D4Life

While it’s been 55 years since we tasted ultimate success, at least the club has a plan and isn’t taking knee jerk reactions to this years poor results! The number of AFL players when asked why they had such good seasons often attribute it to having a complete pre-season. Little wonder our year was poor, with many last quarter fade outs, when you look at limited pre season of our midfield, then injuries we kept getting during the year, add lost confidence and it all led to a poor year, only 5 wins was due to throwing away a few games, Crows loss immediately comes to mind. As with a few others comments, being caught by the 666 impact, doesn’t look so good, but KK and VDB not making it due to injury didn’t help! It highlighted needs for specialist wingers and the game became more about running both ways than ever, lack of preseasons for many of our midfield players just accentuated the problem. Going into 2020, hopefully with good pre seasons behind the majority of the team, some good positional drafting and a better draw, should lead to a huge improvement in 2020! It will be really interesting to see how Viney goes after a full pre season, boy did a lot of supporters unfairly tip a bucket on him last year! I think back to a few games he dragged us to wins in 2017/2018 games, finals in 18, that away game against WC, off one leg against Port, At his best a beast! 2019 was crap, but the club is holding the course, and let’s hope it pays off with a flag or two in the next 4-5 years! Panicking and throwing all the toys out of the pram doesn’t work, Richmond - Hardwick and Collingwood - Buckley just highlight the point.

After a poor season, either our players are not as good as we thought, or shot on confidence and at best not up to scratch on fitness - we probably had close to worst record for 4th quarters in the AFL highlighting lack of fitness! These probably combine to us rating many players a level below their actual capability. It felt difficult last year fitting in players for round one, so let’s hope last years form was an aberration and we see a lift across the whole team in 2020. Hopefully we can find a small forward in the draft who can make the grade in 2020, that would help as this seems to be the one area we haven’t addressed at all, but a lot of improvement has to come from within, a much better run with injuries will help. Improved fitness and more run via Langdon and Tomlinson should certainly help the Demons in 2020!

Buckley had taken Collingwood backwards for 6 consecutive years, before he was told to ease off the players, evidently by Maxwell, because they were miserable. Tigers were a basket case, couldn’t win a final, even in the year they broke through2017, remember a loss they had against GWS mid season, snatching defeat from arms of victory in last couple of minutes, due to lack of leadership, & defensive frailties! End of 16 supporters tried to overthrow the board. Sometimes, a few minor changes can have a major impact, add a little luck with injuries and the draw, or just a hot streak of form and an opportunity can open up in front of you. Dogs in 16, Tigers 17 and even Brisbane this year. As was previously mentioned in many sports get your defensive structure correct, don’t over complicate the game plan for the players, improve your skills, keep pressure up across the field and you can go close! 1. Our backline maintaining a defensive structure should be one of the things that change, and 2. our mids covering a lot more ground defensively. Richo at St Kilda exploited both so will pass on learnings and Burgess plus recruitment of Langdon and Tomlinson should help with the second. Add a few wins and some confidence and we just might get a pleasant surprise in 2020.

All of the deals need to be judged over the next 4-5 years. Harmes has been top 5 in B&F last two years and played some great games on top opposition players, worth locking in! May looks pretty good when he was on the field, a real presence, let’s see what he does over the next 3-4 years. Unfortunately Lever was just coming good when he went down against the Dogs in 2018, hopefully after a solid preseason he has a good 2020. But time will tell on all these deals, it’s too early to call them failures! Corne’s just going for headlines.

Only 6 players kicked 50 or more goals in the league. Another 5 40 plus Another 18 30 plus so in all the league only 29 players kicked 30 plus goals for the season. Tigers had Lynch 63 & Martin 32. Of course Riewoldt missed a lot of games. Your lucky to get one player kick over 50 let alone 2 in any teams forward line, looking for three is wishful thinking! TMac needs to find form and we need improvement and players on the park out of Fritsch Petracca Melksham Weideman JSmith and maybe someone to surprise! Maybe more goals from Oliver spending some time forward. No magic solutions but would be great for us to draft or find out next Jeff Farmer!!

At least we get most of our deals done, unlike a few other teams. Langdon looks very good and will fill one wing. Hopefully Tomlinson the other wing, but he can play a few positions if wing doesn’t work. Both seem durable which is great. Bit sad to see Frost go, liked his effort and speed, but decision making not the best, as every Dees supporter knows! unsure why we didn’t pick up a small forward! Re big forwards, very good ones are few & far between. B+ for me, puzzled re small forward inaction.

Petracca C+ Same as Josh Wagner, killed his credibility instantly in my eyes! Buckenarra like everyone has an opinion, there’s a saying about opinions and a-holes!

The other big point about comparing the Demons to this years top 4 is age of core players Tigers - Martin Cotchin Riewoldt Edwards Lynch Pies - Pendlebury, Sidebottom Treloar Grundy GWS - Greene, Kelly, Cogniglio, Davis, Cameron Geelong - Dangerfield, Hawkins, Selwood, Kelly vs Melbourne - Gawn, Oliver, Viney, Petracca, Harmes Add Eagles who should have finished to 4. While finals is important next year, GF on age is still 2-3 years away. Hopefully we get lucky!

At the end of 2016 at the Tigers, Hardwick couldn’t coach, Cotchin couldn’t lead, the committee was challenged, according to some the club was in disarray! It’s easy to poke holes from affair, particularly into the Demons after a terrible year. Let some changes be made, get a decent pre season behind the players, hopefully injury free, pickup a few players from draft & trading, a few new assistant coaches and see what happens. In the AFL very few teams just go up up up on a linear improvement. While very disappointed with this year, I’m excited to see what Oliver, Viney, Brayshaw, Harmes, TMac, May, & Lever do next year. Max & Petracca build on this year. Have supported Demons for over 50 years and still believe that this is best list we’ve had in that time. While maybe only Gawn & Oliver delivered an A grade season, think back a year and we have a lot of talent!

After 55 years of misery, truer words were never spoken / written!

When you are out of form and low on confidence, players hesitate, 2nd guess, don’t just do it without thinking.

It’s called a premiership century rather than window/clock for all long suffering Demons, next year were 56 years in deep! Or if you want to be positive and talk this century, we’ve only been waiting 20 years!

What percentage of players drafted between 10 - 20 since 2000 have played over 200 games? I wouldn’t mind betting it’s less than 33%. So some people on this thread are happy to take a less than 1 in 3 chance on a kid and trade Petracca who will play over 200 games, just crazy! Petracca is one of the few players who improved this year, in a team that was terrible. Would be a shocking a trade for pick 10-20, or 8-18! The most successful teams in last 15 years include Hawks, Swans, Geelong, and WC have the opposite strategy!

Agree with Binman and particularly your 2nd para Unleash Hell. I think all of Brayshaw, Oliver, Harmes & Viney had surgery or injuries over pre season that made our two way running in midfield much worse. Add in Jones who just wont run two ways and Lewis too slow and you get caught out a lot. Then have back line sitting too high and you have big defensive problems, Dees in 2020 unfortunately. Forward line with TMac not fully fit and out of form, Weideman not kicking on from 2018 and not one nippy forward, the forward line didn’t function. Add pre season woes and then injuries during the season and you have a crap year. After 50plus years on watching Demons, seems like we’ve rarely if ever been a good two running team, and our best football is when we keep the ball moving quickly. Round 6-11 last year we started to really move the ball and play with confidence and it was electric! Hopefully after nearly all our players get a full pre season under Burgess and they train two way running and spread, stop all going for ball at same time, with a soft draw, 2020 offers some hope!

2020 Wishlist Game Plan - in the guts - don’t all jump in after the ball, have someone wait outside to receive who can run and has skills. Run both ways, particularly hard when the opposition gets it. Max once a quarter just belt it 20 meters forward in the ruck! - out back - don’t all jump up to mark or punch, have a few stay down for the crumbs, someone mind the goalsquare, at ball ups & throw ins someone stay goal side to block opposition rovers small forwards! Hold the line in place rather than all going in one half of the ground! - up forward - clean fast delivery, too forwards who lead(not just to the boundary line), take the shots for goal, especially if you mark inside 50, kick straight, crumbers get some snaps! Players - No off season ops - Injury free pre season, where they run a lot, with ball in hand so working on skills - Need - two quick wingman, two quick small forwards, one quick small back Good fortune from poop season - Very good draw - #2 or #3 pick in draft plus an early 20 pick - Salary cap extra space - longer pre season - Burgess meant to be very good - Richardson will be a VG assistant as he was previously and will have learned a lot in six years as coach, also as St Kilda opened Melbourne up, really understands our weaknesses Farewell to another shocking season, we’ve suffered a lot of them, 53 personally, but it builds resilience! Bring on 2020, we live in hope!

Retired Lewis & Maynard Need 5-6 more to go Garlett - cooked Hannan - between injured and too big a difference from his very good to awful J Wagner - tries hard but lacks skill & reading of the game keilty - good - very good VFL, just not AFL Hore - very good plus at VFL, under pressure at AFL doesn’t make it, very close, Pies let very few good ones go! T Smith - almost good enough but 29 C Wagner - VFL very very good, maybe survives as back up!!

He should take 3 years at GC from a financial perspective. Dees could only give him one more year!

Agree, was expecting a 10 goal disaster! However, kicking 1.7 in the last and throwing away a win still hurts!

Jones has given great loyalty and service to the club, so we should acknowledge both of those! The last two years, he hasn’t run or tackled and disposal has been ordinary at best. He can play one more season as a role player, but he needs to lift!!

Once your confidence is shot, you will find a way to lose - 1.7!

Choco Williams Sais a year or two back on the radio, the coaches mantra of one soldier out another in, is what coaches have to say, but he basically called it out as total BS, replace 4-5 of your top 8 players with players 23-27 on your list and your stuffed! While we’ve underperformed with what we’ve had available, our injuries and poor off season add up to a bad year, maybe not 5-17, but irrecoverable from a good season perspective. Bring on a great pre season, a fit list, good draw, better draft picks and s bit of luck and who knows what 2020 holds!

Sounds like better than we have currently. At 73 it’s a yes!

Done! Fortunately I couldn’t make Friday night, sounded putrid. But after 50 plus years supporting them , I just have to stick fat with them, as maddening as 2019 has been!! Just think of the joy if we win one flag after 55/60 years of waiting and waiting!

Once the team has lost confidence, in a season where everything is going wrong, it just spreads and I think has caught Salem! He isn’t a great defender would prefer see him wing or half forward occasionally going into middle for clean disposal!

Hate to agree with your post, but it’s hard to disagree! Lets hope to go out with a strong finish!!