titan_uranus

That was the worst midfield game we’ve played in probably 4 years. To hold them to 22 scoring shots and 82 points is actually a good performance all told given how utterly awful we were at contest and clearance to three quarter time. I doubt we’ll ever see Oliver, Trac and Viney collectively play that poorly again. I sure hope we don’t. Oliver clearly isn’t fit and we conceded that by shifting him to half back; we had to get him out of the stoppages. Viney reverted to old Viney, no awareness and too many ill advised attempts to break tackles. And I would not be surprised if Trac is injured. Couple that with our opponent having an elite midfield and then all of them firing and you end up with us being wholly unable to play the game on our terms. Windsor looked to hit a bit of a wall, Howes was poor, Billings was poor and Kolt’s clearly not ready for this level, so that middle third of the ground was just so bad. I’m inclined to write it off as a mulligan, but we have a major midfield/stoppage problem that wasn’t just an issue tonight but has been evident all year. Rivers looked good there late so I’d like to see that continue.

I agree that this will be a close game. I actually think our form is precisely as strong as it looks - we've looked amazing at times over the four wins but also have had patches of struggling with clearances and territory, and as much as we want to embrace learning to score from our defensive half, Goodwin's said multiple times now that we're not happy with how much we're having to play from our defensive half and it's clearly something we can't keep up for too much longer. Having said that, Brisbane has won the territory battle in all of its three losses (+13 inside 50s to Carlton but lost, +8 to Fremantle but lost, +13 to Collingwood but lost).

This was always going to be the result. It’s not unreasonable. It‘s not a conspiracy theory. It’s not because he’s not a Carlton or Collingwood player. It’s what the MRO guidelines require and it’s part of the AFL’s increasing focus on concussion. We just need to move on, as a club (ie preparing for Thursday) and a supporter base.

We’ve played an extra game…

The loading sure has worked. @binman

Fogarty got the same grading as Kozzie.

No Cam Guthrie or Rohan either.

Adelaide in Adelaide, St Kilda and the Dogs off a 5-day break mightn’t be the hardest fixture so far but sure isn’t the easiest. They, sadly, appear to be right back in contention.

Not a great day with Carlton and Geelong both winning and getting to 4-0 (both as to my personal views on those clubs but also for our season). I dare say they are both going to be there in September.

The thing is, Carlton is 0-7. They’ve only played there 7 times. Ever. We’ve played there 19 times. Almost three times as much. How the [censored] does that happen?

We now don't travel again for 6 weeks (next game away from the G is Round 10 vs West Coast), and only have two games away from the G between now and Round 16 vs Brisbane in the last week of June. That's a relatively kind run given we've been on the road 3 of our first 5 weeks. It does, though, include difficult sides - Brisbane, Geelong, Carlton, Fremantle and Collingwood.

It's a reminder that they're a very good side when they're on, and that JHF makes them even better in the middle (although obviously a fit May makes us better too). We should be incredibly proud of winning both these Adelaide games.

@WheeloRatings do you have quarter-by-quarter figures for CPs, clearances and ground ball gets? If so, did we get beaten in each of those in the last quarter? It felt like when we hit the fitness wall late we started to struggle in those areas and I wonder whether the numbers looked better for all three stats until late?

6 - Petracca 5 - May 4 - McVee 3 - Lever 2 - Gawn 1 - Windsor

I wouldn't be dropping JVR. That was his best game for the year and part of that was the way he got into and influenced the game in the ruck. I like how that's working and I wouldn't touch it unless necessary. I don't think we'll be resting anyone with a bye coming up. Other than who replaces Pickett, my only concerns are whether Oliver and Chandler are genuinely fit. Oliver doesn't look it and I'm unsure on Chandler. I'd otherwise minimise changes and keep the same structure for next week. Go hell for leather knowing the bye follows.

The context has nothing to do with it. Fritsch was vital to us winning, undoubtedly. All I'm asking is whether, if Billings had kicked his goals, would the posts on here all have been "he was soft, drop him"? Bobbing up with critical goals at critical times means patches of poor performance (Fritsch was nowhere in the first half) can be overlooked.

Have now had the chance to watch the game, I reckon we were so much better than those who have posted on here along the lines of "ugly win but we'll take it". We were so well structured and defended the ground so well. Like last week, when they had momentum (Q1 and Q4) they couldn't generate easy scoring shots because of how well we got back and set up our zone. To win a game like that on a 5-day break with Oliver and Viney both well below their best, and with Salem struggling too, says a lot about our team effort IMO. Trac was fantastic but a running theme this year is that we're getting just what we need from most of our 23. May, Lever, McVee and TMac behind the ball were all superb whilst Chandler, Sparrow, ANB and Howes all played their various roles. Even Brown was better than his meagre stat line suggests, with his leading, blocking and aerial contest work. Brisbane will be a massive challenge next week but if we can win that and get to the first bye 5-1, that will be incredible given where we've come from and some of the challenges we've had in these opening five weeks.

None at all. He got off because the system us broken. Intentional punches get a fine if they’re los impact. That’s moronic. The “potential to cause injury” thing is being used to upgrade impact levels for head high contact. The AFL is hyper vigilant on head high contact, less so on gut punches.

Disappointing but not surprising. Also, much to the dismay of many on here, this isn’t a conspiracy, this isn’t corruption. It’s the completely predictable AFL response to head high contact in 2024. It sucks, and there’s probably an argument to be made that we could convince a Tribunal that it was low impact, but I consider that unlikely. This is what was always going to happen to whoever was first to clumsily contact someone in the head like this.

He’s going to be punished. Question is whether it gets graded low or medium contact, the latter means a week. I expect medium, whether the MRO relies on the “potential to cause injury” or not. I still detest that an intentional strike can be a fine but a careless football act can be a week, but reality is this was avoidable and we know the AFL wants to stamp this stuff out post-Maynard.

It’s interesting though, whilst they play different roles and have different runs on the board, compare the Demonland responses to Fritsch and Billings. Fritsch kicks his three and his first half is forgiven/ignored. Billings misses his three and he’s been absolutely slammed on here.

Interestingly though, in his presser Goody said we need to improve and the only star he cited as example of why is inside 50s - he said we have lost that count a few times this year and we aren’t going to keep winning if we keep losing on the inside 50 count.

Define cooked? We were +2 CPs and +4 clearances.

Pickett's getting suspended though, surely.

I figured Clarry was either tagged or struggling with the hand but was worried I'd missed a new injury or something. I'm guessing Brown struggled on the 5-day break too. I guess the good news in that is that Oliver's had less influence than normal and we've won on the road on a 5-day break, and Brown's failed to hit the scoreboard at all but we've generated 28 scoring shots.