titan_uranus

We were down 0-3 and then 3-6 in clearances but finished the quarter 8-8. The midfield battle is crucial. We had Jones on a wing at one stage, which isn't my ideal wing line up.

That quarter turned when we got on top in the middle. We clearly have the ability to move the ball and find scoring options against their defence. Need to stay on top in the middle.

I have no confidence at all. In theory, we can win this. That theory is that our midfield gets on top, our forwards make the most of St Kilda's relatively poor backline, and our zone returns to what it was prior to last week. If we can get the game played in our forward half and we ramp up the brutality around the contest, we can win. But reality suggests we'll either lose in the middle, or turn it over in our forward line, and watch them burst away from our turnovers with pace that we cannot match, with an open forward line (because we'll be pushing up the ground) and goals out the back left right and centre. I think that's what gets me the most. Not necessarily the sinking feeling that we'll lose, but the feeling that I can predict precisely how this game is going to play out. PS: our season doesn't end with a loss (unless we shed too much percentage). A final four of Sydney, Fremantle, GWS and Essendon presents us with a solid chance to go 3-1 and get us to 9 wins at worst. IMO, our season is set up beautifully with a win, but we're not done with a loss.

Two of their last three are away. They'll finish the season with 7 games at the Adelaide Oval and 10 somewhere else. Hardly complaint material.

There have been plenty of comments that the players love Goodwin and they trust him, though. I mean, for all of Goodwin's flaws as a coach, he's generally been able to connect with the players. I don't think he's got it right with Harmes but you can imagine Harmes saying to a mate "Goody's not listening to me" and the rumour spreads from there. Harmes' 2020 is a fail from Goodwin either way.

I suspect this is from a source connected with Harmes? If so, whilst this could all be true, it could also be the way Harmes is perceiving the situation, and the reality may not be as severe. If it is true, I think it's an awful call from Goodwin. It's bad enough that we can't find room for him in the midfield (Sparrow's been getting minutes there this year - so it can't simply be a lack of opportunities), but IMO Harmes is far better suited to a forward role than defence.

I think St Kilda leave King deep and push Membrey up the ground more. So presumably we've brought OMac back to stay with King as the deeper defender and let May follow Membrey up the ground. Lever then peels off the resting ruckman. Tomlinson pushes up to the wing and has to make Hill/Jones accountable on transition by opening up as much space as he can. I'm still not convinced by any of the arguments I've read here about why Lockhart was dropped. I don't even think he's been average/poor, I think he's been solid, and against a side with small forwards, and having had a seven day break, I just don't see the logic here. Can we say all three? Predominantly I say he shouldn't be in the backline. Goodwin's got form for getting this wrong (Fritsch last year). But Harmes is talented enough to be able to influence games more than he has been.

Dogs were two down on the bench for the second half, which I'm sure hurt. However it happened, that result helps us. Dogs have to win out to get to 10. They have West Coast, Hawthorn and Fremantle. If they lose once more this year, they can't do better than 9 wins and we currently have 11% on them. The fact that we're only a game behind them but we have two extra games to play really helps us. If we can somehow win tomorrow, we'll be so much closer to ensuring we finish the season above the Dogs. Will then only need to make sure we outpace Essendon and Carlton from there. If the Dogs had won tonight, our path would have been significantly harder.

Rivers is an upgrade on Harmes. Not necessarily Lockhart.

I just cannot fathom why Lockhart has been dropped. Is there something more to that? Absolutely flabbergasted, and that’s got nothing to do with my views on OMac and Wagner either.

On the face of it... I don’t like it. Lockhart dropped?! Horrendously harsh IMO, the more so given he was surely a good match up for Butler.

Add Fritsch and that's five changes (unless we keep Preuss - but I don't like our chances if we do that).

Well with Fritsch suspended, Sparrow injured and TMac and Harmes allegedly dropped, we're not necessarily fielding our best 22 this week.

I think there's a major cultural difference between being late to training and a mistake (albeit a big one) in the middle of a game. i'm not excusing vandenBerg, btw - indeed, I am not sure he should be playing right now given his output and the clangers/turnovers outweighing the positives he brings. As to Harmes, I agree. I am firmly of the view he shouldn't have been moved to the backline and I think he probably should have been tried as a forward/mid before being dropped.

I know, but I had considered Harmes to fall into the favourites category (along with Melksham and vandenBerg). We've seen Goodwin drop Hibberd, Jetta, Jones and now Harmes this year. It's a trend towards ditching favourites and dropping players who are truly out of form. It's just a shame that trend never extended to Melksham.

I'd like to know more about what happened to Fritsch before we all get stuck in. But if he did something stupid I hope he learns his lesson. Could well cost us a finals spot. If TMac is out, and we drop Preuss, then you'd imagine we must bring in Brown. If not, we'll likely be rucking Weideman when Gawn rests, and we can't afford to do that. If Harmes is out, I will agree with that call, but I will question how Melksham survived being dropped all season.

Yep. 6.3 to 1.1 at quarter time in front of 50,000+ people on a Sunday arvo. Remember it well. Didn't go on with it from there (8.9 to 9.11 from then on). Was also the game we made fun of them by talking about us making finals and them missing. Then we missed the finals. Brought serious bad karma.

What?!

Not sure they're tanking. They're three games and percentage behind 17th with 4 games to play. Which means they'd have to win them all to get off the bottom. Which wouldn't happen even if they tried, so they should really be going all out to beat Hawthorn next week or, better for us, GWS or Carlton their following two games.

Essendon will pass us tonight if they go on to win, but before this board goes berserk at that fact, bear in mind that they're struggling against Hawthorn, a bottom 4 side, and their next three games are against West Coast, Geelong and Port.

Hold on @Skuit, that's hardly fair. I'm not justifying the act of drink-driving. The distinction between what's happened here and your example is that Dahlhaus and ANB are both guilty of the same offence, but ANB's offence did greater damage than Dahlhaus'. Your example involves ANB committing a second, separate, offence on top of the first one. That's not what happened. As I said though, I agree with the principle that it's fine for ANB to have received a harsher penalty than Dahlhaus. The issue I have is that Dahlhaus' penalty is borderline non-existent (is there any evidence to suggest $1,500 fines deter players, or are considered punishment to players?) and is too far away from ANB's penalty. That indicates to me another example of the AFL over-weighting the importance of the outcome on the penalty, when the action should be what is the key factor. When you add to that the repeated instances of the AFL saying that sling tackles are bad, the head needs to be protected, and the possibility of head damage is enough to make sling tackles bad, IMO it all points to a sign that the AFL's system on this issue is not working.

That's two different offences though. ANB didn't commit a second offence of "dangerous tackling while drunk". He and Dahlhaus did the exact same thing, but ANB got punished more than four times more heavily than Dahlhaus for the consequences. The concept of a worse outcome leading to a more significant punishment is nothing new nor is it wrong. The issue is when, as is the case with the AFL, the outcome is overly important in the matrix. The difference between what ANB did and what Dahlhaus did is not terribly great, yet ANB got 4 weeks and Dahlhaus no weeks at all. IMO, if ANB was a 4 week suspension (and that's arguably justifiable), Dahlhaus was 1 week at a minimum.

All hell should now break loose.

That's a ridiculous comment. The current proposal isn't to extend the State of Emergency for 12 months, but to provide the government with ability to do so. And regardless, the existence of a State of Emergency doesn't mean life can't get back to "normal". Indeed, the government's argument is that it needs the State of Emergency to allow life to get back to a safe normal by providing the ongoing power to require masks to be worn or density limits in places like stadiums.