titan_uranus

I'm only able to follow online, but statistically things are average. Disposals: 163-168 Clearances: 18-15 Inside 50s: 24-17 Contested possessions: 53-55 Tackles 27-19 Competitive in disposals and clearances against the GC midfield, which is a win, but the inside 50 discrepancy is frustrating, as always.

Another wonderful bowling display. Most of our bowling innings this series have been disciplined and aggressive at the same time. Lyon went another step to making the Agar decision look woeful, Bird showed up Starc (Starc may feel disappointed but he continually releases pressure with half-volleys and leg-side rubbish. Run-scoring pressure is what did in Root, Bell, Bairstow and Prior), Watson showed that he has to bat at 6 to be able to chip in with his bowling. Great fielding too (Bird's early stop on the boundary, Khawaja's catch off Trott, Harris' catch off Bell, Haddin's catch of Pietersen, all great). Will be interesting to see how we bat on this pitch. The Rogers-Warner partnership will also intrigue - Rogers is in form, Warner's not, and the Rogers-Watson partnership was doing fine. Pressure's on Warner. Watson meanwhile will hopefully avoid the swing and maybe get to get stuck in to Swann. Very keen to see how Watson goes at 6. All in all, the more we play like this and keep things competitive, the more hope and confidence we can draw for the return series. You could argue Warner's our second best batsman. But you'd be wrong. Rogers is our second best Test batsman, and at the moment Steven Smith is third (which shows you where Australian cricket is at right now). That is, of course, besides the point. Maxwell is not a Test cricketer. His bursts of wickets/runs are just that, bursts. They distort his averages. On the African tour for Australia A he made the big 155, but also made a pair. He also took just one wicket in four bowling innings. It's that kind of inconsistency that renders him a limited overs player. He has talent and potential, no one's disputing that, but he is simply not a Test cricketer. Australia has to stop trying to take limited overs talent and moulding it into Test match talent.

Every time Maxwell blazes away, whether in First Class (almost never) or limited overs format, people salivate and say 'he could be the next big thing in the Test side!' He's not close to a Test player. I'd rather see him keep doing what he's doing and being a long term member of the ODI/T20 squads than attempt to play Test cricket and end up somewhere in between a Test and ODI player. His turn in India highlighted how massively far off it he is, and a blazing ODI 100 doesn't change that.

Terrible misrepresentation in the title. It's wholly unsurprising that Hogan isn't rushing to put pen to paper. He hasn't played a game, he doesn't know who is going to coach him in his first two seasons, he doesn't know what we'll be like and he doesn't know how he'll go at AFL level. If you were him, why would you sign? Even if he is desperate to stay at Melbourne, he will do so much better by waiting and seeing who his coach his, what plans they have for him, how he fits in with the forward line/midfield, and he'll be able to push his value up if he takes his perceived form into AFL. I'll go out there and say I actually think players like Jack Martin signing up this early are quite silly.

Ignorance question ahead: Why is Gillies in the twos? Coming back from injury? Form?

The only explanation I can think of for upgrading him but then not even naming him an emergency is that by announcing we've upgraded him, the heat goes on him to lift his game at Casey and push hard for selection in the coming weeks. The plausibility of that is questionable at best, so I'm still dumbfounded.

Rubbish selection. Whilst I understand giving Gawn and Toumpas a rest for their tiring bodies, to have left in all of Davey, Howe and Byrnes, who are giving us squat right now, and thus leaving out Strauss, who is doing all he can at Casey, is ridiculous. Good to see Davis get a game, but totally disinterested about seeing McKenzie again. Should have been someone new.

Probable? It's not probable at all. In order for it to happen, GWS needs to win another game. They won't start favourite in any of them. They are no chance against Fremantle in Perth, I'd argue they're no chance against Brisbane in Brisbane, and on current form Richmond will maul them. The only game they might win is the final one against Gold Coast, but Gold Coast will clearly start favourite in that game given it's on the Gold Coast and GC has been way, way better than GWS this year. Some people on here are taking the one win GWS has had over Melbourne, the worst side in the competition not called GWS, and forgotten how bad GWS had been all year.

I think there are aspects of the technical side of kicking which can be improved. Howe used to try to kick the ball too hard when he kicked, but he's eased back a bit. Ball drop is also fixable (McDonald's ball drop is a bit iffy at times). Decision making, though, is just as important, and that's where most players are just woefully substandard. This doesn't just involve choosing which player to kick to, or how to kick it to that player. It's about the entire decision making process, from when you start thinking about getting the ball, to getting the ball, through to disposal. How many times do you see a Melbourne player run past the player who's just marked it, demanding a handpass, getting the handpass, then running into trouble? How many times do you see a Melbourne player look forwards briefly, then play on sideways/backwards before stopping and going back the way they came? Our overall decision making is abysmal and leads us into difficult, pressured situations which then lead to most of our turnovers.

Fantastic bowling from all of our bowlers. Clarke dropping Root may really come back to haunt us, but we're doing a great job so far. It's going to be mightily frustrating for us if we get close (like, 7/8/9 wickets in) and it rains or the light is bad. So many overs lost to rain/light. And of course, in cricket's wonderful ye olde glory, we take a 40 minute break for lunch at the scheduled time despite losing about 40 overs since tea yesterday. Sometimes cricket baffles.

Davey should be dropped. Probably Byrnes too. In something of a slightly radical move, I'd consider dropping Howe - his work ethic is abysmal. Surely Strauss is deserving of a call up. I think it's also probably time to have a look at at least one of Taggert, Tynan and Davis. Pedersen stays. As much as most of us here don't like him, he was one of our better players v GWS. He worked a lot harder than many of our 'leaders'. Blease is not a scapegoat - he's a chronic lazy underperformer. One good game for Casey shouldn't be enough to get back in.

The decent older players is definitely a difference between us and them. As for the 'better midfield', yes, clearly right now their midfield is lightyears ahead of ours. But Ebert, Boak, Hartlett, Wingard, Cornes and Cassisi were all at Port last year, when their midfield was pretty rotten. Wingard's improvement into his second year has been phenomenal. We can only hope that Viney/Toumpas/M Jones are able to have good pre-seasons, learn from our new coach, get some confidence back, just like the Port midfielders did, and show some improvement. If we get half the improvement in our midfield that Port did in theirs, we'll be in a far better place.

Why would GWS give up Adams just to move up one rung in the draft? The same defeatist attitude that got us Clark from under Fremantle's nose, you mean? I don't think the club has been as defeatist as some on here think. MFC supporters have been, to a degree, but I don't think the club just sits around. I think the truth of it is that we try, but we don't have a great product to sell, and we haven't had great people selling it.

GWS won't win another game. Fremantle and Brisbane away will both be pretty heavy losses. Richmond at home the same. Gold Coast away in round 23 is their only chance but Gold Coast should have them quite comfortably covered. Of course, we also won't win another game either, and we may well finish with a lower percentage than them.

If you wanted to make this kind of comparison, you should have gone with Port Adelaide of 2012. A much similar situation than West Coast of 2010, who were crippled with injuries. Port of 2012 was a rabble. They had no soul (like us), a terrible coach who they were forced to sack/push out (like us), no sponsors (about to be like us), poor crowds (like us). They got a new president (like us), new CEO (like us), new coach (like us). The comparisons are there, at least more than West Coast of 2010.

He was certainly a lot better then than he is now. It's easy to forget. However, that doesn't change the fact that his kicking is as bad as anyone in our side. It always has been, whether he's been in good form or not, and it's holding him back from becoming a better midfielder. The fact that one of our better mids can't kick, like Grimes, shows exactly where we are at as a football club.

We should be targeting any midfielder who is coming out of contract. Taylor Adams showed yesterday that he needs to be high on our list of options. He is the type of midfielder we need - neither solely 'inside' nor solely 'outside', but able to play both aspects of the game. If Sloane and Fyfe are indeed out of contract (people are posting like they are but I don't know for sure), then we need to be looking at them too. Same with Dustin Martin. Dale Thomas has to be considered as well. Of course, most/all of these calibre players will either re-sign, get 'bought' by GWS, or end up lured to a club closer to finals, so that's obviously going to work against us.

The hardest, toughest, most courageous player in that trade is Watts. He's also more talented than the other two put together. I wouldn't touch that trade with a ten foot pole.

Because to be a HBF you have to be committed to work hard both ways. You need to provide strong offensive run, but you need to work back the other way too. Blease has enough of the former but none of the latter. One game at Casey shouldn't be enough to get back into the side for Blease.

Don't hold your breath on this one. It's simply not going to happen.

No, what I'm saying (this is probably too much for you) is that if Wines was here, he'd be way, way worse than he is at Port right now. He'd be far off the pace he's showing now, and the result would be that people like you who think that our first year players are a problem would be having a go at him.

Who would have struggled to have an impact whilst having no support, no fitness, no confidence, no enthusiasm, no leaders to look up to, two coaches in one year, neither any good. Then, you'd have whinged about taking a slow, stocky, unskilled midfielder instead of taking someone who can kick. Either way, we'd be right where we are now. And you'd still be a fool.

If I did start a thread, I'd certainly not be hoping it's so that you can post in it. Toumpas is not a wasted pick. If we'd picked Wines we'd be 0% better, and you'd be whinging about Wines. Toumpas isn't close to being one of our problems right now. Face it.

jumbo, Clint, you're pathetic. You're truly pathetic. You're having a go at a first-year player when our 'senior' players were not just as bad, they were worse. Toumpas has his whole career ahead of him. Where is Howe at? Sylvia? Davey? Grimes? Trengove? Those are the players you should be venting about. Your continual collective inability to recognise how hard it is for a first-year player to play at a consistently high standard when he has no support, no leadership, and no confidence is bewildering at best.

To me, our malaise is a deeply rooted psychological problem. It was highlighted in today's fourth quarter. Kent had run hard to cap off a movement from full back to the forward line to kick a goal from 50 on the run, closing the gap to 3 or 4 goals. There was no celebration though. Not from him, not from anyone who went to 'congratulate' him. It was all glum faces, no smiles, no fist pumping, nothing. It was as if we were 100 points down. Our players have no confidence. They have no spirit. They don't have any belief in themselves, or in the side. Unless they're in front, they don't think they can win. They are completely lacking in enthusiasm, in the will to even be out there. They aren't enjoying football, they have no energy. This is why we don't chase. We don't run hard enough in either offence or defence. We just don't seem to care right now.