Rodney (Balls) Grinter

Understand this is the Petracca thread, but my point is that in the current context, why does Petracca deserve his own thread and the others not. If the rest of the forwardline was performing well and he was the odd one out in not providing the expected output, then I'd understand. But that's not the case and thus I think it's quite unfair to single one player out above others. It's a saviour mentality that people expect him to carry the team on his back and be a match winner whilst the rest of the team around him plays like rubbish, all before he has really yet to establish himself with that level of capacity. Players take time to develop and mature. Anyone seriously consider that we should trade him should ask themselves - should Richmond have traded out Dustin Martin in the years prior to him fully asserting himself on the competition when he was showing the occational flash of brilliance, but not providing a consistent level of output expected of a player of his physical attributes.

Thanks. Yes I knew that. VFL/state league. It's a really vexed issue really, there have been some great players recruited from the state leagues in recient years. Kelly from Geelong is a star and I think AVB would be seen in a similar light if he could just stay uninjured.

Totally agree. Like you, I don't nessasrily think the solution is to drop Patracca, which will just shift one of the opposition's best defenders onto one of our even lesser capable and lesser experienced players. The other point I'd make is that why is this conversation focused just on Patracca, when the output of guys like T Mac, Weid, ANB. Melksham has been just about our only forward to provide good output. I think part of the answer is that our whole forward system is a shambles at the moment and the other part is that it's not just Patracca.

I don't have a problem with us recruiting some of the top notch ones like Hannan, Freitch and AVB, it's some of the more speculative ones like T Smith, Hore and Keilty that I wounder if they are taking the spot of a younger player with more potential, but under developt/under achieved during their U18 time, like a fast outside version of James Harmes. I think at the moment we are particularly missing the pace, marking ability and opportunist goal sense of Hannan. Contrary to my concerns about Keilty, from what I understand, he is about the only key position type we have a the moment that is showing any real form. Sometimes you are dammed if you do and dammed if you don't. The one I'd question the most up to this point is Hore. A VFL best and fairest suggests that he could well be at or close to league standard, but we have a realitive abundance of backline talent, when you consider Lever on the comeback and Petty quietly developing into a quality player. It's all good to recruit the best available player in the draft, but if you rarely/never recruit based on need, then sooner or later you will have needs that are unforfilled.

Well, that was a filthy night at the office. Felt like we had worked our way back into the game in the second quarter, but the writing was on the wall for us when guys like T Mac, Melksham and Freitch miss relatively straight forward goals they would gobble up 80% of the time. Doesn't help when Geelong ended up with 25 free kicks to 12, including a very dubious 50m penalty to them. I really don't feel like the scoreboard reflected our performance tonight. It wasn't a great performance by us, but we weren't that bad either. Positives for me were our midfeild was dominant and most of our backs were ok. I thought Frosty put in a pretty decient game today. Forward line with the exception of Melksham was pretty bloody ordanary though to say the least. I don't think Sparrow is quite ready yet and needs to go back down to Casey for a bit. Nibbler has been practicality non existent, Weid and Tommy have been struggling big time. Pattraca had a stinker. I don't think we can drop too many at once, because all of a sudden, our forward stocks are pretty slim pickings through injury and form. From the Casey report, it sounds like Stretch deserves a game, so I'd like him back in the side, perhaps for Sparrow or Nibbler and then shuffle a few around. Our forward line looks very stagnant and is missing good delivery. I'd like to see one or both of Freitch and Hunt down their. Would also like Salem to push forward more, but don't think we can afford to loose his delivery out of our back half. Honestly, this game felt a lot like the Hawthorn loss of last year. It was a bad loss in it's own right, but I don't think we are that far off the pace. Just need to chalk up a few wins for some confidence and to stay in the Hunt.

6. Oliver 5. Brayshaw 4. Viney 3. Melksham 2. Gawn 1. Frost

Let's go DEMONS. Ive got a good feeling about this game.

For the most part, I think there is a big difference between my respect for the ex-players in the media that have and haven't coached. So easy for these good ex-players to spout their gobs off about the issues with team performance when they haven't coached and don't actually know or have the skills, experience and application to influence team performance. I haven't heard guys like Paul Roos going all panic stations over one or two games. As Goody says Fugazi. I have faith that our coaching brains trust have dissected the actual factors most influencing our relative under performace and have put in place strategies to address them and it won't just be "stop being soo soft".

Gee I loved the way Wheels played. We did have a few great tough players in that era - Todd Viney, Leoncelli, Rigoni, Junior Mac, Davey. Nathan 'Doggy' Brown was one of my favorites as well.

If only it was so easy to bring in AVB, he is recovering from some agitation to the pretty serious foot injury that kept him pretty much game less for 18 months - quite happy for the medical department to play it cautiously. I actually think we are in a position at the moment when our depth is somewhat being tested, so I don't think we can afford to loose too many to undisciplined acts of stupidity. On the cusp if the season we lost Jeffy, Hannan, J Smith, AVB, Lewis, T Smith, JKH, with the first five of the aforementioned particularly hurting us I believe. But anyways we are at where we are at and there is more than enough tallent and experience in the team selected against the Cats to win the game. All about application.

So 56, without trying to sound too cleché, what I think you are saying here is that we are a soo much better side when everyone plays to our system together and works hard for each other. I still think O Mac has a contribution to make to the side, but if he doesn't lift his game, he might need to go back to Casey to find is form, confidence, hunger or whatever he is lacking at the moment. He seems to have got something of a charmed life as a footballer in our senior team to this point, so to get bought back down to earth, made to fight hard for his spot and given an opertunity to fix some aspects of his game could actually be a good opertunity for him, if that what eventuates. Playing at his best I think he can provide good value to the side.

I actually think missing Vanders hurts us a bit in this area - he is such a bull. That said, we have pleanty of other big tough battle hardened guys like Viney, Jones, Jetta, Harmes, Pattraca, Melksham, Hibbard, Salem, T Mac and Co that missing one guy shouldn't be the end of our physical presence. I fully expect the guys to respond this week. If we really do think we need a bit of extra physical bite, then throw in the big Preuss monster to iron out some hand baggers - we are not committed to playing him every week, so shouldn't matter so much if he gets suspended. I can't fully explain our slow start to the year in a way that doesn't sound like it's just making excuses, but we were one of the best, if not the best contested ball sides last year, so I'm not really concerned that it's a toughness or willingness to work thing. If anything, I think last week we feel into the trap of getting too many guys sucked into the ball and then getting burnt on the outside. Pretty hard to win contested ball when the ball isn't in a contested situation.

As you point out Cunningham had serious form in this area, for the AFL to let him off after making all these big statements about stamping it out is quite simply astonishing. Bernie had form too, but that's against the point. I actually think Max will be a protected species against Geelong this week though - you watch. It would be a huge embarrassment for the AFL to let a high profile player like Max to be snipped off the ball two weeks in a row. Recon a few early free kicks and/or 50m penalties would do the job. If the umpires don't control it and Max us targeted again, then it just needs to become open warfare from our guys and I'd back us in against the hand baggers any day.

Seriously the AFL needs to start basing these suspensions on the intent of the action, not the outcome. If you throw a punch that isn't something that is could reasonably an action of playing the ball (i.e. a spoil or handball) - automatic 1 or 2 week suspension. Whether it glances or makes good connection, what's the difference. A glance is only good luck away from becoming a Tom Bugg/Andrew Gaff outcome. If physical injury occurs as the result, then the minimum 1 - 2 weeks can be increased. Players and clubs hardly care about fines - they care about missing games.

Not sure I'm the best candidate for the job, but I'd be more than happy to give Christian a first hand explanation of how much force is in a gut punch without breaking any ribs.

Our centre clearance work against the Lions was also bad. Max was winning the ruck, but we weren't getting the clearance. I think adjusting to the 6-6-6 rule is a fairly significant issue for us at the moment. Where as many teams just used it to clog the oppositions forward 50, we used it extensively to get that spitter (often ANB) off the back of the square and assist with centre bounce clearances. I do wounder if we should do something risky like just use on of the back flankers (probably Hunt) to run through the centre square to assist with our centre clearances. The opposition would be left with the choice of running with them or letting them run through unmanned and most times I think they would follow them through. Sure our tactical guru would be working through this issue with the on ball brigade in the off season and will be interesting to see how it all falls out once the dust settles.

BTW though, I think naming a guy on the bench is practically meaningless these days. They are either named in the side or they aren't. At most it sends a subtle message that your next move is out of the team, but there are better ways to do that like just a direct conversation between the player and coach, but I'm not sure threatening players that are down on confidence and trying to establish themselves is the right move for a coach and I couldn't see Goody doing this to be honest.

At this point in time, I'm inclined to agree up to a point. I put the question on the match day thread as to why people thought he was getting a game over others like Petty and the only thing anyone could come back with was to quote his reputation as an experienced intercept marker. I haven't been impressed by this guy's JLT or senior match day performances to date at all. His kicking is only average. Is he considered a better stopper that Petty at this point? I'm not making my final judgments on Hore any time soon, as I think he and the team probably need more time to find a bit more form and for me I'd be happy for that to be at Casey at this point for this guy. But that then poses the propersition that it's not going to get any easier for him to get a senior game with May and sooner or later Lever and/or Lewis comming back into the side.

I thought we spotted up forward 50 options pretty well yesterday. A couple of good hit-up to ANB (which he unfortunately missed), was a pretty decent pass from T Mac to Jones in the last (wiped my mind of that outcome). On a more positive note, I did think that kick to T Mac in the first quarter on the edge of the square was a pearler and Melksham's foot skills passing into our forward 50 are elite. Does make me also think that we are missing another medium-tall forward option at the moment though like Hannan or J Smith. Hannan doesn't always rack up huge numbers but often really makes his possessions count and I was impressed with both Smiths (Joel in particular) before they were injured. Not sure Keilty plays quite the same role, so he might be needing to be seen as either a better option than Weid or better than Preuss in the ruck.

Not sure how you could develop a rule to stop favoritism of an umpires pet. On a serious note, I wish they would stop paying free kicks for some pretty incidental high contact. Only have to give a feathers touch of anything above the shoulder and they are paying it. I know they need to protect the neck and head, but some of it is just plain silly in a game of such close combat/contact. Honestly it even frustrates me when these frees go our way, because you know there will be one comming back the other way at some point, potentially an even more critical time. My perception from what I watched was also that the umpires went pretty soft on the deliberate out of bounds rule this weekend.

GWS, Carlscum, St Kilda or Norf to Tassie. Grassroots participation in Qld is through the roof - justifies two teams.

Agree. I thought Wags was actually one of our better players. Also thought Nathan Jones was ok, with the exception of that dropped mark. No way Goodwin is dropping both Oscar and Frost in the same week as some are suggesting. I'm tipping very few changes to keep some team stability. Will certainly be some interesting reviews, but then they challenge will be laid down to respond and I recon we will.

I don't get why so people on this forum go on about a lack of pace and are then so quick to say - drop Frosty. He's one of the quickest players in the league and when he gets up and going, uses it to great effect. I also agree with your assessment of the compeditive nature of Frost Vs Oscar. Frost didn't play a great game for us yesterday, but few did. I'm still fairly baffled how Hore is getting a game over Petty at the moment. Petty has looked far better than Hore so far this year to me. I'm tipping Max won't get dominanted like that too often and that will change the dynamic significantly. Apart from May, I can't see us making many unforced changes.

It sounds like a load of BS to me - Gaff shouldn't have been allowed to play either, particularly the AFLX rubbish, where there was the additional reward of some extra cash (although for Gaff, perhaps that could go towards Andrew Brayshaw's dental bill - from experience, trust me!). But I'd say the disallowance of May (and probably others) to play in VFL practice matches would be due to the VFL games being played on a concurrent weekend as an AFL home and away game for which the suspension applied. I don't know why a) there couldn't have been a VFL practice match last weekend and b) why the byes season start and end for the VFL isn't made to line up with the AFL season - leads to some very sub optimal situations at times.

6. Salem 5. Melksham 4. Harmes. 3. Freitch 2. Wagner 1. Hunt