titan_uranus

A lot of talk about us losing this game last year. We went on to beat them later in the year, relatively comfortably, at Optus. They were a better side then, too (but we had May and Petty didn’t get injured mid-match).

But what if we do? If we go 1-2 in those games by beating Brisbane, will that help you believe in us?

Why Geelong and not the Brisbane return game? Geelong’s 5-5, playing iffy footy, and we get the luxury of playing them in Geelong. Brisbane is IMO clearly the next best side after Collingwood (if not better) and that game will be at the G.

I’m not going to write the season off if we lose but I will be disappointed if we look too short down back and/or if TMac and JBR struggle. No Oliver hurts badly but we covered well for Gawn and I’ll back Harmes and Sparrow in to give us good cover today.

Who asked those questions? Prior to the Hawthorn game we’d beaten Geelong, Port, Brisbane, GWS, Sydney, the Dogs and Essendon. In other words, every single other top 8 side.

Why do you use the near perfect 2021 season as some sort of crutch for your pessimism? Yes, we were brilliant in 2021. That is something to be celebrated. For a side that you believe has been “worked out” since then, we’re doing pretty well to be 23-11 since then. Do you think we’d be 34-0 if we hadn’t been “worked out”?

So the segment is in a Fox Footy article and I don’t understand some of it, such as this: “If you look at the absolute points for and points against, against West Coast, North Melbourne and Hawthorn, it’s plus 90 points in those three games, but against the rest it’s minus 50 points.” What is this? It can’t be total points for/against because we won those games by a combined 200+ points. It’s not average either, because our average across the other 7 games is not -50. Can anyone explain?

Oh ok well the point remains, whoever last week’s sub was is now “in” to the 22. But they don’t come up as an “in” because they were already “in” as the sub. They can’t name a replacement until they name the new sub.

It means last week’s sub, Fyfe, is “in”. AFL has to change the rules to mean clubs name 23 plus three emergencies. If the sub is credited with a game, the sub should be named alongside the 22.

I’ll give the FD one more go at the JVR-TMac set up, and the no-third-tall defender set up. But neither have me convinced and I’ll be more than a little peeved if we lose in circumstances which suggest a different tall mix might have made a difference.

Walyalup loses Sonny Walters.

In: Harmes, Sparrow Out: Hunter, Oliver, Jordon Jordon, Woewodin, Smith, Laurie the emergencies.

I think of all the things I dislike about Demonland, revisionism tops the list. We were 17-1-4 with a percentage of 130%. That’s the entire season of course, not just the last month. Pre-bye we beat Geelong (prelim finalist), GWS away (they finished 7th and won a final), Sydney (finished 6th), the Dogs at Marvel, Brisbane, plus St Kilda, Richmond, Fremantle and Carlton (10th-13th - so not finalists but also not bottom sides). Post-bye we also beat Port away (prelim finalist). Saying we didn’t click until round 20 ignores the stunning body of work we put into the first 17 weeks. Saying we got “beaten up” by the Dogs ignores that we’d already beaten them at Marvel, and is inaccurate anyway - that was a 20 point loss where it was single digits midway through the 4th quarter. We beat 16 of the 17 other sides that year (only missing out on Collingwood). Our 2021 season was, from start to finish, supreme.

Can someone post the stats David King was talking about? @fr_ap’s post above is spot on - stats done as totals make no sense if our sample is 7 games compared to Port’s 8 or Brisbane’s 9. I accept we’ve had the three easy games but we’ve also had Brisbane in Brisbane, Port in Adelaide, GC on the GC, the Dogs and Richmond in prime time (where they tend to do better). That slate of games is tough, so it wouldn’t surprise if we’re middle of the road for key stats. Clearly we need to improve but I suspect Collingwood are also middle of the road (in fact on SEN the other night they were mentioned as being 14th or worse in a number of key offensive stats).

Chandler’s good games have stored more than enough brownie points to guard against being dropped this soon. I’m not sold on the JVR-TMac combo but if we’re dropping one IMO it should be TMac.

Oliver won't play, Bowey's a "test" but sounds OK. Dunstan's still 1-2 weeks off. The simplest option is Sparrow takes Oliver's spot. We share Oliver's high midfield minutes between Sparrow (who usually spends 10-20% more of each game on the bench than Clarry does) and others such as Rivers, ANB and Pickett. But I'd like to see Turner play as a tall defender, moving Lever back to the third tall role he's played best in, replacing the role Petty used to play, and getting Turner some more experience as a reward for good VFL form. I don't think we need all of Bowey, Brayshaw, Rivers and Salem in the backline and I'd look to push Rivers further up the ground as I think he has real promise as a midfielder. If Bowey's injured, that makes my proposed changes easier. If he's fit, then I'm not entirely sure yet who gets dropped to make way for Turner. I also want a change to the forward line. I don't believe a JVR/TMac combo works. I'd prefer to see Brown in place of one of them, although I accept his VFL form hasn't been strong. If we make no change there, I'll understand it, but I think we can do better.

https://www.melbournefc.com.au/news/1338135/injury-report-oliver-scans-in “Clayton had some soreness at the end of the game and following a clinical assessment from the physios and the medical team, scans have shown that he’s got a hamstring strain,” Griffith told Narrm Media. “At this early stage, we anticipate Clayton won’t be available in the short term. “His return to play will ultimately be guided by his ability to deal with increase loads and reconditioning. As such, we will have greater clarity as Clayton progresses through his program.”

So is the Sam Edmund tweet confirmation that no one actually knows what is wrong with Oliver because we're going on nothing other that tweets from journalists?

I'm surprised we've chosen to challenge at the Tribunal. Not because I think it should be a suspension, but because I'm doubtful that we'll win.

I don't really think there's much point going on about this given you two have both clearly made your mind up based on your dislike of TMac. FWIW, I didn't like TMac's game and I don't think we can persist with him and JVR as the two tall forwards. But I've watched that clip and I don't think there was so much time that it was so obvious that he should have handballed to Viney before the tackle. I think you both want that to have been the case because it's TMac. But even if I'm wrong about that, TMac's entitled to assume that he either gets tackled legally (and his arms would be free and he could have released the ball) or he gets rewarded with a free for an illegal tackle. Jonas' tackle was illegal twice

I don't agree. Here's the incident: From what I can see, TMac picks it up looking away from goal, turns to look up field, has Viney as you've said, but has Jonas in the way. So he tries to side step Jonas and get his hands free to, potentially, handball to Viney. Jonas then gets him high: Should right there have been a free to TMac. Jonas then proceeds to dump him illegally which should have been another free kick to TMac for a dangerous tackle. But the main point is that I don't agree that it was simple for him to offload to Viney in the time he had.

I don’t know if we have another gear or anything like that, but I do know that clubs regularly hit better form in the second half of a year. Last year Collingwood was 4-5. No one would have expected them to have lost only 4 more games in more than a year. And of course last year Geelong was 5-4 and showed no signs of running the table from then on to win the flag.

Based on the TV coverage this is what we saw. Would be keen to hear from someone at the ground though - did no one stand up for him, or did we just not see it on TV?

I was responding to @SPC saying be wants Goodwin to make us “unpredictable”. What is “unpredictable” about how Geelong is covering Dangerfield? Nothing, I would argue. I’ve already posted about my view that we don’t have enough midfielders of quality as compared to the best sides. I just don’t see why we have to be “unpredictable”. I want us to do whatever we can to plug the gap as best we can. If that’s Harmes, fine. If it’s Sparrow, fine. But we don’t have to go random left field to be “unpredictable” just for the sake of it.

Just out of interest, what is Chris Scott doing right now to make Geelong “unpredictable” with Dangerfield out?