titan_uranus

So the statement tells us that the club has been speaking with players to get feedback on what's gone wrong this year. Piecing things together, it seems like Trac has taken that opportunity to ventilate issues he has with the club. If we believe Morris, those issues don't include Goodwin. Given how bad our fitness has been this year, I am going out on a limb here and suggesting (with no evidence at all) that one of his issues with the club has been our fitness program. I just wouldn't be surprised at all if his injury made him reflect more strongly on the fitness/health aspects of the club.

I’m confident this is not correct. One thing explicitly said in the report is that he’s not unhappy with Goody. The Viney talk is simply talk that North have thought about trying to get him, not that Jack wants to leave. The Oliver talk has never included “he wants out”. And over the last few months we’ve had a stack of players re-sign. Bringing all of that together, I don’t think the players are ”crying out” against or “not believing” in Goody or the game plan. I suspect they do believe in it, but are struggling to execute it.

Whilst I don’t know that sending the players to America is the answer, I suspect the sub-standard facilities have more of an impact than we want to believe.

You know what’s interesting about this? They didn’t show a single piece of footage from the game on the weekend as an example of us being “boring”. Both Cornes and Lloyd are quick to grab footage and work with it (like the May stuff in this clip) but not one clip here. I’ve argued earlier that I don’t actually buy it. Our lack of scoring on Saturday wasn’t for want of trying. It was for want of ability. We can’t move the ball quickly because we can’t kick or handball quickly when under pressure. We tried. We failed.

Source? Even this report says he’s not upset at Goodwin per se.

The report is that he’s unhappy with the club (but not Goodwin) and if he were out of contract would request a trade tomorrow. If true, this is a “sack whoever it takes to appease him” situation. This club will fold if Trac leaves. It’s not just who he is on the field, it’s who he is off it. He’s connection to our supporter base, he’s marketable, he gives us relevance where we might not otherwise have it. He has, until King’s Birthday, been so incredibly passionate about this club. If changes can be made to make him feel more comfortable, then we make those changes. Stuff concerns about putting one player above the rest. Exceptions get made for people like Trac.

Definitely worth bearing in mind. Our fixture this year has ended up being brutal from a repeat match perspective: Brisbane, Port, Dogs and Fremantle, along with Collingwood (and West Coast). The minimum six games against North, Richmond, St Kilda, Adelaide, GC and Essendon. GC, by comparison, has had 8 games against this crop - and they're one of them! They've squandered one of the all time easiest fixtures this year.

Out of interest, where did you find this?

It's actually (ridiculously!) possible that 14 wins misses: Brisbane wins at least one (14.5+) Fremantle wins both (14.5) Dogs win both (14) GWS therefore loses both (14) Hawthorn wins both (14) Carlton wins both (14) The lowest percentage of GWS, the Dogs, Hawthorn and Carlton would then miss (currently that's Carlton, 1.1% behind Hawthorn). Imagine if Carlton miss despite going 14-9... Meanwhile, also ridiculously, 13-10 might be enough to get in: Fremantle loses both (12.5) Carlton loses both (12) Essendon loses at least one (11.5 or 12.5) (could be worse if Hawthorn or the Dogs don't win again) In that latter scenario, Collingwood make finals if they win both. We'd also have remained in the running had we won on Saturday (and our percentage would be irrelevant).

Our pursuit of Houston would have started a while back, at a time when we would have expected our first round pick to be 10-12 or something. As the season has fallen apart, and that pick is now 6 with a possibility of becoming 5 (or even 4 if we want to get really pessimistic…), the club may well have had to reconsider. I’d sure hope so, anyway.

Another good post, even though I don’t agree with all of it. One thing that I’m seeing a lot of is the notion that we were “boring” on the weekend and that Goodwin’s at fault for having us play that way. I didn’t see it that way at all. I didn’t see us trying to move the ball slowly, backwards/sideways, etc. What I saw was a side trying to spread, and trying to move the ball quickly enough to generate scoring shots, but failing. We consistently missed kicks/handballs (side bar - how often do we handball to or behind a runner instead of in front of them?) and didn’t appear to have the legs to run out the game. I also don’t buy that Goodwin’s pressers have a draining impact on the players. I reckon they have next to zero impact on the players. The (limited) behind the scenes content we get from the club shows us he’s a different person internally as compared to in the media/externally.

@Dee-tonator‘s right on this one. Had we won last night, this would be the equation for finals: - we beat GC and Collingwood - Carlton loses to WC and St Kilda - Fremantle loses to GWS and Port - Essendon loses to at least one of Sydney and Brisbane Obviously no guarantees this all happens but Carlton are in free fall and have a stack of injuries which opens the door to them going 0-2, and Fremantle right now doesn’t look likely to beat GWS or Port either. The only way this season gets any worse is if we find out after all is said and done that 13 wins would have been enough, and we end up on 12.

Hawthorn too - they have to bring their four Tasmania games back to Melbourne soon. As I’ve said before, if you withhold attendance to make some sort of point, or because you think attending games should only occur if we’re playing high scoring football, you’re killing the club. We won’t withstand these sorts of narratives forever.

And the Lions aren’t even in the top 4. Dogs, the current flavour of the month, are currently 4 goals down to a bottom 4 side. I’m with you. The frustration for me is that we’ve put this season together in a year where middling form can get you top 4. We’re not that far off Geelong or Port but 1-4 in games decided by under a kick and two beltings to a Fremantle side who hasn’t really achieved much else for 3 months has ruined us.

Hawthorn won’t miss finals from here. They’ve played one bad game since Round 7 and they close with the bottom 2. IMO it’s down to the Dogs, Fremantle and Carlton. Carlton should win their last 2, but can’t be certain with their injury list and loss of form. If they lose again they’re almost certainly done. But if they win both they’ll likely pass Fremantle who have GWS and Port and on current form won’t win both. Dogs have been in top form but have Adelaide and GWS, two games they can easily lose. If they lose both they will also be passed by Carlton if they win twice.

Was it just me or did anyone else reckon Tomlinson has slimmed down and added some pace? He was making a habit last night of tearing off up the ground and I felt like he was much faster than usual.

Agree re Turner (assuming you meant invisible not invincible!). Fritsch could easily have been the sub too, and would have structurally suited us better. But sick or not, JVR was struggling big time.

Turner’s leading and marking yesterday was hugely promising. Not sure his fitness is good enough (a common theme for other players IMO) but with hopefully a strong pre-season I reckon we’ve found something. Now if we can just find someone to do the relief ruck work to allow us to stop rucking JVR…

It’s not an excuse anyway. If they were sick why did we play them? JVR was one of a handful of sub options. I’d have preferred Hore but presumably Melksham as sub forced us to look at a forward.

It’s the nature of this season. Sides are going to make top 4 who just aren’t at the level of top 4 sides of years past. I believe this is the first ever season in which all 18 clubs have had a stretch of going 1-4 or worse. Sydney last week lost by 100. Port just struggled to put away a bottom 6 side (us). GWS has lost on expected score for almost every one of their last 6 wins. Geelong has multiple 10 goal losses and struggled last week against a bottom 4 side. Brisbane isn’t even in the top 4!

Wow. Speechless.

Goodwin said in the presser we had gastro through the group this week. Half a chance Oliver and JVR had it at some point I reckon. Both looked like they had it from the first minute of the game.

If Houston were a free agent I suspect the majority view here would be that he’d be a great addition. We just lost yet another game hallmarked by our poor foot skills and we are seeing increasing calls for McVee to go into the middle. But attaching pick 6 to him is where most of us feel uneasy. IMO trading pick 6 in this draft out for a 28 year old half back just isn’t the right move.

6 - Pickett 5 - Gawn 4 - Viney 3 - Petty 2 - ANB 1 - McVee

No doubt these were the good parts of his game. But he fumbles, he misses easy kicks, he is still too soft, and he dropped his head badly after his howler dropped mark and missed snap. IMO, the good did not do enough to outweigh the bad. But I might be too harsh on him.