Mel Bourne

So anyway..... He’s officially a dud? Genuinely curious here, because I really didn’t pay attention to many of his previous games.

I was as surprised as anybody to see his name appear twice in the press.

Help me understand the negativity towards Joel Smith, that I see so much of around here. Two articles I read (The Age, AFL) both cited Joel Smith’s influence in the backline (particularly running with Dangerfield) as a reason the Cats were kept to a low score. He’s played 11 games since 2016, and it looks like 2020 might be his first opportunity to get some consistent footy into him, but so many seem to be of the opinion that he’s had his chance and failed. Was it his attempting to take a speccy in defense against Carlton that put everybody off?

There’s an entire thread dedicated to this on DL. As per usual, full of facts and things resembling them.

Which is a shame, cos scoring goals is cool.

Charlie Spargo, if you’re reading this......stop reading this.

So why do we have them? Either get rid of them or get them going NOW. The only way they won’t get “brushed aside” is when they’ve got games in them and the experience that comes with that. With little money to play with and low draft picks for the time being, these players are our future whether we like it or not. There’s plenty of talent in there, but without experience they will dwindle, coast then eventually settle for the mediocrity that our club seems to thrive on.

This season should be officially deemed a work-in-progress year (yeah I know, another one) and get games drilled into the youngsters one or more of Jackson, Sparrow, Pickett (obviously), Bedford, Chandler, Bradtke should be getting games every week.

That all sounds perfect, really. And fantastic that it’s only a step away.

I had the scene in my head of Salem taking his sweet time after being awarded that 50m penalty...

That was baffling. I was yelling at the TV. So emblematic of the club as a whole.

[censored] poor effort, Dees.

Have been pumping up Lockhart, but now that he’s fully inflated I’m noticing some factory defects.

They create/find targets. A basic tenet of the game which we simply suck at. Every possession has felt like a fluke today.

Game over

Yep. Her earlier suggestion about keeping Petracca in the forward line was a good one too.

We would be creaming this match if we had any viable forward targets. Hunt doing his best, but seldom able to finish. TMac clomping about, not taking marks a better player would and Fritsch, disappointingly not proving to be the surprise package we hoped for. Until we have a genuine class forward, this will always be the story.

That Kozzie leap got me excited about future Kozzie leaps.

As front-on as front-on gets. Befuddling.

Hence the term “overt”. I know what you’re getting at but some things are less nebulous than others.

I dunno, I think bringing him in as soon as we did would've helped him psychologically. The more anticipation for his first match, the more pressure he would've felt along the way. He's now got those first game nerves out of the way, and the next time he laces up the unwanted attention and scrutiny will be considerably lessened. But yes, we were fortunate to get away with it.

Wasn't always an entirely benevolent force, mind you. A lot of black artists were victims of overt plagiarism without receiving the appropriate compensation. Led Zep in particular were shockers in this regard, but there were many, many more white artists who exploited the lack of legal protection behind the early blues artists' work.

Have to agree with this. Yes, there will always be a contingency who wear their bigotry with a bewildering pride, but there is an enormous chunk of the troll-market who would immediately vanish if faced with actual accountability. The only time I could see an avatar as worthwhile would be for forums where people need to discuss highly personal problems (such as whether or not to play Harmes in defence).

Maybe he is being himself?

Cue the scene in The Club with Geoff Hayward staring at the seagull, mid-game.