Gawndy the Great

5-6 goals from d50 stoppages is unforgivable. We have suffered from these types of brain fades in the past and need a goto formula to really knuckle down and choke the stoppage in d50. I noticed it in game and am not surprised it has come up on here. You can excuse 1 -2 per game but even that in consecutive games would be a red flag let alone 6 in one game. Yze would want to pull his finger out and focus on his job as the midfield and stoppage coach and not let this develop into a trend as there were a few last week as well and can bet your house that the Swans will have a plan to win exploit us in this space too.

Is it the same knee / ailment that affected him last year?

Wasn’t able to listen live… how soon does the podcast become available on the cloud?

clearly coaches agree on the 5,4,3 but Goody thought Lever and Oliver were better than Dunkley and Cameron. Thought Daniher should have got some votes with his 5 snags

I think most of the main questions around our performance have already been asked. I want to know the opinion or the team resilience aka mental toughness. I think we can all agree that a portion of our (non) performance on Friday night was attributed to Gawn's injury (or was it?) but what does it say for us to just switch of like we did after he got injured? Not everything goes your way in a game and i thought we were made of some pretty tough stuff. Is this an isolated case or does it speak to some of our performances late last season - when the tough got going we were not prepared to go in knee deep.

To avoid any doubt. Watch today's media conference. The potential confusion is that he has yet to go the club to confirm a treatment plan. https://www.melbournefc.com.au/video/1293098/rd-3-media-conference-max-gawn?videoId=1293098&modal=true&type=video&publishFrom=1679875709001 Some positive soundbites: No swelling, starting to feel better already, wont be 2-3 weeks as a minimum (comparison to Jack's recovery) but still feel bullish.

A KPD is a must given its approaching 11 o'clock on May's career. Cant see him playing more than 2-3 years with his history of soft-tissue. I think one of Sparrow/Taj takes Viney's role when he leaves and we have a few more years before we need to stress about life after Oliver/Trac. Kynan will probably get an opportunity at HF early in his career but provides another option as insider midfield in 4-5 years time. Our two KPF are untried, but we are covered for now. White's boy will come in when Gawndy retires in 5-6 years time. Ultimately we have a good list that are currently in the window. We will taper off in 5-6 years but should avoid a major re-build if we are able to restock this year with 2 quality players.

I was up in Brissy a few weeks back and it was very sticky. Had some colleagues over from SE Asia and they said it felt like home just a bit cooler. I guess that could explain the fumbles. But the contested possession count … how do we explain the lack of grit? Is it really Gawns injury? I mean I understand if it is, but that also concerns me that we could be that easily distracted.

We beat Sydney twice last year if it wasn’t for injuries / fitness. I expect the midfield to come out and make a huge statement next week. They have too much pride to accept the dismal performance.

There is evidence building that he may just not be as good as we all thought he’d be… it happens.

Which at the time was his worth as a rising star and premiership player. Just goes to show we got shafted when the deal was made as we all thought Freo were top 4…. Hence this threads existence

Brisbane were not that good last night. We were just plain terrible. Hard to say whether we were shell shocked from Gawns injury. Collingwood play with no fear and have a game plan that is all out attack. Question is whether they can sustain that all year long. All it takes is a single team trying something different to break them down and then all else will follow if it works. It’s early days and declaring flag favourites right now is plain old ridiculous.

Which hopefully will all go to Pickett when he signs.

If he didn’t, that’s on him. he had everything going for him at the Dees.

When are we putting up the 2023 afl draft thread?

I’m loving this. Freo are shizen big time.

He was touted as #1 but he was the Doggies academy recruit.

Dogga playing soo bad.. they’ll becoming for him big time if they lose.

I’m assuming your not in Melbourne as it’s 7.30pm - you may as well call it a day 😂

Worse.

Pffft the Doggies at the pointy end again!

I like that move. Brayshaw butchering the ball so far this year.

Is Petty confirmed ? He just had a hyper extended knee and hopefully with some ice and rest, should come up fine with the 8 day break. Even so, Daniher kicked 5 on him so maybe give him a spell with May coming in. I’d look at bringing Hibbo in to lock down Papley and have Rivers take Hayward. Otherwise we match up well elsewhere. I’d look at giving the ball to Hibbo, Bowey coming out of HB. Brayshaw should go back to defensive wing - he’s a liability atm. Maybe we can get Hunter to play a deeper wing role to help with a quicker transition. Because when we do it we are seriously unstoppable.

It’s funny he mentioned that because I did think through out the game, players don’t seem interested in planting there feet and pivoting sharply or trying to evade. They probably had no familiarity with the surface, which let’s face it doesn’t excuse the entire performance but does explain some of the clearance issues. If that is due to surface, then F Me why are we giving these teams an edge? GEELONG with their narrow wings, Sydney and their shorter pitch etc. why can’t we have a level playing field literally and figuratively speaking. Every ground should have the exact same measurements, soil and surface conditions etc or you find another ground or cough up 4 pts.

Best time for it tbh. You can bank 5 of those and we should win at least 6-7 of them. Biggest test next week.