titan_uranus

None of this is anywhere near as bad as Taylor Adams. What that decision says is that you can intentionally knee someone in the head and, if you plead guilty, be suspended for just one week. Read that again. Intentionally. Knee. Head. If that's what the points system is serving up, the system is horrendously, fatally, flawed.

I ought to be surprised at some of the pessimism in this thread, but I'm not. Some people on here appear to just be itching for the next error to befall the club so they can say 'I told you so! We're not improving! Why didn't you all listen to me when I said so!!' If you think we're worse than last year then you're far more delusional than those who you criticise for suggesting we're doing OK. If you think our best is the worst in the league then you didn't watch our best convincingly beat Richmond, the Dogs or Geelong (two current top 8 sides, one pushing for the 8 (and in Geelong)). You didn't see our best dominate Collingwood for sustained periods (current top 8 side), or GWS for the first half (current top 8 side), or Port for the first half, or Adelaide for the first quarter. Yes, the last four of those didn't turn into wins, and that's both disappointing and not good enough. But suggestions that our best is the worst in the league are just ridiculous, the evidence shows you to be wrong. It also obscures from the reality of football - no side plays at its best week in, week out (hell, Fremantle just lost to Hawthorn by 72 points). Our best is more than good enough. If anything, the issue is our worst - our worst is not acceptable and dips below pretty much all other clubs' worsts. IMO we're working on this but a combination of bad list management, bad team selection, bad luck with injuries, and bad leadership mean that it's not being improved as fast as I would like.

1. Family 2. Paul Hopgood. Lol jks, Jeff Farmer 3. 2000 qualifying final, upsetting Carlton. Close second, 2006 Elimination Final, upsetting St Kilda and ending Grant Thomas' career 4. Far too many to choose from. 186? Watching what Schwarz was capable of and having it ruined. Ditto Jurrah. Ditto Clark. Possibly ditto Trengove. 5. One day, this club is going to become successful and will demand the respect of others. I cannot wait until that time comes, because in the interim, we will continue to be bullied and made fun of simply for our choice of football club. I hate how little respect this club gets (not that it deserves it). I hate that every week people laugh at playing Melbourne, or pity us for yet another loss. Nobody gets excited about playing Melbourne, nobody cares about what is happening to us. That's going to change at some point, and whenever it happens, those of us who stuck through everything will be well within their rights to be smug-ass knobs.

Brisbane's key forwards are Staker, McStay and Bourke. Combined today for 0 goals. In fact, their goals all came from midfielders - Zorko, Beams, Adcock and Hanley. Clearly this game is going to be won or lost in the midfield. That's all Brisbane has. If their mids are on top of ours we're going to be in trouble.

Like how we fought back yesterday? Meanwhile St Kilda finished the game having kicked 6 goals, 3 of which came in a 3 minute burst (i.e. 3 goals in just short of an entire game), in perfect conditions, against a side who hadn't won for a month and cruelled with injuries. Sounds a lot like Melbourne, actually, and I guarantee you if that had been us with that performance you'd have lamented our terrible skills and inability to score.

Michie and Riley getting a heap of the ball in these conditions isn't wholly surprising, but nice to see anyway. Grimes and Toumpas laying a bucketload of tackles is also important. Along with Spencer and Jamar who appear to have done well in the ruck (given it's pouring, that's no mean feat), there are at least some names floating around for selection.

Well you hadn't quoted that post so forgive me for not reading your mind. That aside, I don't share your thoughts on Garland, and even if he is shutting down the third tall, if they're the third best then we need to be asking more from a senior player than that. I don't mind if McDonald and Dunn are playing pure defensive games when they're being given numbers 1 and 2, but for most opposition sides number 3 shouldn't be such a threat to stop Garland from peeling off, linking up, and once in a blue moon taking the first option when he gets the ball. The other issue I see is that I don't think we can go long term with Dunn as the second tall defender. Frost may end up being that player, and Dunn then becomes the third defender. I'd take that before I take the current set up. I'd like to see Garland get some attacking flair into his game. At least Grimes had developed that this year.

The point is, after we lost to St Kilda plenty on here questioned how/when we were going to win another game, which we did in the most surprising fashion of all by beating Geelong. IMO there's an equal chance we lose one or both of the Brisbane/St Kilda games as there is of us upsetting North, Collingwood or the Dogs. At least in those three games we know we'll be starting underdogs and there won't be that element of pressure that messed with us yesterday and is likely to mess with us again against the Lions.

I should say, I don't think it's a bad thing that we have some versatility in the side. Throwing McDonald forward every now and again for 10 minutes or a quarter might be a nice boost. Geelong did it with Taylor, Hawthorn sometimes does it with Lake, Fremantle does it with Johnson. Before that, West Coast had Hunter who used to be a key swingman. However, McDonald's a defender and we need to continue to get him learning and developing in that role.

See? This is what I'm saying. What is it you see in him? At present, is this the best argument in favour of Garland that you've got? We need to keep him because of Howe, Cross and Grimes? The four names you've mentioned are four massive parts of the problem at this club. The fact that Howe will likely leave, Cross is petering out, and Grimes is in and out, is not a reason to keep Garland without Garland actually having an important role to play. What is that role? So far in 2015 Grimes has been the more attacking, more likely to use the first option and has provided more run.

Easy to forget how great he was in the first six weeks, isn't it. He's a defender. He's not in form, but if we keep moving out of form players into new positions we'll never settle as a team.

I reckon part of it is confidence (i.e. the confidence that it's going to be OK even if you miss because it's just Melbourne, not Hawthorn or Fremantle etc.). But part of it is simply luck.

Hogan to defence, Hodge to captain us. Interesting from ENYAW.

He was fiddling at a ball well outside off. He should be better than that. S Marsh at least is in form. The only reason Voges is playing is because he made a century against the worst side in Test cricket. He has very few credits in the bank and I don't think he'll make it through the series (at his age, if he's not making runs, he shouldn't be playing). How many credits does Haddin have? He hasn't made a century since 2013, he's only made it to 50 once since the last Ashes series (18 months ago). He's also dropping catches. Like Voges and Watson, not sure he'll make it to the end of the series. Agreed. It's not as bad as the result seems. However, if we don't get a few things right at Lord's we can kiss the Ashes goodbye.

Dixon and Martin were suspended for drinking the night before a game, not the night after.

Not letting them go out after a game is like turning them into soulless robots for whom football isn't fun. Which is what Neeld tried to do, and we hated him for it. We should demand the highest standards from our players but they are young men who need to enjoy football. Forcing them to go whip themselves at night as a penance after every loss doesn't help and most likely wouldn't work anyway.

Hogan shouldn't be immune from criticism. However, it should be put in perspective. If you're going to have a go at Hogan, you should also be having a go at the senior players yet again not playing well (how many of Dawes, Cross, Vince, Jones, Dunn, Garland, Lumumba and Howe played good games today?). FWIW Hogan acted 'sulkily' far too much for my liking today. He is going to get beaten every now and again in his career; Hurley's in AA form, Hogan's not the first forward he's had the better of. But I didn't like how Hogan didn't really look to put in second efforts today, which is something he's done this year quite well. Bad game, but not even close to a concern, let alone one of the more serious concerns.

Moeen comes on for the last over before lunch, Warner and Smith cruising, and he takes Warner out. We've now lost 4/9 with our iffy middle order yet again not standing up when needed. Voges has played one outstanding innings but it was against the West Indies and he hasn't done anything of note since. Clarke doesn't look fully fluent, Smith's thrown his wicket away twice with poor shots. Watson and Haddin are both out of form with the bat, I can't see either of them making a respectable score. I'd drop Watson for Mitch Marsh and bring Siddle in to replace Starc. Voges gets another chance but Shaun Marsh is in better form and we're going to be 1-0 down in a few hours, we can't afford to lose more Tests. If Voges isn't performing that one century he made shouldn't be the only reason he's in the side.

A lot of it depends on who plays well at Casey, but ANB and Stretch look like they could use a rest - we're playing one short with Stretch and ANB looked knackered today. Brisbane will most likely play Martin alongside Leuenberger so we may need to bolster the ruck - we cannot have Dawes rucking against either of those two. Spencer may well get brought back for this, in which case we'll have to drop a tall I think. Might be Dawes.

I tend to agree with you. I don't see in Garland what everyone else appears to see. He is horrendously slow at disposing of the ball, generally makes bad decisions too. I wouldn't say he's a good kick - we have worse, but it's not like he has some silky kicks we can't afford to lose. I don't consider him good one-on-one, again we have worse but we have better. He's not tall or big enough to play as a key defender but we have Jetta to play on smalls. I really don't see it.

Press conference is up: http://www.melbournefc.com.au/video/2015-07-11/rd-15-paul-roos-media-conference Things Roos said: Bad goalkicking makes things much harder (compared the 18.5 vs Geelong to the 7.18 today) Noted our inability to bring the ball to ground - was discussed during the game and after it, we didn't get it done TMac made a good contest at times as a forward Simple to analyse - when we went forward and made a contest, we did well, when we didn't make a contest it went straight back out Not always the forwards fault. We're young and the 22 haven't yet developed the required 'synergy' together Denied that the Essendon situation had an effect on our players mindsets Noted we had 10 players under 50 games and 5 or 6 first year players No question about it, both from a mindset perspective and a game-result perspective, missing goals hurts us What will we do about it? We have to practice executing under pressure We also have to practice 'being in that position' (i.e. being favourites) To avoid another fade out, need to focus on the things we did well - statistics showed we did things well Players feel it when you're 4.15 and losing the game despite doing well in general play We tried the two ruckmen thing, Gawn doing well but still has bad habits Viney's been 'really consistent' since returning, liked his game today Disappointed we haven't won since Geelong, affects confidence Thinks we're still playing better than we have been, but there is an 'inability to win games'

His inability, and more importantly unwillingness, to kick on his left, is telling. Tyson has the same problem - cannot, and will not, kick on his right. One of Daniher's goals came today from Hibberd kicking on his right, which is his non-preferred.

We definitely were flat, but I'd say that was mental more than anything. Whether the players just thought it was going to happen, or whether they were afraid of losing to a basket case (personally I favour the latter), we just didn't have any spark or zip. But the fact we ran all over them in the last quarter suggests it wasn't fitness.

Plenty of other sides allow their opponents to play a loose man in defence. They counter it in other ways - usually that involves their own spare man having an effect on the game. Whenever our opponent drops one back, it's like we're playing one down, as if they've added the spare man to their 18. Part of the reason the tactic is working against us is because we're unable to generate anything from our own spare man, and we're also unable to generate anything when we man that spare man up - clogging our forward line seems to rob us of impetus.

Jones, Garland, Viney, Vince, Tyson, Dunn, Dawes, Lumumba, Garlett, Cross and Howe. That's the core leadership group. How many of them had good games today? Vince? Jones, maybe? Combine that with the fact that ANB, Stretch and Harmes were all ineffectual, and JKH was a bad choice as sub (yet another game day mistake from Roos), and it's no wonder why we lose games. Great post.