titan_uranus

What the OP shows is that too many still haven't been able to accept that we're a different side this year. Most previous years being down 20 points to Brisbane at HT would be curtains. But repeatedly this year we have started poorly but improved as the game has gone on (GWS, Richmond, Sydney, North Melbourne and now Brisbane).

The Crows released a press statement accepting the fine and said they accept it and own the mistake "from top to bottom". So I suspect they definitely did the wrong thing. https://www.afc.com.au/news/952221/club-statement-afl-sanction

I'm certainly a bit more confident about beating Geelong with Cameron now that I've seen us hold Brisbane to their third lowest score all year despite them having Daniher, Hipwood, Cameron, Bailey, McCarthy and McStay. But Geelong have a much higher ceiling than the rest of the top 8 because we just don't know how well they can play when they get closer to their best 22 on the park. As to their second half fitness, they're league leaders in third quarters having won 9 of 11, and they're 7th for fourth quarters having won 6.

St Kilda's season's got to be over, you'd think. At 5-7 they're going to have to go 7-3 at a minimum to make finals, but with their terrible percentage of 77.6%, they might need to go 8-2. Their fixture includes Richmond, Brisbane (away), Port, West Coast (away), Sydney and Geelong (away). I can't see it happening.

I think each of Spargo, ANB, Hunt, TMac, Oliver, Harmes and Jordon have arguments in their favour.

Yes but they played that game without Dangerfield, Blicavs, Guthrie, Duncan, O'Connor and Miers. They're playing poorly but winning. They have more room for improvement than probably any other side currently in the top 8.

The sort of thing Sparrow did is the sort of action the AFL wants to stamp out. He runs past the ball to bump - if you then make contact to the head, you get penalised. So, based on that, Sparrow should be cited. However. Buddy Franklin did the same thing last week on Newman and wasn't penalised due to "insufficient force". That's in part because Newman got up and carried on straight away. Based on that, Sparrow should be fine. There was minimal impact to Rich.

It has dawned on me that the second half last night may well be the best football we have played in my lifetime (30+ years). As has been said, premierships aren't won in June. Still three months of H&A games and there will be improvement in some of the sides below us (Geelong and Richmond the two big ones). They've reached 8-3 despite having a number of key players out injured. Unlike Richmond, who gave up some games through injury, they've kept themselves top 4 for a second half of the year surge. I fear Geelong just as much as the Dogs or Brisbane.

Watching the game I thought Melksham was terrible, again. But it's hard to assess off the TV. He had our fifth most pressure acts, with 16 (for context, ANB had 26, Harmes 23, Pickett 22, Oliver 20 and Petracca 17. Assuming no injuries, someone has to go to bring Langdon back. I'd have no issue with it being Melksham, but I suspect he's playing a role the coaches want. I really, really don't want Sparrow to be dropped. Each time he's been given a game this year he's played really well IMO and I think he deserves to hold his spot. So honestly, if Hunt isn't injured and we need to drop someone...I don't know who makes way. As to Weid v Brown, my personal view is Brown never should have been dropped and whilst he hasn't done anything at VFL level to warrant re-selection, Weideman's not doing enough. I'd make the switch, but it's line ball.

Scores conceded vs top 8 sides: Geelong - 60 Richmond - 48 Sydney - 58 Bulldogs - 59 Brisbane - 75 I'll add to that this stat: Across all 12 games, we have been behind in the fourth quarter for 43 seconds (after Taylor Walker's goal). That's it. Someone asked Swamp this on Twitter. There were three such games in Round 10 this year.

That was enormous. We’ve just beaten the two best sides, neither match at our home ground. We held a high scoring side to 20 scoring shots and 75 points. We needed a lift at half time, so we lifted. We backed our system in, we turned the tide, and then we scored heavily. You cannot be anything other than impressed by that.

Huge quarter. Major lift in the middle and as a result we had far more forward half ball. Brings our forward into play and nullifies them. But those three bad misses (TMac, Weid and Pickett) could come back to bite us. At least now we know we can match them. Game on.

The thing about the umpiring is that we're getting some really iffy high contact ones but all the marking contests and HTB calls are going their way. Bailey was caught stone cold and it was play on, Salem gets a 50/50% one and it's called.

If you're having a crack at the forward line you don't get it. We're scoring from 50% of our inside 50s, which is a better conversion rate than the Lions. This is on the midfield. We're -11 in CPs, -8 in clearances, -3 in tackles (despite being -43 in disposals), and -14 inside 50s. No side in the comp will compete with Brisbane if the ball is spending the majority of time in Brisbane's forward half.

It’s hard for them to get involved. Inside 50s are 9-14, they were 6-6 at one stage so they went on an 8-2 run at the back end of that quarter. Ball is spending too much time in our back half.

They’re playing out of their skins. They’re sticking marks, getting hands free in tackles, bounces going their way. Lucky to only be two goals down. Need to lift. But the positive is that we have a lot of improvement in us.

30% chance of showers, it's not going to bucket down.

So much this week comes down to stoppages and clearances. We saw last week how important it was that we won centre clearances and limited the Dogs' ability to get clean possession from stoppages. The Lions score heavily from stoppages so we have to do the same. If Neale, Zorko, Lyons and McCluggage get on top, we'll be in trouble, but the converse is equally true for them.

It's way worse though if they hold off until Thursday, it gets worse or at least not better enough, and they're stuck. They have to make a call sooner rather than later and the Vic government can't make a call that soon.

Should have won and had we, we'd have made finals. I've been casting my mind back to the game. Pickett missed a soda handball to Langdon in the square, Bennell missed from 10m out, then in our final foray forward Hannan had Viney open inside 50 but went long, high and to the pocket, missed, went out on the full, then Fritsch gave away 50 by not giving the ball back. Infuriating. Would love to win tomorrow just to feel better about last year.

That may actually happen but we won't know if it's happening until mid/late next week, which is too late to organise and sell tickets. As the HUN article says, they have to make the call soon so that planning and selling can begin. The timing is horrendous but right now the goal is to move it somewhere where we can make some money and claw back some of the $1M+ loss we're going to cop.

Can anyone share a summary of that article? I'm guessing it says something about Viney?

Also missing Cam Rayner and Jarrod Berry, both are best 22. But yes, they are pretty much on par with us in terms of strength of the 22 playing. Most other clubs have more missing than this.

Neale and Lester are significant upgrades on Mathieson and Madden, albeit Neale might be underdone. Brisbane are imposing, but whilst it's true they've won their last 7, all but one of them have been in Queensland, and of those all but one have been at the Gabba. They've had a great fixture run after their shocking opening month. So yes, they've beaten Port and Richmond, but they did so at the Gabba, where they've barely left for two months. They're surely no less beatable than the Dogs were last week.

I'm happy with that call. Really happy to see Sparrow get a game. Interesting emergencies: Baker, Bedford, Bowey and Mitch Brown. M Brown getting into the emergencies but B Brown not.