titan_uranus

There’s no doubt that without Pickett we are going to look slow against them. There’s also no doubt they are a talented side in contention this year. But Collingwood yesterday looked just as slow as I expect we will, and played one down on the field when N Daicos slowed to a walk, and yet generated similar scoring shots to 3QT and, on everyone’s favourite stat, the xScore margin at the end of the game was 2 points. Collingwood was also +21 in CPs, +4 in clearances and +1 in inside 50s. Tom Green makes a difference to these stats but they show you where GWS’s problems were. Unlike Collingwood, we should be able to take advantage of them having a weak ruck, plus we play at home not away (and hopefully not in the heat), plus we’re hopefully able to run the game out better than the Pies did, plus we get the benefit of an extra week to plan against what we just saw. So whilst they’re favourites, I can see how we win.

Great stuff, as always. Your site also tells us that in 2024 we scored more than our Expected Score across the season. On its face, this tells us that our inaccuracy last year comes principally from taking low-percentage shots on goal. We take far too many shots from angles (and interestingly, mainly the left hand side). @WheeloRatings Do you have the ability to break down how many games we lost where we ought to have won based on xScore, and vice versa? I'm interested to know whether the xScore across the season is skewed by outliers.

It’s both, isn’t it? There’s no doubt the quality of our entries has been too poor, generating too many low percentage shots from 40+ out on 45+ angles. I agree that comes from Goodwin/the FD believing that dominance of forward half territory was the way to go. But we lose enough games on expected score to tell us that we should be scoring more from the shots we do generate. We have unreliable kicks all over the field and, excluding Fritsch and Turner, that includes our forwards in set shots.

I assume when you say “preferred” you acknowledge this is no chance of happening? Like, for example, Turner suddenly playing defence alongside May, Lever and Petty?

This is what gets me, too. I like AJ, but he isn't playing unless we're dropping one of these three other guys. We haven't set up all summer with JVR, Turner, AJ and Fritsch. Yesterday AJ would have been on the bench until late but came on early because JVR went off. If we were going to play all four, we would have done so yesterday. AJ is priming himself for Turner's spot, IMO. Turner would want to start the year well.

I’m sure plenty wrote the season off at half time. It was a practice match. I’m principally concerned with the JVR injury and how we tried to move the ball. From the looks of it, we’re trying new things. It’s ok for them not to have worked well today. However we’d dearly want the goal kicking to be a cobweb-blow out sort of thing. Doesn’t matter how well we move the ball this year if we still can’t kick it between the big sticks.

Confirmed that Culley’s 46:

As an addendum to this, last week David King said we were one of 6-7 clubs who could be ruled out of flag contention. Despite this, yesterday he said he had us in his top 8, until last minute switching us out for Gold Coast. He does not have Sydney, Carlton, Port Adelaide or the Bulldogs in his top 8, despite ruling none of them out of flag contention last week. Strictly speaking not inconsistent, but generally speaking classic David King.

Gawn on radio yesterday said he’s playing, and he expects everyone to play except Melksham and McVee.

I think this is the right call. I don’t think we’ve had adequate midfield depth for a while now and from all reports Culley has done everything asked of him, and more, this pre-season. I reckon we’ll see him in the side earlier than many expect, even if only for a handful of games.

Cal Twomey’s article suggests the rationale to cutting it off as early as possible is to allow lower league clubs to know who is actually going to be playing for them, without fear that at any minute their players might be picked up by an AFL club. Surely the end of February/start of March isn’t too early for leagues which don’t start until the end of March? And even if it is, surely today (for example) is practically no different to Friday, but allows us and the other clubs who had their practice matches on Saturday to get in before the cut off?

He obviously can’t given who he’s employed by, but tbh I think he’s conceding as much with the word “quirk”. It was so obviously foreseeable.

The official AFL website is running a fan survey, with a bunch of respectful questions on there, like this one… Guess they forgot the “none of them” option…?

As much as the result is pleasing given we had 10-12 best 22 out and they had maybe 2 out, it was a practice match so the result is largely meaningless. For those who were able to watch, I’m far more interested in our game plan - how did we set up, did we press high, how did we move the ball, etc?

His reasoning was, as usual, not bullet proof. Cornes said he’d rule Port Adelaide out and King said he wouldn’t rule them out because Butters, JHF and Rozee might all go berserk and that might be enough, despite them being weak both in the backline and the forward line. Surely similar logic applies to us with, say, Trac, Clarry and Gawn?

Is it just me or is this clip not doing the rounds on Demonland already?

So it could be be a Cometti favourite - the third of two options (Henderson over both Culley and George)

Pretty damning interview. I applaud his honesty tbh. But it’s abundantly clear that he wants out. I suppose we have 6 months to convince him to change his mind.

The timing of this match is the sort of thing that needs to be raised at the AGM. Why are we embarrassing ourselves and our hardworking volunteers? Is there a good reason? I certainly can’t think of a good reason for a Friday afternoon timeslot in school term. The McAdam injury is devastating given his changed fitness and attitude this pre-season. Only serves to compound the frustration that comes with Pickett’s suspension.

That’s what you took from that? It’s arguably (maybe inarguably) the most open/candid interview he’s ever given. Which may not be saying much given he’s renowned for being a deadpan closed book, but makes the interview insightful all the same.

In part three, Goodwin on Oliver: The Demons have spoken privately with Oliver and admitted he should not have been floated in any trade scenarios with rival clubs last year without telling him first. Oliver, 27, was blindsided when he discovered in the media the Demons had raised his name with Adelaide, prompting the gun midfielder to have his own talks with Geelong last year. The messy saga continued a difficult year for the Demons, but Goodwin said the club had worked hard with Oliver to wipe the slate clean and prime him physically to help rediscover his best. Goodwin said he shared “an incredibly close relationship” with the brilliant ballwinner and was adamant Oliver was all-in on helping drive the Demons forward after a tough end to last year. “It was certainly uncomfortable how things played out publicly last year, but Clayton is really aware of how much I love him and how proud I am of the journey he has been on,” Goodwin told the Herald Sun. “And just how much the whole club loves him and how much we want him to be part of the footy club. “I have known him for 10 years and we have ridden the ups and downs and it has been a hell of a journey. “But right now we are writing a new path and from all of the conversations I have had with him he is as engaged as anyone. He loves his teammates, and he wants to be part of something (special) again. “He holds the pen for the new chapter as we all do.” At his best, the four-time best-and-fairest winner and 2021 AFL Coaches Association player of the year is one of most dynamic clearance-winners in the game. But Goodwin said fans should not expect Oliver to be at full power straight away as he continues to build fitness and touch after a challenging 12 months. He played 21 games last season but did not finish inside the top-10 of the best and fairest, indicating how much ground he has to make up after some personal issues, in part, wiped out last pre-season. “He has missed a lot of footy and a lot of training and this is what this whole pre-season has been about, connecting him back to the game, and getting him ultimately back to his best,” he said. “I think that will take some time, so we need to temper our expectations a little bit in terms of where he will be initially. “There are some challenges, but there are also a lot of opportunities. “We are confident if we keep working with him he will get to where he wants to get to and as part of that it is about being a great teammate.”

On himself: Goodwin married his partner, Kristine Brooks, who is the Australian boss of investment group Milford, in front of family and friends in Bali over Christmas, and said he has “never been happier”. “I feel as light as I’ve ever felt. It’s been a tough period,” he said. “To have the things spoken about me personally has been tough. “I’m (now) happily married. It was an incredible time with the family. “I put myself out there with my (all-white) outfit, clearly. I walked out there (for the wedding ceremony) and my brother said ‘What number are you batting?’ And then I walked a little bit further down the aisle and Bernie Vince said ‘Are you playing bowls for Stansbury?’ (laughing) “So I’ve never been happier. I feel fresh and I’m enjoying coaching as much as I ever have and hopefully everything is all behind us. “Hopefully, in time, people will see the person I am and we can all move forward.”

On this year: So, what are the internal expectations in 2025? “Just to get our days right, get our training right and just continue to be open to exploring new ways of doing things,” he said. “We want to build a clear identity in our game style, but we want to be able to win multiple different ways. That is the challenge for every team – to do everything well. “I want our fans to see changes in the way we move the ball but also in the way we defend because the reality is we weren’t good at any phase of the game last year.” But before they could whip the Sherrins out to start the pre-season, Melbourne headed to Bright in north-east Victoria for a bonding camp run by mindset master Ben Crowe. The tumult of the end of last season had to be addressed. When Petracca and Oliver considered their futures for different reasons at the end of 2024, it was unclear if Melbourne was a fully united football club. And any remaining cracks are always going to be exposed when the on-field pressure comes in the new season. Not ducking the question, Goodwin said “there was some healing that needed to be done”. So in the Bright team meetings, players opened up about not only last year, but the past few years, and emotions came to the fore. “It took a lot of vulnerability from a lot of players, and a lot of vulnerability from staff, myself included,” he said. But there is no point in training for football if you can’t start that process of reconnecting and for us, the healing. “Ben (Crowe) had worked with a lot of teams and some elite athletes around the world and he was unbelievable. He has been a constant in our pre-season. “We would do some things differently last year and there have been some learnings we would all take a lot from it. So we were able to express all that and move forward. “There were some conversations that needed to be had, but we can’t live in the past. “We hold the pen to write the next chapter and we will hold that pen and we will write. “That will be our theme for the year.” “But the question is how do we do it? I think we are all excited by that part and the new ideas that we are exploring”.

On the gameplan: But it won’t be the same long-down-the-line tactics that drove Melbourne in 2021-23, and returned for the second half of last year. In the most candid interview of his coaching career, Goodwin said he made an error zigzagging in game style last year, leaving the team “confused”. At the start of last season, the Demons changed up their ball movement in a bid to find the forward-half efficiency it needed to be successful in September. In the 2023 finals series, the Demons had 32 more inside-50s than Collingwood and eight more scoring shots than Carlton and lost both games in heartbreaking fashion. “We would have more inside-50s but lose. That was the consistent theme at Melbourne, which is frustrating because we did a lot right,” Goodwin said. “So you start to scratch for the five per cent extra.” So the Demons changed the game plan for 2024 and enjoyed a strong start, winning seven of their first nine games. But they were belted by a combined 127 points by West Coast and Fremantle in rounds 11 and 13. And that is when the Melbourne coaching staff blinked. To stop the bleeding on the scoreboard, Goodwin brought back key parts of the old 2021 premiership game style after the round 15 mid-season bye. In hindsight, it was a mistake. “In the middle part of the year we got a little bit wonky,” he said. “We lost some personnel and we lost a few games really badly and we were totally uncompetitive and it was un-Melbourne-like. “Belted by Fremantle by 92 points, lost to West Coast in Perth by 35 points. “Similar to players, coaches are no different, we get nervous. We lose confidence. “At that point we asked ourselves, how do we help this team become more competitive? “So we went back to a little bit of what we knew. And in hindsight that (old method) probably wasn’t the best way to go. “We were more competitive yes, but we were still losing games. We don’t evolve. We don’t improve and we don’t get better. We don’t grow as a team, as a group, as a club. “If I had my time again, I would have continued down the path of exploring that different way of playing and that is the learning. And that is really what our summer has been about. Keep exploring, keep looking at different ways, for better ways.”