titan_uranus

The Geelong loss? Our third game for the year? After we'd fallen over the line against Carlton? It "killed any momentum"? That makes absolutely no sense to me. You are advocating for writing off the season because, the argument goes, we can't make finals (and/or can't win the flag). That, IMO, is accepting our current mediocrity. You want improvement. So do I. But why can't we demand improvement as well as wins?

Based on the way he moved around the ground, yes it absolutely was. Sparrow I agree with: he wasn't necessarily the wrong player to pick but he wasn't in the right role and it impacted others. If we want to tag someone, Harmes should do it. In fact, Harmes probably shouldn't be playing at all unless he's spending significant time in the middle. So putting Sparrow in there over him is a mistake and the FD should have foreseen that.

Goodwin moved Fritsch into the backline in the second half, as part of his (useless) flipping of magnets. Yes, we run around the field a lot, but it stems from turnovers. We looked composed and well structured over the past three weeks. We weren't turning it over as much. The two are, IMO, inextricably linked. When we turn it over, we find ourselves caught out of position and then we look all over the shop, forcing everyone to sprint around to try to plug gaps.

Says the poster who does nothing but start and bump threads criticising players and doesn't engage in rational discussions. You cop heat on here because, like olisik, you're impossible to read or deal with and infuriatingly repetitive. If you don't like copping heat, relent on the monotonous over-posting and try talking about something else once in a while.

No posts between July 11 (the night of the GC win) and last night. One post about the GC win, half about us and half about Rankine. One post after the Carlton win.

Maybe we should re-name this thread the @Elegt and @olisik circle jerk.

But they're not though. More than ever under Goodwin's reign, we're keeping forwards higher up the ground as outlets for when we get the ball back. Our mids are defensively running now, which is essential. No team leaves defence up to the back six alone. If we're losing energy defending, which we are, it's because we keep turning it over forcing us to have to manically re-set our zone and sprint back into defence. Too much running between the 50s and not enough keeping of the ball inside our forward half (which is what Goodwin has always wanted).

Our defensive zone is actually one of the things we've been getting right the last month. There's no defensive setup that can contain a top of the ladder side when you turn it over like we do. Longing for old-fashioned one-on-one footy isn't the answer. Concerted effort for our mids and forwards to improve their skills and work rate is.

You know they lost their last 4 in rather pathetic fashion? Sure, a fightback tonight was good for them, but they're old and experienced and should be contending for top 4, not trying to escape the bottom 4.

Oliver does a lot right but he stands out when he plays poorly because his kicks are absolute coach-killing soul-destroyers. I don't agree with anyone suggesting we should trade him. He's only just turned 23. He's played 90 games. His peak football is still be ahead of him. But he clearly has to work on his kicking and, indeed, his disposals under pressure. Too often guilty of the hot potato handball when he's under pressure.

Last night was appalling but if you're writing the rest of the season off now, aren't you just "accepting mediocrity"? We're 3-5. It's not exactly a launching pad for finals, but the 5 losses are to 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 6th. In a season where we play everyone once, we have plenty of games to come against sides not currently in the 8 with few to come against sides that are consistently good (indeed, St Kilda is the highest-ranked side left on our fixture). That doesn't mean wins will come automatically and if we play like we did last night, we'll be 3-7. But if we get back the run and aggression we showed in Rounds 6-8, we can and should beat both Adelaide and North and level out at 5-5. From there, a 4-3 record may be enough to make finals.

Can we stop with the "put him in defence" thing? His field kicking coming out of the backline is a team destroyer and we cannot tolerate it. We also don't need it with May and Lever finally settling into their roles. He kicked 53 goals in 20 games, and a sizeable portion of those games didn't have Hogan so let's also drop the "it was fine when Hogan was there" schtick too. He's capable, but he's not delivering. Simple as that. Is it fitness? Probably. He was always an elite endurance runner but that's disappeared. He was also always a reliable shot on goal and that's gone too. Is it confidence? I think so. I think he's a major confidence player and in 2018 he felt like he could do anything. Now I suspect he thinks he can't do anything right. Is it coaching? I think so too. He should be playing a lead-up mobile forward role, not a goalsquare gorilla role, nor a high half-forward/wing role. Ultimately it doesn't matter what it is, the reality is he's not best 22 and shouldn't be playing. From where he was in 2018 to where he is now is a remarkable drop. If he cannot get fit and improve, his career at this club is probably finished.

There's certainly merit in suggesting we trade one of our midfielders. Brayshaw and Harmes are inside midfielders being played in roles they're not suited for. If that's our long-term plan for them, it's not a smart use of resources. If either of them could be traded for something different (e.g. a key forward, a high draft pick, or another midfielder who varies the dynamic), we should be considering it. But by the same token, one or two list changes here or there isn't going to fix us. We're going to hold onto the majority of Oliver, Viney, Petracca, Brayshaw, Harmes and Sparrow. The only way forward is for them all to collectively lift their output.

I think the point May is making is that when you turn it over as much as we do, you continually ask your forwards and mids to double-back from aggressive forward running to provide scoring opportunities back into defensive running to help out. So we had our forwards and mids slingshotting up and down the ground because we kept turning it over. Which in turn meant we were exhausted and then the errors mounted. The same thing would afflict any side turning it over as much as we do. So much of our malaise comes down to turnovers. Are you basing this on last night or the year overall? Because last night Lever was looking for switch/angled kicks every time he had the chance. We had three talls plus Max last night. Repeatedly kicking down the same wing to Max is stupid. I'm not against the concept of kicking to a tall target and being content to let the ball go over the boundary line if we can't retain possession, but it shouldn't be Gawn every single time who is the target. I accept the differences between the Richmond loss and this loss, but the point is that we had a poor performance just four weeks ago that, rightly or wrongly, brought significant heat onto us. Yet here we are again. We need to learn to sustain effort for four quarters, and for more than three weeks at a time.

May's interview is telling IMO. He notes the following: skill errors reduce our confidence, but the errors are not a confidence thing but, rather, a concentration thing. Direct quote: "the game's too hard to just turn up and expect it to happen. You've got to focus every disposal" when our confidence falls, we go into our shells, so we stop taking the game on; we score when we take the game on, but we stopped doing that; when the ball is spending too much time in the back half, we tire our defensively, limiting our ability to attack. When that sort of thing comes from a player, it's illuminating IMO. Clearly spoke honestly. Shows that we have too many players who don't mentally focus and/or cannot perform consistently week in, week out. That leads to mistakes, that leads to us going into shells, and that leads to losses. Our coaches and players, jointly, should be past this by now.

A well-reasoned counter to how I felt last night and still feel, to a lesser extent, this morning. The one key issue for us, though, is that we have these "mulligan" performances far too frequently. We were terrible against Richmond just four weeks ago. Here we are again, four weeks later. I agree there are opportunities in our fixture to win games and correct this season, but unlike other clubs who have had one-off shocking performances, our track record does not instil confidence that there is some sort of righting of the ship to come. Indeed, given our history, I'd suggest we're more likely to fall flat and finish bottom 4 than we are to become a legitimate flag contender from here.

I think I want TMac, Brayshaw and Jones out, to be replaced with some sort of group of Bennell, vandenBerg, Tomlinson, ANB and Hunt. That's before we consider fitness issues with the next game in just six days and another one four days after that. I'd give Harmes Brayshaw's spot in the middle first, before dropping him. Don't drop him on the back of a game he played in defence. He's not a defender. Goodwin should know that by now.

Dropping some players might make a small, one off statement, but as has been the case for 18 months, it's not going to fix us. Only proper change across our coaches and players, will fix us. (But I'd start with dropping TMac and telling him he doesn't get gifted another game until he earns it).

6 - Lever 5 - May 4 - Lockhart 3 - Hibberd 2 - Petracca 1 - Oliver Oliver doesn't exactly deserve a vote but there's no one else and he at least continued to put his body on the line through the four quarters. His kicking was deplorable though.

An absolute disgrace. Stripped all the enjoyment from the two wins and the half-decent game vs Brisbane, and replaced it with that feeling of dread and anger that we're all too familiar with. But somehow my anger at the club is being rivalled by my anger at some of the posting here. People getting stuck into Jackson and Pickett, who have played like 11 games between them, or calling out Lever when we was probably our best, or asking Goodwin to make changes on the field. The problems on show tonight are long-standing deep seated problems that we all know about, and they're not drafting, nor are they kids. The way we play is wholly dependent on winning CPs and clearances. When we don't win them, we cannot win. We require high level intensity at the coalface and across the ground. If it falls apart, we have nothing else. We want to play an aggressive forward half game but that doesn't work when you turn it over, and we turn it over an unacceptable amount. And we have a crop of leaders who disappear when we need them and fail to lift or improve us. So let's stop potting our first year players and put the blowtorch where it belongs: on Gawn, Oliver, Brayshaw, Viney, Harmes, Salem, Jones, TMac and Melksham. And on Goodwin, for his continued inability to stem the tide or make any permanent inroads into our failures.

It's only 24 hours less than what Port had, and we were at least in Queensland last week (they were in Adelaide). Not sure it's that much of a factor?

Ah good one. If we play like this, all 17 clubs are better than us. Meanwhile the Dogs won a flag four years ago. When did we ever "go past" them?

This is far more of a problem than gameday moves. I get people are frustrated but there is so much rubbish in this thread. There's plenty wrong with the club but complaints about Lever (possibly our best), Pickett (7th game) and Goodwin not flipping magnets is ridiculous and doesn't address the real issues: turnovers, gameplan, lack of leadership, inability to play football unless we win CPs/clearances, lazy midfielders.

It's not necessarily about different methods, but it is about how dependent we are on CPs/clearances. If we can't dominate in the middle, everything else falls apart.

What do you expect him to do? He's got Fritsch on a wing, Viney in the forward line, TMac higher up the ground. What do you want? It's systemic change from him we need, not gameday flipping of magnets.