Rodney (Balls) Grinter

Lol. Love your work worship. Similar to your comments elsewhere, I do wounder if and how anyone could get much understanding of game plans from watching training drills and even circle work or match sims. I guess the well trained eye might make some pickups about these things, but then, I guess that Richmond aren't exactly going to go changing their set-up based on what they just saw a 17th placed Melbourne's training. I'm guessing the valuable information is all the verbal instructions delivered by the coaches at the huddles on what we are trying to achieve which can't be spied from the outer. As @Earl Hood so poignantly noted, it's only if we can actually translate what we do on the track to matchday that anyone will take serious notice and there are no secret games, so the tactical game plan stuff is well on display for all to see then anyway. I'm not totally dismissive that tactical initiatives at this point in the season can't / don't make a difference but agree with you that it's beyond most casual observers to pickup.

Which Selwood? I'd hardly consider May and Melksham as peripheral for some that have spent, or are presently spending stints in our rehab group, though hopefully they are back our of it soon enough.

Concussion, broken jaws and a kick square to the nuts - the Brayshaw boys seem to get all the most unpleasant of blows dealt to them.

As preseason roles along, the start of the season is finally within sight. Not that I put huge weight on the outcome of our first preseason game, but I'm personally hanging out to watch some footy again and that preview of the state of the side and how individual players are tracking in something with less resemblance of a training run. Also a good point to sit back and understand how the fitmess of our list is tracking for Rd 1. What is the potential lineup of fit and ready to go players? Interested on others thoughts and assessments of all of the above.

As your earlier comments and the one above both alude to, being awarded the free kick or not is almost just the icing on top, but the physical presence and pressure that gets applied through these acts is priceless in so far as the impact it has on the opposition's psyche.

Or from a MFC perspective, channel his inner big Carl!

Ed Langdon added to the list of MFC culprits. He and Jackson need to follow the lead of Mitch Hannan by tidying up their long hair do with a neat short back and sides, us being the gentlemens club and all. Barassi wouldn't have had a bar of this long hair hippy nonsense (take note Goody), no wounder we had the season we did last year.

Yeah, I know, but in the tradition of Australian journalism, why let the truth get in the way of a good story.

Merged topic from discussion in a few threads. Early candidates are: Ben Brown Brodie Grundy Luke Jackson Max Gawn Nathan Jones Dyson Heppell James Worpel

At which point they should like suspend any Essendrug side from competing in season 2020, no top-ups, just no Essendrug FC.

Hope they have got a "get a f@#%ing haircut" clause in that deal.

I rated Keating as being a solid, robust, reliable ruck option, but I'm not sure that he would have been the best ruck in the league. Had a pretty decent team around him and did enough to carry his weight and play his role within that team and I think that's really the key.

Would also love to see Viney back at full fitness and Clary take it up a few more notches to become the most dominant midfielder in what transforms into the most dominant midfield in the competition.

Would love to see AVB go through a season uninjured and finding his most damaging, bone-crunching form.

Oh, come on. Training in that kind of smoke would be like poor mans altitude training wouldn't it? An opportunity missed by the MFC.

It just a flesh wound!

Talk about having your cake and eating it too. You also have to wounder if this will set a precedent amoung free agents.

Not great, but at least by all accounts he got himself into much better shape before this (hopefully) minor flare up, so we should still be a long way ahead of last season in this regard.

Partially agree, but I don't see much about the way Freitch plays as being non robust. Guy is a better pack mark than some others twice his size in our team. Have seen him frequently put his body on the line and bring down quality marks, so I don't get this thing about Fritta needing to step into gear - he just needs to be played in position forward where he is best suited and of most value to our team and not down back, where perhaps he doesn't have the right mindset to be either a defensive player or distribute the ball as confidently on the rebound.

So for me, just making the 8 in 2020 will be just - meh, now show us if this side is really something and finish top 4 in 2021. P.S. to contradictory to almost everything I have stated in this thread, I took out the G.F. gaurentee membership option early in 2018, because if we ever do make it again an win one, by F%#@, I'm going to be there at the G to remember it!

From what I've observed I think there are diffences. Asides from them having a heap more arrogant sunny day supporters, even their more reasonable supporters don't get carried away with just making finals when they are not in a realistic position to contend, because when you have won a flag only 3 - 5 years earlier, why get carried away and grasp at straw hopes of a miracle flag from 6th position. Conversely winning that flag from outside 4th is all I've ever known as a MFC supporter and thus until fairly reciently I've held onto that hope that us making finals gives us a chance at that all illusive premiership. Incidentally, I didn't think we would beat WC in the prelim in 18 and didn't think we would take the world by storm in 2019, but didn't think the drop off would be so sharp either.

Agree with much of what you are saying Macca. But at the same time, I do wounder if the expectations or lack there of within the supporter base and or the recent history of lack of success feed back and infect the psyche within the playing group and club. The players last year did also talk about riding the wave of support that embraced the club come finals time and in some ways I wounder if that contributed to us playing too many players carrying injuries along the way that ended up totally screwing our 2019, where as a club more confident and focused on winning flags would have taken better stock of what finishing 5th meant for the road ahead in finals and wouldn't have thrown the kitchen sink at winning two elimination finals at the expense of the physical well being of so many of those players? Anyways I know for me personally I've learnt the lesson that winning premierships from the lower rungs of the 8 is a folly and if we are not on track to do that, then not to get too hung up about the season as it plays out win/loss and final position wise. Also to finish in that top four, it usually means only 5 - 6 losses for the season or only one loss in every 5 - 6 games, so if that's not how we are tracking, then again it's just another development year, perhaps with some additional finals experience added on.

Elaborating on that mindset thing - aim low, achieve low. I do wounder if it's actually become culturally ingrained within the MFC, drives thinking and decision making and a becomes somewhat of a self fulfilling prophecy? Does on some level the club congratulate it's self mid season, when it looks like we are just in a good position to make finals and even subconsciously take the foot off the accelerator and stumble, where a club with a more recent history of success knows that just making finals is a non achievement, keeps pushing and sets it's self up with a ladder position to give it's self the best chance of real success at the pointy end of the season come finals?

The premier rarely comes from outside the top 4. Dogs in 16 are about the only exception I can think of off the top of my head in the past 2 decades. If your not finishing top 4, your not truely contending, just pretending. In 2018 we were one win off finishing top 4, so I hardly think it's an unattainable goal with the list we have. I really do think it's partly a mindset thing, but it's a barrier the MFC needs to break to win us that elusive premiership.

So just looking back on the 2018 W/L record and ladder again - another 1 win and we finish 3rd and play WC in Perth for the 2nd Qualifying final, another 2 wins and we finish 2nd and play WC in Melb. Sydney in Rd 21 was the other very winnable game that we through away. At the time there was uproar and panic on Demonland that it was the game that would see us miss our opportunity to make finals. In retrospect, it was a game that prevented us from finishing top 4. I know hindsight is kind of useless is some respects, but I think it can also be a useful guide and learning tool. That game against Sydney also really sums up the step change in maturity that those core players like Oliver, Brayshaw, Trac, Viney and even Max need to take. My recollection of that game was that we absolutely blew them out of the water in the first quarter and established what really should have been a match winning lead. Instead we enabled Sydney to peg back the lead over the course of the 2nd quarter and then start to dominate and dictate the game. A mature side would have known how and when to defend that lead and close out the game. I really do think that in 2018 we showed we were close to good enough. Really looking for us to go to that next level and become clinical and consistent in seizing the opportunities that present.