titan_uranus

Melksham on radio this morning revealed that Gawn has a fitness test today. Also said Sparrow plays a defensive and team role but also needs to play with more freedom without just focusing on his team role, which is why he’s been dropped. Sounds 100% spot on to me.

Source? Sounds like rubbish to me. Since when have we ever picked someone for sentimental reasons?

FWIW, in the same radio segment where he said Houston’s likely to come back to Melbourne, Peter Ryan also said his “intel” is that Clarry’s going nowhere.

This is everything I hate about AFL media. This topic is only relevant, let alone a distraction, because of the media and Cornes himself in particular.

There are people on here who have admitted that they refuse to go to games to "protest" against what they perceive to be poor performance of the club. Our own members admit they don't go to games. Hard to blame the media from having a dig at us then. FWIW I agree with the other posters who are concerned we will get a lower crowd than the 19k Richmond got two weeks ago. We might play well on Saturday nights but we don't draw good crowds to them, even at the best of times. I reckon we'd do better crowd-wise if this was 1.10pm Sunday.

For me though, that evenness of the ladder makes me want to push for finals more. The reality is that the only way we can make them from here is to win at least 3 games against GWS, the Dogs, Port, GC and Collingwood. That will give us at least some sort of form running into September, and we could cop a side like Geelong, who will make finals given their soft final five games despite being like us and struggling to beat good sides. I'd much rather finish the season strongly and see what comes of whatever final we can draw first up.

“There is an increasing belief that the 27-year-old will request a trade once the Power’s campaign ends, but he is yet to relay that to the club and is focused on completing the season, according to two sources. The rumblings about Houston’s future, and in particular his links to the Demons, started early last month. Industry sources who wanted to remain anonymous when discussing Houston’s future confirmed Melbourne were monitoring the situation.” Also says he’s actually contracted to 2028, not 2027, and that Port will be up for a trade to get picks in so they can try to get Perryman. Suggests we’d have to part with a first rounder.

I agree. Their last fortnight has been less impressive than the 2-0 result suggests. Of course, we have to demonstrate that we can produce quality football against a genuinely good side. We did this for 2.5 quarters against Brisbane but unless you rate Essendon (I don’t), we haven’t really done so since the Carlton loss in Round 9, and not for long enough to win since the week prior vs Geelong.

This is a different tangent to what you said before, which was that they’re not that good given their recent losses to Hawthorn and the Dogs. Yes, they play us exceptionally well. They match up against us brilliantly (eg even when Gawn and Trac play they match us at stoppage) and play a style that we struggle to combat. The ruck point’s been done to death already. FWIW I disagreed pre-game with the argument that, because it worked vs Draper in the wet, it would work again vs Darcy/Jackson. The issue, as Goodwin said in the presser, is that we don’t have anyone else on our list who was going to offer much more. That’s poor list management, not coaching.

-17 in stoppage score despite being obliterated in clearances tells me we are still setting up well at stoppage and behind the ball. However, the -44 from turnover will no doubt be impacted in part by our uncompetitiveness in clearances, which led to the ball being camped in our back half far too much.

Ridiculous take. Sydney aside, everyone has lost games to everyone else on the ladder. At any rate, Hawthorn is, on form, a top 4 side, the Dogs aren’t far off. Fremantle also beat Sydney a few weeks ago.

He is regularly in our top handful for pressure acts (4th yesterday). We know we’re a nothing side without pressure. So I assume it’s that side of his game which is keeping him in the side. Because I otherwise agree that his game on offence is nowhere near good enough. That same post also mentions Bowey as a player who is underperforming. I agree. Of all parts of the ground, we have depth in that part (unlike the midfield), so I’m not sure how much longer we can keep playing Bowey on current form.

It’s pretty weak to say nothing after a win, wait for a loss, then say “you [censored]” or “told you so” or similar. But equally, the reaction to beating Essendon was OTT. I maintain my general view that Goodwin’s a far better coach than most give him credit for, principally because our list has not been anywhere near as good as what some have tried to make it out to be. It’s becoming clearer now that making even finals, let alone top 4, in 2022-23 was an achievement given what the other three recent premiers have done (or not done) post-flag.

Who are you dropping out of JVR, Petty and Turner to bring him in, bearing in mind Gawn is coming back too? Surely our focus has to be on the mids after what we just dished up? Given what I’m reading here and seeing on the stat sheet, Salem, Sparrow, Kolt and AMW would all be up for debate?

I didn’t get to watch the game today so there isn’t much I can add. I fully expected a loss today, but not by 50, and not with 0 clearances in the first quarter and 3 to HT. Fremantle clearly love playing us and I’m more than a little bit embarrassed at how easy it seems for them to dominate us. Just have to accept that we were always going to lose this one and move on.

What even is this X account though? Just some random made up rumours thing? Or any sort of track record?

Not even remotely true. If we lose we’ll be 2 points out of the 8, and still within one game of 5th (possibly 4th too, if Brisbane lose). Our draw gets easier from here, not harder, with the last three (Port, GC, Coll) easier than the next three (Fremantle, GWS, Dogs).

Yep agree. We can win this, and I am 100% all in on the optimism and confidence, it’s refreshing and enjoyable. But IMO Fremantle are a top 4 side and will be eager to bounce back after last week. We are deservedy marked underdogs.

I believe it’s 17 of the last 18. And the outlier was the Dogs in 2016.

After today I think it looks like this: Win, and we go to at least 7th. Whether we go up more depends on if Brisbane lose and whether we catch Port or Geelong on percentage. We’re 0.5% behind Port and 1.3% behind Geelong. Lose and we’re 10th, unless we shed 5.5% and slide below Hawthorn. IMO, our games are almost in order of descending difficulty from here. Fremantle in Perth, GWS and Dogs at Marvel seem the three hardest. Port, GC and Collingwood IMO the easier three.

With a win tomorrow, I believe the wildly ridiculous best case scenario is currently that we finish this round 2nd. We would have to win and make up like 7-10% and then each of Carlton, Geelong, Brisbane and GWS all lose, which is possible as none of them play each other. Without the percentage gain we’d be 4th, and then 5-6 depending on if Brisbane or GWS win. On the flipside, if Port win and pass our percentage (very possible) we can win and go down a spot on the ladder (all those sides above us win/don’t go below our percentage). If we lose we may stay where we are if Port, the Dogs and GC lose, but worst case scenario we’d be 12th (Port, Dogs, GC and Collingwood win and the latter two pass our percentage). So, our window at the end of this round is 2-12. What the [censored].

Well. Yeah. That helps. Don’t mind Adelaide finding some form. They have Hawthorn, Geelong, the Dogs and Port in their next four.

I posted this earlier in this thread but I don’t agree with this. Not anymore in the current AFL media hyper-trade era. I do not accept that these stories are all born out of something legit. But, even if they are, the “legit” bit of this could easily be nothing more than “other clubs think they can entice him”. Which may amount to nothing more than wishful thinking, or a deliberate attempt to “stir the pot” to see what sort of response comes from the club or Clarry.

Most of the finals contenders have at least one game left against a bottom 5 side. They’re all issues for us, unfortunately.

The timing was definitely a factor. We won ours just after Richmond had won 3 of the last 4, which came just after Hawthorn won 3 in a row, which came just after Geelong won 3 out of 5. However, three years on and there's a fair chance we will be the only one of the last four premiers to have even made the finals the year after the flag (Richmond missed in 2021, Geelong missed in 2023, Collingwood may miss in 2024).