titan_uranus

That was the Dogs' 8th game at Metricon this year (although to be fair it was West Coast's 5th). We'll finish the year with no more than 3 games at any one venue. I keep banging on about this but it's a relevant factor.

The Sydney loss wasn't just a lack of skill, there were workrate issues on display. The main reason I'm furious at the Sydney loss is that from the start our intensity/workrate were off. Just like the Port game. Except we've got two wins over the current top 8, with an opportunity to win a third before the season's done. Two wins over the current top 8 is the same number that the Dogs, St Kilda, Collingwood and even Richmond have. Indeed, no one has more than three wins over the current top 8 except Brisbane (five).

Not really a fair comment in a 17-game season. Just means the Dogs have had to play the good sides already and the Saints haven't. Yes it does. The 9-win scenario assumed Collingwood and GWS finished 6th and 7th. It was then us, St Kilda and the Dogs fighting for 8th and if we all finished on 9 wins we'd win out on percentage (so went the theory). It's now possible that everything could line up for that but we miss out because the Dogs get a 10th win - we beat Fremantle and GWS (but lose to Essendon), GWS beats St Kilda and Carlton but loses to us, St Kilda loses both games, Collingwood beats GC, Dogs win both games. We miss out (assuming we pass St Kilda on percentage, which was always going to be necessary for us to make it on 9 wins). Had the Dogs lost, we'd have made it. Still, if we win all three we're near-guaranteed to make it (to miss, one of the Dogs and GWS is going to need to make up the 6-8% to catch us on percentage).

I reckon Brown's stiff to lose his spot to Preuss, who's not a forward and didn't show anything last year outside of a half of football vs Sydney the first time to suggest he can fit alongside Gawn. Is there something up with Lockhart? Injury or discipline or something? How he's not getting a game right now is utterly beyond me, the more so given Smith held his spot. Forward line abysmal but the usual scapegoats cop it (Spargo and Brown) whilst Melksham and Fritsch hold their spots. Happy to see Bedford and Baker get a game, great to see Hibberd back, but on the whole these changes show we're struggling with form, fitness and cohesion. At this stage of the year, that's troubling.

Important, sure. But in order to tackle your opponent has to have the ball. Pressure has to stay on when we have it and when the ball is in dispute, too.

To be fair, if you look at the top 10 (i.e. the top 8, us and the Dogs), there have only been three losses by that group to the bottom 6 in any recent time: our loss to Sydney (Round 15), GWS' loss to Sydney (Round 12) and Collingwood's loss to Fremantle (Round 9). Every single other side in the current top 10 has won every other game against the bottom 6 since, I think, Round 6. So it is rare.

The bolded bit is completely, utterly, wrong. There is so much more to pressure than tackles. Having said that, we're 17th for average tackle differential at -4.5 (only Carlton, North and Adelaide are worse than -1.7). That, couple that with the fact that we're only 11th for average disposal differential at -3.6, concerns me. It's one thing to be 18th for average tackles, but if we consistently played in high-possession/low-tackle games, our average differential would be closer to 0. That it's so far away from 0 to have us 17th shows that we're getting outworked too frequently in that metric. Interestingly though, we're 6th for average 1%'ers differential, at 1.8. I don't have a definition of 1%'ers so I don't know what they include, but they likely include spoils, smothers, blocks, shepherds, those sorts of things. So we're doing some of those pressure-related things well.

I've seen enough from Smith to feel confident in saying he's not a footballer at all. He's an athlete. No football brain. A bit like Frost in that regard - doesn't stick to structures, can't control his urge to run and jump. Looks great when he does good things because of that athleticism, but on the whole just won't work whether forward or back.

Has anyone at the club said anything about the fixture or the flying into Cairns? As far as I'm aware, no. The only people mentioning it are supporters. FWIW, we've had as hard a fixture as anyone this year. I heard someone previewing the Dogs-Eagles game tonight saying that the Dogs have a 4-3 record at Metricon this year. That's 7 games at the same venue - we haven't played more than 2 games at any venue all year. There is, in my view, no doubt at all that we've had to do it tougher than most in terms of moving around, acclimatising to conditions and ground sizes, and trying to get some sort of consistency to our "home" games. None of that is enough to explain the Sydney performance, but it is a factor to consider when the season is said and done.

Ah yes I forgot we were focusing on the Goodwin era. Round 23, 2017 surely takes the cake.

The rumour is 9 changes. No idea if true. But when was the last time any team, let alone us, made 9 changes? We know Jones, Harmes and Brayshaw are out. OMac is surely another. Another five from there is insane to think about: would surely be looking at players like Melksham, Fritsch, Spargo and OMac. I'd be surprised to see 9 changes, but if we do, let's hope the surprises are more in relation to the players coming in than the players going out.

No love for Round 22, 2016? We'd just won three straight to get to 10-10, including our drought breaking win over Hawthorn and another drought breaking win over Port Adelaide, in Adelaide. We had Carlton at the G with finals still on the table if we won the last two. Carlton was on a 9-game losing streak. Sunday afternoon, 40,000+ at the G. We might not have beaten Geelong, in Geelong, in the final round to make finals, but we should have given ourselves the chance.

I don't, no. Only three games left, one of which is on Monday, so there's not a huge amount of time for them to get back before the end of the home & away season.

Unfortunately not. If Hibberd's not ready, it's quite a bit of experience going out without much to bring back (Jones will miss too through injury). Presumably PIckett is one inclusion. I'd like to see Bennell and Lockhart too, and maybe Baker/Bedford. We'll need players to be able to rotate through centre bounces to take Brayshaw's minutes.

Despite our 7-7 record, still in line for a top 5 Brownlow finish and an AA jumper. Has taken his game to another level this year, which very few other MFC players have done. There is a continued expectation on him to lead us. It's important we all remember he's only just now reaching his 100th game and is only 24 years old. So many comparisons get drawn between him and Dustin Martin. IIRC, Martin's entrance to the AFL's elite was 2016 (first time he won RIchmond's B&F and made the AA team). That was his 7th season. Petracca's currently in his 6th season, one of which he missed entirely through injury.

If there was competition for his spot, I would agree. A lack of intensity and a low-possession game aren't really going to impact us that much. But it's not like those in the 22 are doing much better than this. I mean, are we really saying Melksham's 8 disposal, 0 tackle, no score game is more impactful than what Bennell might produce? Or Fritsch's 13 disposal, 2 tackle, 0.1 game? Spargo's 9 disposal, 2 tackle, 1 goal game?

In what world are any of those players an equivalent for Papley? Indeed, I'd argue all three together isn't enough. What?! I thought Hore had a really promising first year and would be getting games right now in OMac/Smith's spot if he wasn't injured. Wouldn't have him anywhere near a list of players to delist, let alone second. Happy to release Jones, J Wagner, Smith and OMac though. Not yet sure on Hannan.

It's so simple! All we have to do is have 44 elite, best 22 players on our list!

I'm no scientist, and I'm guessing neither are you, but maybe there's a different impact on players' bodies to playing a match of AFL, a (highly) contact sport with a large field, than playing soccer?

I am reliably informed that Brayshaw and Harmes will miss this game due to injury.

You're not a fan of either of them? Hore is a far better defender than OMac and Smith. The kicking is a problem but not as bad as you're suggesting.

I'm not sure the weather exacerbated our poor kicking. But I am sure it exacerbated our poor decision making. Whether it's on the coaches for failing to make sure we knew what we were doing going into the game, or on the players for their ineptitude, we were just mindlessly kicking it long to hope the wind did the job for us.

The fact we flew in so late is almost certainly on the AFL. We were in Alice Springs with St Kilda. St Kilda needed to return to the Queensland hub. So we flew with them. Fremantle was in the hub and needed to fly to Cairns. So we flew with them. Had we flown directly from Alice Springs to Cairns, that's an extra flight the AFL had to arrange (St Kilda still had to fly back to Queensland and then Fremantle still had to fly to Cairns). Sydney was in Adelaide and had to get into Queensland somehow, and no one else was flying from Adelaide to Queensland, so they were able to just fly them to Cairns without having to worry about anything else. I'm not sure, but I'm relatively confident these decisions weren't made by us.

How many threads does olisik need to start after a loss? To answer the OP, no, we didn't get it wrong.

The suggestion isn't that Bennell needs to become a CP/clearance-winning bull. It's that he needs to be capable of, and willing to, defend. He has to chase and tackle when the opposition has the ball. We saw yesterday that when forward half players don't do that (e.g. Melksham and Fritsch), we look terrible and we struggle to score.