titan_uranus

Yeah. Best game. Relative to the ones before. It’s surprising that it’s happened this week, when it didn’t happen for the last 3 weeks.

Yeah but we’re dropping Fritsch after his best game of the last month, bringing Turner back after one week and no Casey game (so why TF did we drop him last week) and Kolt comes back without a VFL game. It’s haphazard.

May and Pickett both named. The only defensive emergency cover is Howes. McVee, Kentfield and Jefferson all returning via VFL.

https://t.co/qmMiB8giE8 In: Fullarton, Tholstrup, Turner Out: Fritsch, Henderson, JVR (all dropped) My initial thought: WTF are we doing

This seems two weeks too late and not at all the right call, but let’s wait for the team sheet.

Agree, although not necessarily in relation to Fritsch. Spargo’s the one who comes to mind for me.

In addition to our 23 players who are under 24, we also have 13 players who are over 29. That leaves just 9 players aged 24, 25, 26, 27 or 28 on our list. I don’t know how that compares to other clubs but I’d guess it’s not similar to the contending clubs this year. PS two of the 9 players in that “prime” age bracket are Henderson and AJ, who only started playing AFL this year and have 7 games of experience combined.

I agree. He was very blunt yesterday when he said we’re too easy to play against. Which is true, and is being lost amongst the focus on our lack of scoring. If anything it means we have nowhere to hide on Saturday.

Some interesting tidbits from Daniel Hoyne on radio tonight. We are apparently the third fastest ball movement team in the competition, with the main reason being because we get it and go quickly (i.e. playing on), with short forward movements Our ability to move from one end of the ground to the other is the 5th best in the competition, but we're awful at scoring from these transitions - scoring from 1 in 4 of these chains, when AFL average is 1 in 2 We are apparently +26 in first possession across the first five games, but -36 in clearances - the 62 point swing is the biggest ever recorded after five games Gawn, Oliver and Viney are all bottom 5 in the competition for converting a first possession into a clearance I'd hazard a guess that no one is surprised about points 2-4, but point 1 will raise a few eyebrows on here. We've heard Goodwin talk about getting "good looks" but not converting them. Point 2 above backs that up. We've also heard Goodwin talk about our method at stoppage being bad. Points 3 and 4 back that up.

Have you ever seen a president do this before? Ever? If he did, the criticism would be that we’re infighting, lacking unity, drawing more attention to ourselves etc.

Insanity. The line should be north of 30. I suppose it just reflects on the market’s lack of faith in Fremantle on the road.

If he said nothing he’d avoid a meaningless response like today’s letter, but be criticised for being “asleep at the wheel” or similar. If he says what he said today it’s vice versa. Reality is, because we’re down in the dumps and/or in a crisis right now, he is going to be criticised no matter what he does.

I don’t think that is an accurate summary. I think the recent reporting is that our search is narrowing down and nearing conclusion, but not that we have one.

We’ve also only won 4 quarters of football, all year. 4 There was a time a few years ago we won something like 15 consecutive quarters or something. 1-3 in first quarters, 0-4 in fourth quarters. Starting poorly, finishing worse.

I find Gawn’s post-match comments about our players, including himself, dropping their heads truly fascinating. Is he dropping the filter and saying what he thinks but shouldn’t be saying? Or is this a planned way to try to stick it to teammates who are struggling? Or is it just a sign that he’s tired and his leadership is waning?

JVR was given an impossible role last night so it’s no surprise he struggled, but equally it’s fair to say he needs a reset. Send him back to Casey to get his hands on the ball and to remember that he knows how to lead, leap and mark. We can’t keep playing Sparrow when he impacts games as little as he did last night. Make him a dedicated tagger, or set the standard by dropping him.

Whatever we are doing to try to improve, it just isn’t working. The forward line, skills, stoppage work, intensity, defending transition - nothing has any consistency to it. Goodwin might be able to turn the ship around, but we don’t have the luxury of time to find out. As every week goes by our players look increasingly dispirited, devoid of confidence and apparently unclear on what they are supposed to be doing. That’s not entirely on Goodwin but it doesn’t matter anymore. We are 6+ goals worse than two bottom 6 sides. Trotting out 20-23 of the same players who played last night, sticking to the same script, is going to lead to a 100-point loss to Fremantle. We need change, and we need it faster than whatever the best case scenario with Goodwin is. A special mention to our pathetic fitness - we’ve actually been within striking distance on the scoreboard in four of the five games so far, but each time have been embarrassingly wiped off the field in the fourth. Like the rest of our current football program, whatever we’re doing with our fitness program just isn’t working.

I see you’ve learnt nothing from recent years. Remember when Carlton was flag favourite this time last year after starting the season like a house on fire? Or when Geelong won their first 7, only to lose their next 5? Or when we went 10-0 to start 2022, and then…no I know you remember that one. Collingwood look good now, even though they’ve copped some good luck getting Sydney and the Dogs when they did, with both missing stacks of elite talent. But it’s Round 5.

Perhaps scheduling Adelaide to play tonight, off a five day break after playing on the Gold Coast in the daytime in early-April, wasn't the best idea?

Presumably Fritsch, Trac and Melksham are going to be played as marking/leading forward targets to support JVR, and particularly when Gawn's on the bench and JVR's in the ruck.

Fagan? They guy who took six years to win a flag after five years of finals which included two straight sets exist and a lost home prelim in 2020 when a home GF beckoned? And has the same number of flags as Goodwin? And it took Scott 11 years to win a flag. Critics of Goodwin on here say he was "gifted" a list by Roos, or by JT (you've just argued this today in this thread). Scott took over the Bomber Thompson squad, won that flag, and then had Selwood, Hawkins, Duncan, Guthrie, Taylor, Enright, and later Blicavs, Stewart and then Cameron, and still took 11 years to win another one. Trac is playing forward though. Not exclusively, but we'd be stupid to give him 0 midfield time. He's majority forward, and that on its own is working for us. By now I think the evidence is clear - Oliver can't be a defensive mid because when the going gets tough he resorts to "see ball, get ball" too much. Who knows if Viney could be a forward though, because that's a lever we've never properly pulled. And agree re: Max, his lack of form is killing us everywhere (at stoppage and on transition).

Meanwhile how can any of us have any confidence that the FD knows how to improve our forward half woes, when we don't appear to even know how we want to line up in the forward half? Round 1 we went with JVR, Jefferson and AJ. AJ relief rucked, during which we had JVR and Jefferson. Round 2 we went with JVR, Jefferson and Turner. JVR relief rucked, during which we had Jefferson and Turner (until Jefferson got injured). Round 3 we went with JVR and AJ. AJ relief rucked, during which we had just JVR, until the fourth quarter when we also sent Petty forward. Round 4 we went with JVR and Turner. JVR relief rucked, during which we had just Turner. Round 5 we are going with just JVR. When he relief rucks...? AJ's suspension and Jefferson's injury have obviously mucked around with our plans, but to me this is all over the shop.

This where you lose me. You hold absolutist views and don't appear to appreciate there are layers to selection. Yes, stability is important. Yes, the players not in last week's 23 who are available (other than Lindsay) are fringe players. But where you see "backing the players in to get the job done", most of the rest of us see out-of-form, or even worse, not-playing-their-role players who are continuing to be selected. Repeatedly playing players who are out of form or not playing their role sends bad messages everywhere. Is there sufficient pressure on Sharp, or Spargo, or Melksham, to lift their games, when they continue to be picked? Is there sufficient motivation for Fullarton, Laurie, Brown and Woewodin to keep busting their gut at Casey, when they never get picked and/or only get picked as sub? Further, you say you're happy with the changes, which presumably means you're happy with Turner being dropped. Why does Turner only get one game to try to fit in with the side, when stability is so important? So yes, stability is important. I accept that there is merit to giving the core of our side more time to work together - forward cohesion requires the mids understanding the forwards and vice versa, and that is harder to develop if we keep changing the personnel. But this has to be balanced against form. Stability cannot, with your level of absolutism, always trump form.

Meanwhile if the players show no emotion, Demonlanders would say “look at them, they don’t even care”.