BenJamin on Deesy St

I just think it’s a rubbish argument that 99% of players hit their peak at 26 and don’t improve thereafter. That was the other poster’s claim. In fact, if one were to look at this a bit more closely and crunch the numbers, I wouldn’t be surprised if the best years for the majority of players (and you can apply this to top-line soccer, basketball and cricket players too) are actually when they are between 26-30. And I’m talking about performance here, not talent. Not saying Frosty is a superstar by any means, but I am saying his best years could be ahead of him.

Um, no. Houli, Higgins, Hurn, Edwards, Ablett, L Jones, Hawkins, Burgoyne, K Simpson, R Henderson, Gawn and Betts immediately come to mind as players who improved - many of them quite a lot - after 26. Then there’s a batch of >26-year-old current-day champions whose peaks seem to last forever! Like Pendlebury, Fyfe, Dangerfield, Martin and Sidebottom.

Precisely

Let’s bring back Cale M too

“Members will hear our learnings,” Gary and Glen say. And they will hear our yearnings. (‘learnings’ - sigh. And they used it twice!)

Selfish, really? I must be watching a different game. Our leading tackler and contested ball winner for a few seasons now, the guy who wins us the ball more than any other and always tries to distribute it quickly to teammates in a better position. How much better would we be if we had a couple of class outside players for Oliver to feed the ball to? But we don’t, so I wish he were more selfish. I wish he held on to the pill longer instead of giving it off so fast. I wish he backed himself more and used his power and acceleration out of stoppages. I wish he lifted, rather than lowered, his eyes in congestion more, and used his disposal in a more incisive and direct way, with more metres gained. He tried a couple of spearing kicks into the corridor last night that didn’t come off and got down on himself - I hope the coaches would encourage more of that. Take risks, back yourself. Be arrogant with the ball. Aspire to the level of impact and ball use that Martin and Bontempelli so often display. Oliver is a special player for us already but is yet to reach his full potential.

The Gawn Conspiracy. What is it with Max and the umps?

The Lions’ run and spread was bloody impressive in the last quarter and a half. And their pace. We simply couldn’t keep up in the end. We looked ‘heavy’, like in the pre-lim debacle. The Lions were gliding across the ground. The sooner we get Burgess (or someone of his ilk), the better. Gawn’s injury looked nasty at the time (happened right in front of us, with the Brisbane sun in our eyes). No doubt this hurt our ability to win stoppages and clearances (the key to our game). This didn’t change even when he was back on the field (why the risk?). The sooner Preuss comes in, the better. I’d really like to see us play two ruckmen - for good - with the big German given the licence to clean up blokes and intimidate, on top of his normal ruck/forward duties. I’m thinking a Jimmy/Strawbs-like combination from the class of 87-88, one of our best teams of the last 50-odd years. I admit he is one of my favourites, but I’m finding criticism of Clarry’s game last night hard to fathom. With the game slipping away, he was one of the few consistently winning the ball in close and in the air, and generally trying his guts out. Even Brisbane fans around us recognised his efforts. He, like Gawn, needs more support - both around the ball, and ahead of the ball. More Dees’ supporters than I expected were at the game and in good voice. We had the Lions’ fans - who were mostly a friendly bunch (despite, or perhaps because of, our seating in front of a large bar area) - worried there for a while. That was before their jovial and, in the end, slightly annoying chants of ‘Hippy’ drowned us all out.

Good stuff. I might do a bit of roaming too, if things aren’t going our way!

Sounds good, thanks for the info. Would have loved to get to the German Club (Weissbier is a particular favourite), but we’re arriving not long before start of game.

@Demonland Heard you on podcast (Grinter interview was excellent by the way, brought back some fond and painful memories) saying you’re making the trip. Good timing with school holidays! As it turns out, I’ll be taking my brood, too. Never been to the Gabba. What’s it like for spectators (we’ll be on wing, ground level, I think)?

To all those who think umpires don’t influence results (or that crowds don’t influence umpires’ decisions), please watch that last quarter. Utterly ridiculous. Most one-sided crap I’ve seen since, well, the Eagles’ last home game.

The bloke is a gun and has a massive emphasis on maximising players’ running ability and aerobic capacity. Along with Hinkley, Richardson and Koch, played a major role in transforming Port from basket case to finals’ contender in one pre-season. No doubt he will be highly sought after by other clubs/codes if he’s coming back to Aus.

I’ve been a big fan. We got him across with the 3-year carrot knowing full well that, on field, his third year would be a diminishing return. (I still would like him in the team to take kick-outs though, and was perplexed he wasn’t selected when Salem was a late out v Giants.) Leaving aside the off-field benefits he clearly has brought to the club, let’s not forget that we gave up next to nothing for him and, in his first two years as we rose up the ladder, he played 43 of a possible 47 games, finishing top 3, then top 10, in the B&F.

I agree he played a part in changing that game, although he didn’t break his leg (that happened from a Hunt smother, I think). Lewis merely punched him as the Blues and Cripps were getting on top.

I wasn’t commenting on Goodwin. I was commenting on North’s approach last night, which was utterly ferocious and the primary focus of their game last night, if you or anyone else cared to watch it. And Shaw used very specific language around attacking the man, not the ball - which I thought was interesting and instructive.

Yep, and not just hunger, but unapologetic and uncompromising physicality, led by the captain. Shaw’s comments in post-match presser said it all: “We went into the game with the mindset that we wanted to attack our opponents. That’s what we’re about. We’re a physical football team, we’ve got physical players. Jack Ziebell, Ben Cunnington, Cameron Zurhaar - these guys are big bodies, they attack the man. Jed Anderson. These guys go after them and I wanted to encourage that in those players.”

How about some other stats? 2 games, 4 goals straight. 2 games, 1 win (which is sad to point out, I know, but such is the state of our season). Last game in seniors v Saints: 2 goals, 15 touches, 16 hit outs. The bloke can co-exist with Gawn, can actually free him and T-Mac up, as other posters have mentioned. And he’s not afraid to throw his weight around, which is (i) a vastly underrated trait these days (in terms of the impact it can have on both teammates and opposition players) and (ii) far more than a lot of his teammates are prepared to do at the moment. (See the impact Mumford’s return is having on the Giants this year.) The coaches would probably base his continued omission on their preference for players with more mobility, run and spread, defensive accountability especially on transition etc. They might also think Max in his current form doesn’t need any support. But I would take the ’one trick’ of Preuss - if that means his size, physicality, tap rucking skills, kicking ability, role as a foil for Max and T-Mac, extra marking option (other than Max, which is sooooo effing predictable) for that get-out-of-jail kick from defence or along the boundary line - over all that right now, particularly when our work rate when we don’t have the ball is absolutely crap anyway. He isn’t going to make that side of our game any worse now, is he, while making other aspects of our game better. Top team Geelong are playing two rucks at the moment. Premiers West Coast play two rucks, as well as super coach Clarko (in other words, the tactic works and you can build a proven finals-winning game plan around it). Why can’t we, especially when our two could arguably develop into the best pair of the lot of the current crop?

We haven’t even hit Winter yet, and we ain’t gonna play in Sept (when the weather gets warmer). Goodwin has erred in not bringing Preuss in sooner. He is not the panacea but he does offer some critical things for us, not least his own qualities as both a tap ruckman and big, intimidating forward who can take contested marks. When rucking, he allows Gawn to drift back as an intercept defender (at which, in the absence of Lever, he is our best). And when up forward, his mere size and presence would mean T-Mac could get off the leash a bit more. Bring him in, I say, and leave him in.

2, 4, 7, 10, 12, 14 (+2), ? After supporting the Dees for 40+ years, I should have known not to entertain any prospect of getting silverware this season (or ever!), but that damn linear progression had me fooled for a while. All I can hold on to now are the examples of the Cats and Richmond, who made finals in 2005 and 2015 respectively but fell away quite dramatically and against expectations the season after, before doing their reviews (and getting Neil Balme in footy admin) and winning their drought-breaking premierships in 2007 and 2017. 2020 for us, then. Would Balmey come back?!

Tonight (and for rest of season) I’m looking forward to seeing which players are doggedly prepared to drag our team’s performance out of the mire. I suspect Clarry will be one of those. For me, he’s reason enough to go along to games. And I like the INs this week in so far as they address a couple of areas in our forward defensive set-up that have been sorely found wanting so far. I’m talking about (i) small forwards with good closing down speed who, with their pressure, can cause turnovers at the source (Garlett and Lockhart) and (ii) gut-running high forwards who can cover and block opposition space on transition (Nibbler and Stretcher Jnr), that is, when the opposition gets the ball in our forward half and looks to counter and/or switch.

Beaten by our own turnovers and their circle work. Don’t know which is more disappointing - probably the latter as it points to a lack of (i) awareness, (ii) preparedness to run and cover and (iii) fitness.

Melksham non-free kick near end of first half the turning point in this game. Absolutely disgusted and utterly confused by the inconsistent application of rules around prohibitive contact in marking contests, and holding the ball / incorrect disposal. It’s almost making the game unwatchable for me - and, of course, being 0-3 and getting home with my kids after midnight because of this city’s crap public transport system doesn’t help matters.

Indeed, hopelessly compromised. Doesn’t matter how you cut an 18-team comp into 22 games, it will always lack integrity and be inherently unfair and unequal. Teams should either play each other (i) once in regular season (17 game season, alternating home and away each year) or (ii) twice (34 game season). Of course, neither scenario is likely to happen, for different reasons.

RTG, I’m having PTSD episodes even thinking about Eagle Rock and the cauldron of blue and gold, Optus Stadium, with the din of whinge and entitlement! Looking at the 100+ pages on the Draft/Trade Cheeseboard, I don’t have much to add about Jesse. I and the girls would love him to stay - should I get one of my daughters to send him an envelope with 20 cents in it (remember Chris Grant)? I am interested to know - if he goes - what’s going to replace the quarter time entertainment of Hogan’s Heroes and, more recently, Hogan’s High Ball. May’s Haymakers or Kolodjashnij’s Ukrainian Tongue Twisters?