titan_uranus

Sydney's beaten Brisbane and Geelong, nearly just beat Port in Adelaide, and also beat Richmond on the G. They're not pushovers and are a bit like us in that they seem to do better against good sides than bad. But yes, we have the hardest draw of our competitors and it's going to require us to win some big 8-point games to hold our top 2 spot.

My biggest concerns from here are: COVID disruptions impacting our fixture or preventing us supporters from being there at finals time Injuries disrupting our stable line-up the Bulldogs Geelong

Is there any real doubt about us being able to play Port in Adelaide? SA's current rules don't prohibit it. By the time of the game we won't have been in NSW in the previous fortnight so unless things get worse from here, we'll be going to Adelaide won't we?

They've got Sydney, in the top 8, and Essendon, pressing for top 8. Their game against us is at the G, a ground we're undefeated at this year and not their strongest ground. Our "ordinary percentage" of 131.4% 0.1% behind Brisbane and then 9.2% or more in front of everyone else? FFS. See above. We're 10% ahead of everyone on percentage except Brisbane. That gets us, on your doomsday scenario, to 3rd. As to the draw, yes we have more games against good sides than anyone else, but: We're 5-0 against the top 8 and 9-0 against the top 12 It may be a good thing to be repeatedly tested in the final eight weeks prior to finals. Or would you rather play rubbish sides who we won't see again in September? We were missing Tomlinson, whilst McLean is not "pivotal" to their line up, he's arguably not even in their best 22 when Treloar and Dunkley are fit. The Dogs are good, obviously, but I'm sick of people always looking for reasons to doubt us.

You can't on the one hand be like "the other clubs are going to up their defence in finals" and then criticise me for arguing we could have kicked 14.9. There's no substance behind your argument that the other sides are, just cos, going to match our defence in finals. The point I am making about the 9.14 is that we still generated 23 scoring shots. Our forward half work can improve, no question, but it's nowhere near as bad as you've been arguing, and the net result of all that is that we're not "going nowhere" in the finals, as you claimed.

There are some huge issues facing the AFL. Talk of a footy frenzy is dangerous - they cannot reduce games to 16 minute quarters having had 15 rounds of 20 minute quarters. But asking players to back up full length games on 4-day breaks, which is what was required to compress the fixture last year, is dangerous (and the AFLPA will, rightly, revolt). Then there is "fixture integrity". They can't reduce the season to 17 games because some return games have already happened (Essendon v Hawthorn, Brisbane v Geelong, Richmond v St Kilda, North v GC, West Coast v Bulldogs were all repeat games). So the "least" number of games that can be played now is 18 per club, but then how does the AFL work out who everyone else's return game is against? Another example is Fremantle v Carlton next week. There is talk of that game being moved from Perth to Melbourne. But Carlton has already played Fremantle at Marvel earlier this year. How can Carlton get two home games against the same side? There are serious problems here if WA and SA don't let sides in.

Whilst this isn't an unreasonable argument, this GWS defence you speak highly of just conceded 90 points to Hawthorn. Dylan Moore, 176cm tall, kicked 4.1, whilst Tim O'Brien, a distinctly mediocre tall, kicked 2.2.

From the replay they showed at the ground it looked pretty clearly a goal to me. The entire ball has to cross the line before it's a score and on the replay looked relatively clearly like he got his boot to it before the whole thing had crossed. Why do we have to assume that? If our rivals haven't improved their defence after 14 games, why will it suddenly improve in the last 8? Meanwhile our "weakness" forward of centre isn't that bad anyway. We still had 23 scoring shots last night. 9.14 makes the score a lot lower than it ought to have been. 14.9 and no one's complaining about our ability to score.

GWS' recent "form" is a furphy. Since beating West Coast in Round 10 they've been thrashed by Brisbane, drew with North and had a win over an inept Carlton, and have now lost to Hawthorn. Right now, COVID aside, I'd argue Fremantle are as well placed as anyone to displace Richmond or Sydney from the top 8.

Jon Ralph and Eddie on Fox Footy have been going OTT hyperbolic with their statements about the AFL being close to crisis with COVID. However, they are raising issues worth considering. We know players don't want hubs, and we know the AFL has told players hubs are a last resort. Eddie's suggestion was that the AFL will do another "footy frenzy" to get a stack of games played in a short period, which limits the time the NSW and WA clubs may have to spend out of their home states, so that they can then go home to be with their families for a 2-3 week period, presumably during which the competition takes a break.

We're 15th for average centre clearance differential, at -1.4. Only Gold Coast, Carlton and Hawthorn are worse. But what I can't find is our average scores conceded from clearances and/or centre clearances. Because I'm relatively sure that stat will be strong in our favour. For example, we're miles in front on average intercept possession differential, at +7.6. Geelong's second at +4.4, Brisbane third at +2.8. So we might be giving up more centre clearances but we know we also win it back a hell of a lot more than our opponents.

Yes but you also "had us down" for a loss vs Essendon. Remember, you've been wrong before.

Hitouts to advantage: Gawn 10 Jackson 6 Draper 3 Wright 3 Everyone else 0 Centre clearances: Oliver 3 Merrett 3 Gawn 2 Draper 2 Harmes 2 Parish 2 Langford 2 Everyone else 1 or 0

Rubbish. We are going places in finals because of our defence. Remember, we're 5-0 against the top 8 and 8-0 against the top 11. Our gameplan stands up when it matters. Each of the Dogs, Brisbane, Essendon, Geelong and Sydney are top 8 for average points for per game (indeed, the Dogs. When they played us, they scored: Geelong - 9.6.60, their second-lowest score of the season and lowest number of scoring shots Sydney - 8.10.58, their second-lowest score of the season and third-lowest number of scoring shots Bulldogs - 8.9.57, their second-lowest score of the season and lowest number of scoring shots Brisbane - 11.9.75, their fourth-lowest score of the season and third-lowest number of scoring shots Essendon - 8.9.57, their second-lowest score of the season and second-lowest number of scoring shots

Dear lord this is a terrible take. It was just a mis-kick. He ran around the man on the mark to try to get the extra distance to score. He shanked it.

Mmm semantics maybe, but yes if anyone "dominated the centre" it was Merrett. I'd say Gawn dominated his opponent, which was critical to our win.

Yep they were insufferable at the ground.

You said we were beaten "time and time again" in a stat we broke even in. We had as many quick centre clearances as they did. If anything, the disappointment was from stoppage clearances.

Mate, Gawn absolutely destroyed Draper today. We didn't lose the clearances because of Gawn. We lost them because Jackson struggled in the ruck (he was hobbling at three quarter time, was he injured?) and because Merrett played a blinder and Parish is in AA form.

9-9 actually, and one of theirs was from an unforgivable 6-6-6 free kick we gave them. We do have one of the best midfields in the comp. But Merrett played a blinder and Parish and Stringer are both in red-hot form, so it's not like our opposition's weak in the middle. Plus Viney was clearly underdone.

I can't help but feel there is a major country-wide outbreak on the cards. NSW has let Sydney's outbreak get too far away from them, then a miner potentially exposes hundreds of people who have dispersed across multiple states and territories, and now a crew member flies up and down the eastern seaboard despite not knowing they were a close contact (critical to find out why that is - was this person ignorant and not checking, or were they missed by contact tracers and weren't notified). If the infection rate increases there becomes a stronger argument to get AZ into more people under the age of 60, but that will never happen given the damage to AZ's reputation that the federal government has allowed to happen. Blame Gladys or Dan all you want, far and away the two major reasons we're in this boat are hotel quarantine and the vaccine rollout.

For most of the game I felt we needed another marking option in the forward line. I think we need to try Ben Brown again, but I'm not 100% convinced, particularly because I'm not sure who makes way. I see the arguments for Pickett. He's been off the last few games. But there are clearly risks with taking his pressure and speed from the forward half out of the side. Did Sparrow do enough to hold his spot? I liked what he did but 11 disposals from 55% time on ground, is that something we can improve on with Brown?

6 - May 5 - Lever 4 - Langdon 3 - Oliver 2 - Gawn 1 - Brayshaw Honourable mentions to Hunt, Salem and Petracca.

This is like the Sydney game. So many on here were fearful going in. Now that we've won, so many are criticising the win. Someone said we're being "picked apart". Which is just the most ridiculously bad take from this game you could have. We conceded 8.9.57, so that's 17 scoring shots. That's the second least Essendon's had all season (their lowest was 6.9 against Brisbane) and it's their second lowest score all year (again, Brisbane their lowest). The main reason this game was close was our forward half inefficiency in the first and third quarters. Had we converted our inside 50s and time in forward half when we were on top, we'd have won by more. Which is a frustrating concept, but one mainly within our control. If TMac, Fritsch and/or Harmes kick even one of their set shot misses late in the third, the oomph could easily have gone out of it for Essendon. This wasn't our defence, which yet again stood up on the wide expanses of the G. Lever and May were outstanding, just exceptional again. Hunt took AMT out of the game and Salem was strong and rebounded. If you weren't at the game I don't know if it was clear but Brayshaw was brilliant on his wing (as was Langdon but I'm sure he was noticeable on TV). Brayshaw's two-way running was phenomenal. Oliver's lift in the second quarter helped get us going, and Gawn gave Draper a complete bath in the ruck. Clearly though the delivery inside 50 and the forwards themselves need work. I felt for most of the game we needed another tall forward. I'm sure we were high on forward half pressure acts but for much of the game I felt we were crying out for someone else to offer a marking option, particularly when TMac was up the ground. On the umpiring - the overwhelming majority of the decisions I'm seeing complaints about online, and heard complaints about at the ground, were correct. Stringer hit Jordon in the head late in the second. Harmes didn't have prior and attempted to kick it late in the fourth (which is not HTB). These are important wins. They're built off system, and we know it works because 12 times this year our opponent has struggled to score, and that includes the four highest scoring sides other than us we've played (the Dogs, Brisbane, Essendon and Sydney). Oh, and it's so satisfying beating that mob.

I've seen this a lot, with talk of us being "pretenders" if we lose. IMO, a "pretender" is a side like Port or, in this season at least, Richmond - beefed up record with wins against bottom 10 sides but unable to beat good sides. We're undefeated against the top 8 (and even if GWS replaces Richmond that will remain the same). IMO, a loss tonight doesn't make us a "pretender" or put a question mark on our "September credentials", it will just put in jeopardy our chance to do any September damage because we'll be making our chance of a top 2/4 spot less likely. For so long as we keep playing good football against good sides, we're not a "pretender" and we're absolutely ready to contest in September, but we'll be shooting ourselves in the feet if we keep dropping games to bottom 10 sides.