BW511

Milkshake and AVB must be very good trainers

I hope Goody listens to SEN @george_on_the_outer & @Lord Travis. Maybe things look a lot more complicated and difficult from the inner sanctum and an outside perspective is all it takes. If Goody and Jennings were great mates, wonder if he's picked up the phone for a little advice?

Jennings has just told every club how to beat us and it's unbelievably simple. Interesting hearing the chat around Clayton and how it was hard to admit things were not working when he was getting plenty of stats. Jennings has made at least 2-3 references of not coaching to stats. It's sounding a lot like Goody & the playing group are all trying too hard to do too much. The idea of Max rucking back half and T-Mac rucking front half seems like a no-brainer, gets T-Mac involved in the play and maybe works him back into form. Edit: Everyone is frustrated with Lever, well he is being actively targeted. A lot are frustrated with Clayton, he is being actively targeted. Petracca was interesting, but people don't notice that one as much because he's about the only bloke doing anything the other way.

Love the optimism Chook, however what makes you think we can turn this around in a matter of weeks when the problem has existed for 18 months? The ball is in the wrong hands at crucial times because of selection, unless Goody and co want to eat humble pie, that won't change.

It would be great if we had blokes picking themselves with their performance. At present, almost every position on the ground could be debated and reasonably argued. Trac, Max, May and maybe Hibberd are my only guaranteed starters. Hibberd is only based on last week's game too. Every other spot is a raffle

Considering we are a 'contested ball' team, you'd think that would be the play. Keep it on the deck where we can at least be competitive, rather than in the air where we are inept

You couldn’t do that nowadays and that’s not a problem for us anyway

We all know it’s a glaring issue that we don’t have a second tall forward and we have two of our best ever whacking the club this week. I haven’t heard either say they are available to help? They may well have reached out, but you’d hope they are still willing to assist the club if it’s something they can easily aid with

You can't just flick a switch and decide to have a baby. It is much harder than school teachers lead people to believe and being a professional athlete doesn't stop life from happening

I mentioned this in one of the other threads in relation to Viney. I suspect a large portion of Demonland posters are a long way removed from newborn children. It is extremely taxing mentally and emotionally, particular if it's a first child. Football would be quite low down the priority list

They may not be considered a great kicking side but Cotchin, Martin and Houli would be ahead of our best and that gives them 3 more than us who deliver the ball forward of the centre

Richmond and Collingwood both have very good field kicks at their disposal. It can work if you have the players for that style, we simply don't

Interesting that everyone says Tomlinson would need to improve his defensive efforts to play forward, I'd argue that by competing and drawing his man to a contest, he is contributing more to our scoring opportunities than any chase or tackle. It's also somewhat ironic that they suggest Tomlinson play the Tom McDonald role of 2018 while the man himself is stuck playing deep.

The poor buggers that got left behind would be spitting chips

Agree, Trac has been doing it well. Not convinced the others can do it and it would not hurt to have more elite kicks, even if it's just to add a different dynamic around our midfield group

They should have been there from the first day Jackson walked in the door, regardless of Weideman's from or place in the team. We paid a lot for him and you'd think it would be smart to give him the very best resources to develop his game. Would not harm Weideman either, so it's a win-win. Also, what is stopping Weid from getting in touch with these guys himself? He needs to get his skates on in the next 6-12 months or he'll be lost to the game

We need a linebreaking elite mid. Have needed it since as long as I can remember. Guarantee our forwards would be much better with Whitfield or Kelly hitting them up as first option

Perhaps he already is, hence the reluctance to wheel him out

He's behind Oliver and Petracca in the pecking order and is not creative at all or skilled by foot. Would have limited currency and would have to walk, otherwise a LOT of Melbourne supporters will be up in arms. He's also got a new baby less than 2 weeks old, footy is not anyone's priority during that period

I know it's pessimistic, but there's very little to suggest anything different will happen. There's a very long and deeply ingrained history of zero success

There was an article just last week about Roughead transforming the Saints forward line. Fresh out of playing and under Clarko, everyone's messiah. He would not have been expensive and would have been perfect for Weid, Jackson, Brown, Fritsch etc. As a club, we are reactionary

It’s not like there’s a whole lot of AFL coaches waiting in the wings? So yes, my parameters are broad, but probably only gives half a dozen actual options. The best coach won’t immediately change this list, the way the club is run or suddenly give us industry leading facilities. What can we offer that would possibly convince Clarko or someone else of that caliber?

Clarkson is a very good coach, perhaps the greatest ever, but our club is nowhere near strong enough and united enough to follow his lead. He is an uncompromising leader and we seem to have a lot of people happy to just feather their own nests and say they are part of an AFL club. Not sure it’s a good match. Getting Clarko would cost a hell of a lot more than just his wage, because we’d need to give him the best people to help him get the job done. I think we need someone in between Clarko and Goody for experience, with a strong and experienced group of assistants. We don’t have much on field leadership at all, certainly none that’s tasted success and it costs us dearly. Geelong, Hawthorn and Collingwood in recent times have at least one superstar, usually more, but they also have half a dozen senior players that are almost guaranteed to win their position for the day and drive the standards/expectations for everyone else to follow.

It is so demoralising to know that we can't get the ball through 4-5 sets of hands to set up a proper opportunity. We can't string more than 2-3 possessions together to create these chances.

I think this sentiment has probably been repeated many times in your 65 years @Gee N. You've shown more ticker than the entire organisation for hanging in that long. Across the league, I would be surprised if we weren't in the bottom couple of teams for admin, facilities, staff, players and overall budget. This is not an elite organisation and our results reflect that. Until that shifts, we will keep riding this merry go round of mediocrity