Kent

Just now, Spargonicus said:

Exactly - we need to stop talking about deliberately biased umpiring. Focus solely on the poor standard (which also causes unconscious bias with home crowds).

its a con the afl are corrupt in my view and the umpires are complicit in ,managing outcomes 

I wish it wasnt so but thats the optics

Just now, dee-tox said:

Incompetence or bias is not a conspiracy. 

 Bias  is a conspiracy with out a doubt  incompetence parading as competence is prta of a conspiracy

1 hour ago, picket fence said:

Toby Bedford runs into an open goal and misses..... How Melbourne!

Yep he has been practising that for years Coached by the best almost team in the league

8 minutes ago, Ouch! said:

He's a year older than Petracca. What does our age profile have to do with anything when we are in a premiership window that is likely going to be 2-3 years top. 28 years of age, his statistics are very similar to Kozzie, and importantly his tackling is exceptional as is his goals average per game.
He's an ideal replacement for Melksham, and as harsh as it sounds I can't see Melky getting another contract. I'd love to see the club keep him around, but don't see that being as a player.  

we have a huge hole developing in our age profile 23 to 27 

The premier ship window is lower now than last year cant see us top 4 next year and thats when your age profile matters

1 minute ago, DistrACTION Jackson said:

Have a feeling Brown will retire. Think we will hold onto TMac for one more season.

what the hell for pay him out its so hard to watch him trying

17 hours ago, Jaded No More said:

Agreed.

Gawn did not hold up his end of the bargain. It also did not help that he got injured early, was slow to get back to full fitness, and when he played forward it was wet and windy.

I actually thought he impacted the contest up forward against Carlton, but his goal kicking is an abomination. He is just not a forward. Neither is Grundy.

Our desperate need to get a tall forward working, thanks to injuries to Tmac, BB and then Petty and then Melksham, meant that we tried to force a square peg into a round hole. 

It did not work, and having a million dollar bench player who can't do much else but ruck, is a luxury we cannot afford. 

Grundy can't play forward, but he also can't play behind the ball or take a contested mark like Gawn. Which means he can only do one thing, and that is be a first choice ruck. But is he as good a first choice ruck as Gawn? No he is not.

Having said all that, the reality is that Gawn is 32 next season. He has had a long history of knee issues. He cannot go on forever, and the irony is that if Grundy did not choose to leave, he would probably end up getting a lot more game time next year. 

surely thats why we recruited him

Max didnt want to transition it seems to me one knee injury form disaster as you stated

4 hours ago, RalphiusMaximus said:

Honestly, I'd be happy enough to see him come in as depth, but he's not worth chasing from what I can see.  A late bloomer, mediocre averages in most areas and kicks a little under two goals a game.  At 28 he's not likely to improve much on his existing numbers.  Will he be good enough to win a regular spot in our side?  

agree with this assessment Ralph average 1.4 goals a game. Also doesnt improve our age profile

14 hours ago, Timothy Reddan-A'Blew said:

Just to bring this thread up to date, Melbourne-wise, Luke Dunstan, retired.

But also to ask a question: Several threads seem to refer to James Harmes as actually, rather than speculatively, gone. What is his current status?

Finished 4th in B&F previously currently falling off cliff

6 minutes ago, greenwaves said:

Does anyone know if we're conducting a review?

yes it will be run by Goodwin and Max no need for any other input Great year, many many  learnings move on to 2024

17 hours ago, roy11 said:

Was playing well v Hawks and North in games he was injured in. Provided his foot heals well/promptly, expect him to do a good job next year.

not robust enough to play a whole season looking at his history

Wouldnt be relying on him to first KPF

42 minutes ago, Demon Dynasty said:

I reckon he (and the FD...it's a big experienced team we're talking about here) managed the first half ok but then botched the 2nd with Clarry out for so long.

That put a stack of pressure on Tracc & Viney to lift their output to cover off.  Plus a bit of JJ and Harmes coming in to assist.

But for mine the Harmes option (on a couple of occasions) was the wrong one.

Goody was probably deceived somewhat by some ok to good performances at VFL level and probably still had recent strong flashbacks of his 21/22 efforts and figuring he may get back to somewhere near that.  Fair enough.

Unfortunately for Goody and all of us, Harmes was nowhere near his 21/22 and after the first recall should never have gotten the next call up.

For mine it was Dunstan in for at least a few matches while Clarry was out.  Even ahead of JJ.  But especially ahead of Harmes.

Why do i say that?  Dunstan like for like was about as close as we had to Viney in terms of extracting and distributing the pill.

The physicality required in this position must be immense week in week out.  At that point Dunstan was the most likely bull to switch in for a week or two.  Harmes not a regular extractor anyway and wouldn't have provided the relief required to Viney regardless of form imho.

Even a couple of Dunstan assists,  spread out spasmodically over about 6 to 8 weeks, may have been better.  Especially as we knew Clarry was a long term fix.

Imv Viney was the bull, the extractor....the ball getter we needed to protect as much as possible in order to keep him as fresh as possible coming in to finals.

We live and die by his performances much of the time, just as the Doggies do with Libba's form/abscence.

The game against Hawks, Libba missed the second half from concussion.  They lose by 3 points.  The week after they lose to the lowly Eagles by 7 points.  Came back the week after and vavoom they beat the cats at the Cattery by 4 goals.

That little window of his abscence sees them miss the finals by two premiership points.  One more win and they're in instead of the Swans.  A coincidence?  I think not.

In the QF against the Pies, Viney was a massive 55% off his H&A Season rating.

Recovered well against the Blues, posting a rating 20% higher than his H&A rating, but by then we were pushing up hill in terms of missing our chance at the weeks rest via the Prelim and going in to our 2nd consecutive final without the likes of JVR and Gus.

very good points made well

On 9/19/2023 at 5:33 PM, Demon Dynasty said:

Absolutely.  That could've been Dunstan for the Norf game.

Team selection and player Thrashing  was appalling all year  Cooked again for finals

5 hours ago, YesitwasaWin4theAges said:

I reckon the club were fugged off (Grundy) was meeting other clubs (Port and Sidney) during the season, fair enough your manager but not yourself (Grundy) Not all in for the duration of the season.

still doesnt explain not subbing Schacke

1 hour ago, Wells 11 said:

Interesting … and not something I had considered. You’re right though,  IF that was in any way true, for whatever reason, it would have been front page news and derailed our preparation. 

as if our preparation was perfect Far from it

On 9/19/2023 at 11:00 AM, SthSea22 said:

What would you do if you were Grundy?

Risk injury and then stuck in the VFL?

Surely not his choice he is contracted and plays if picked What's in it for the Dees not to play him

Much bigger story in the back ground I think Hope this isn't some sort of personality clash

16 minutes ago, jnrmac said:

If you are expecting Jefferson to step up and address our fwd line issues you will be severely disappointed.

Jefferson may  not make it in my limited view unless he gets seriously stronger and more mobile

17 hours ago, DeeZone said:

Will Verrall is the same size as Luke Jackson so he is tall enough for a ruck/forward, he and Jed Adams need big pre-seasons so we can see how good they are, when fit and healthy both came to us with injuries. !!

Didnt they have big preseasons this year??

"Of the 25 players that played finals, only 9 of them either matched (for the sake of this argument let's say they got to within 5% or better of their H&A season rating) or bettered their H&A Season Rating.

The nine players were...

Clarry +3.5%, May +32.6%, Gawn + 15.3%, Tomlinson +8%, Hunter -1.7%, Pickett +11.3%, Smith +6.7%, Spargo +3.4% and Hibberd +4.3%"

Cannot win finals playing like this

On 9/18/2023 at 7:41 AM, Dwight Schrute said:

Salem won't be traded, but in my view he should be moved into the midfield. we have all the grunt in the world but lack some class in there. people keep complaining about the bombing it long, but that's all Viney, Oliver, Petracca, Sparrow, Langdon. none of these guys are above average field kicks. 

If you look at the Pies, Pendles, Sidebottom, both Daicos boys, Crisp. they're all significantly better kicks than any of our mids. 

He is not healthy enough to play midfield at the moment Had a very ordinary year and perhaps should have been rested more

2 hours ago, BaliDemon said:

Possibly. I think a lot of us are on the same page about having a crack at a mature age key forward. It’s just a matter of who’s available and how much we’re prepared to compromise adding quality kids to the list. We likely won’t get a draft hand like this again for quite a few years so it’s critical we get the balance right. Personally I’d like to see us bring in two mature agers (McAdam & say Tom Lynch) and two kids from the top 10 in the draft, plus a back up ruckman. 

All this  should have happened last year and we chose Grundy

Hmmmmmmmm??

On 9/11/2023 at 12:39 PM, poita said:

Any young, developing ruck with good management should look at 2 years learning under Gawn, then being the main man from 2026 onwards, as being the golden ticket for ruckmen.

At the very least you can do what Preuss did and use the apprenticeship as leverage elsewhere.

The way Max was attacked this season he may not have two good years left in him

I would hate to roll the dice and not have a permanent back up

56 minutes ago, ucanchoose said:

More turnovers than a Danish bakery at the top level

yep fitted right in

2 minutes ago, Left Foot Snap said:

That's where my thoughts are.

What about winning the game Sure this BS comes later

On 9/13/2023 at 1:01 AM, JimmyGadson said:

A habit that so many one eyed supporters miss in their gushing over him. 

It's the kind of habit that just kills us and just completely undoes all of that mesmerising contest work. 

Part of this habit is actually technique. If you watch him kick whilst on the run under little pressure, he kicks the ball across his body instead of hips facing leading player. This often results in a shallow and high trajectory kick that is almost always advantageous to defenders. It's really really bad and nobody talks about it. 

one of the worst Kicks in the league but he is a Demons superstar

2 hours ago, Supreme_Demon said:

While I sort of agree with Garry Lyon, he could of expressed it more eloquently. I guess football was more important than English class in his younger years at his old town in Kyabram.

He is always known as being a grumpy bugger ol' Garry Lyon though! 🤣

It also needs to be remembered that the Melbourne players were quite traumatised seeing poor Angus Brayshaw getting knocked out for 2 minutes by that vile piece of slime Brayden "the Thug" Maynard.

Nevertheless, I am sure the Demons will "suck it up" and hopefully use the disappointing exit from finals as motivation for next year.

Here is the link with Garry Lyon's comments: https://www.news.com.au/sport/afl/suck-it-up-claims-stars-ko-derailed-dees-run-after-finals-choke/news-story/4479e3db7817a98992ad748f28457bc7

I should note that everyone in the football media loves to kick the Melbourne Demons while we are down and out. But you gotta expect that when there are high expectations and you don't meet them. Oh well....better to be criticised for poor finals performances than being Wooden Spooners! 🤷🏼‍♂️

Quote"

In an alarming reveal, statistics show the Demons have three of the worst rated kicks in the AFL – with captain Max Gawn officially ranked the worst of the competition.

Jack Viney was named third worst while Clayton Oliver was seventh in the stat for players that have more than 200 kicks to their name this season.

“They’ve got three of the seven worst kicks in the comp!” Jonathan Brown said.

“Your best players are your worst kicks in the team!

“To have three of the top worst seven … explains a bit,” Buckley added.