherwise - if Port can FIFO, surely Brisbane (vs Hawthorn) and Adelaide (vs the Dogs) could too.

You do know we beat the Dogs this year already, right? At their preferred venue? It's very easy to feel despondent after a loss or, in this case, a draw, but reflecting on the season so far we are very much in the hunt for this win.

The season's not being called off. It just won't happen.

I think that's right. If we finish 3rd or 4th, in all likelihood 1 and 2 are the Dogs and Geelong. I'm sure it's possible that, say, Port doesn't lose again and finishes top 2, whilst one of the Dogs and Geelong collapses worse than we do so that we finish above them. Most likely outcome, you'd think, is Dogs/Geelong top 2, we finish 3-4. Otherwise we slide further and drop to 5th or 6th.

Just in case anyone isn't aware, we cannot miss finals from here. We're 5.5 games clear of 9th with 5 games to go. Relax, Demonlanders. We have qualified for the finals.

Well we don't actually know what the other three forwards were doing because they're off screen. I certainly didn't mean to slot Viney entirely so my post was poorly worded in that regard, but Viney could have kept running if there was nothing on. I don't know why he chose to kick it at that point. Keep running, I say. Maybe, as has been suggested, he sees something off-screen that indicates a lead but the sync between him and that person (Jackson, maybe), is out of touch. He had more time and space to work with, is my main point.

Jeepers. It's revisionism when you now argue that Richmond was missing so many players you couldn't name them when in reality it was just two. What about your post isn't undermining our wins? You're going back to three strong wins against top 8 sides and putting up arguments that in my view are either blatantly wrong (e.g. the Richmond injury one) or unfair criticisms which don't take into account the things we did right (e.g. Geelong not "twigging" to the stand rule - which by the way is news to me). There isn't an ounce of "poetic licence" in my post. You're arguing our previous wins against top 8 sides don't automatically mean we''ll win the remaining games against top 8 sides. That's a completely fair argument. But you're doing it by arguing our wins against Geelong, Richmond and the Dogs weren't actually that good. That's not a fair argument, for the reasons I've outlined above. Nothing "poetic" about it. And for the record, I've never argued we're going to beat all of Geelong, the Dogs and West Coast in the run home. But given how we've played against top 8 sides this year, it's not unreasonable at all to think we can, or even that we're more likely to beat them than we are to beat Gold Coast or Adelaide.

GWS loses Greene, De Boer, Briggs and Stein. Sydney loses Mills, O'Riordan and Cunningham. One massive out for each side.

Second quarter, 7.30 in. We're 26 points up having just kicked a goal. We win the centre clearance, Oliver kicks to Viney inside the centre square and he takes a mark. He plays on as he has space in front of him: There are two players deeper than Fritsch, who you can see gesturing for the ball to his advantage. He can take at least a few more steps but chooses to kick at this point, ostensibly to the deeper players, but his kick lands nowhere near a leading Melbourne forward and ultimately right in a hole covered by three Hawthorn defenders: This is the sort of thing we see all too often from Viney, with no real improvement in this area of his game. If that kick is the limit of his distance, why didn't he take a few more steps? He could have drawn vandenBerg's opponent and had the handball out laterally.

I'd love to know the reasoning behind this. The chance of there being a crowd greater than GMHBA's capacity is probably 0%. Why must the game be played at the MCG?

Would have loved to see a Carlton loss to really get the natives restless but alas in classic Carlton style they've put in two quarters of tripe but will win the game off the back of 20 minutes of AFL-quality football. With a win they won't move up from 13th but they'll only be a game and around 10% out of the 8 with five to play. Their last five are North, St Kilda, Gold Coast, Port and GWS, with only one of those games being away from Marvel.