NeveroddoreveN

Our backline is stacked with talent....The more i think about our actual gameplan though we have many issues created by the way we defend as a team. Literally our whole forward line is often inside the opps forward 50. It makes scoring hard for them, sure. It also makes scoring hard for us as we have nobody to transfer the ball up the field. Why are we doing this when our back 6 is stacked with talent and both our wings work hard defensively? Have said for fair part of this year that we simply don't put nearly enough pressure on their ball carriers....Sure we run back hard to d50 to defend but we allow them to waltz the ball up the field, often uncontested til in their half of the ground. For the dare to come to our game i think we really need to look strongly at teams like Sydney/Collingwood/Geelong as to how we can improve our ball movement and player positioning all over the field, both offensively and defensively. It concerns me with Goodwin he may just double down on what we have been doing defensively, and think we just need to do it better for longer. Last year there was trust amongst the players within games. This year it seems like when under the pump the structures and that trust diminishes. Maybe it is warranted as some bust their guts and others don't? Maybe some of our players have unconsciously been picking or choosing when to go, i am not sure what the real issue is, but trust certainly has come into it! Fremantle and Carlton to a certain degree took our blueprint this year. It worked for both of them in large parts. Ultimately though some teams have evolved into much more attractive game style that actually counters a lot of these defensive type styles. Come finals the defensive styles did not hold up vs Collingwood/Sydney/Geelong. Ironically, all of these teams changed in part due to the dominant type finals we had last year. I think we need to change quite a bit to actually contend again next year, an exciting style that keeps both the players and the supporters invested and excited. If we don't evolve and our gameplan stays the same or similar, sure we will make finals but very unlikely to do damage against the new breeds of teams when it matters.

Mentality....Even during the 10-0 start we were getting out to handy leads then cruising or trying to just hold on for the win. I would say we flirted with form, we stopped short of developing being ruthless when we were dominating, then took the foot off the pedal/we relax.

Talent only takes you so far. Melbourne won a Premiership last year after an honesty session on Staffords farm. Players asking why we were basically so carp. Some home truths obviously emerged. Our better players had to be more damaging. Our lesser players had to put in far more effort. Collectively they knew our list was good enough, but there was something missing. Was it attitude, was it honesty, was it not wanting to waste an opportunity with a very good list? This whole culture thing comes massively into play for successful sporting organisations across the globe. The terms "respect" and "great people that care" is often thrown around these successful mobs. Perhaps is too soon for Melbourne supporters to reflect openly about where we went wrong. Seems to be lot of angry people wanting blood, not excuses, nor intangibles about culture! We have never had a good culture, not in my lifetime anyway, and i am close enough to 50 now. To think that it is a non factor in terms of long or even short term success is borderline madness. Teams like Geelong & Syney and now Richmond is hellbent on building this intangible thing called culture. It means players down to boot studders want to be at the place quite simply. They feel valued and respected. I really can't see that we are much different, we are also trying to build up this culture thing. Remember a French mate telling me Aussies had less culture than a spoonful of yoghurt, was funny at the time. Culture is basically having standards across the entire operation, it actually is not that intangible to accept that it even exists, even if you believe it has zero validity!

What do we have a squad for? There is no way that Salem showed more on the training track to get automatically reinserted into the team. Did he put his hand up say i am right? Did we just pick him with blind faith that even though clearly not fit he would be better than other fit players? I would say both culture and injuries affected our season. We had plenty of chances to freshen players up. We had an in form Casey team all year. We gave virtually the same 22 opportunity all season and by the end of it they were banged up. To say that it just one area or another is complete folly. If we review this years fadeout simply due to injuries we are in for a world of hurt next year!

Yet we have underperforming players all year across the field. i hardly think Chandler got a chance, nor Dunstan. We also seemed to pick Weid when he was out of form. We don't really have selection criteria, or at least certainly not a rigid one.

Culture is hardly fixed in one year....even if it was a Covid Premiership one, We really went back to some old habits when under the pump. Other teams saw this and ramped up the pressure knowing there was a good chance we would fold. Last year i think we all could see that players were busting a gut for each other. Often our bottom 6 was really hard to pick as we seemed to have a group putting in when required. This year i could count maybe 2 or 3 of those type performances of overall consistency and effort.. In fact, i believe we dropped off so much that it was getting hard to pick a bottom 10 or 12 players, let alone bottom 6. Too much is left to too few. And that is compounded when games are getting close as our regular performers try to do more and generally get punished for trying to lift and compensate for teammates simply doing the bare minimum. Great post and i agree, there has been an underlying arrogance. Maybe this year will humble us into not getting too far ahead of ourselves. I also went off the Gawny/Gus podcast at similar time mid way through season....the little barbs really annoyed me. Respect is a massive part of culture, i am not sure our club as a whole quite gets it as yet.

I agree...it was madness to drop Bowey though for him.....Was clearly in better form than Salem/going harder/more impact both times he was dropped this season. There are too many favorites within the team that do not get dropped due to form. Spargo/ANB/Hunt/Sparrow/Harmes/Hibberd/Melksham/Salem/BB just to name a few....almost half the team were out of form for long periods with a winning Casey team having players bashing on the door all year. Very few even got to emergency. As much as i liked seeing Hunt/Melksham perform coming up to finals, i knew we were in real trouble when basically sublime games from both actually got us the double chance. And i have no idea why Smith was named emergency last few weeks....he had shown very little at Casey....could name half a dozen that were in better form. If i was the guys striving to get a game in this team, i would feel angry and pretty disgruntled. What does it actually take to replace out of form players over long periods? Bedford/Bowey and Tomlinson all got dropped after poor performances yet we see 20 + weeks of some guys that just seem to get blind faith they will turn it around. Our selection policy is really poor, particularly considering Goodwin stated that the guys that missed out would drive that hunger this season....If only they actually had a chance to! One last thing i recall Goodwin saying that all players were being trained how to play multiple positions.....i literally saw one move all year and it took until 4 minutes to go when our season was all but gone. Petty would have given BB some much needed assistance had we pulled this move off weeks ago. We had backups that could have taken Petty's spot, either Turner or Tomlinson both in good form. We would have lost only a little in defence and may have been functional going forward as clearly Petty is the best mark in our team who actually reminds me a little of Naughton. Oh i forgot we did try Spargo wing i guess.....We are way too easy to play against with the lack of coaching moves from the box. There seems to be very little creativity, and honestly it looked like it sucked the life from the players trying to win every game in a slog ultimately.

Just heard on the radio that Daniher will be out tonight for birth of his baby....Good for us!

lmao...In Dodoro we trust!

And another realist might be saying we are not playing that well :P Personally i live in hope when it comes to the Demons. It is highly likely a lot of our supporters have been broken by supporting them over the years. Pessimists still hope and support this club. It is a good thing we are all not the same....We have glass if full, empty or everywhere in between types supporting every club.

We need all the support we can get. Be that optimists, pessimists or realists. We will not win it all playing like we did last night is 100% true.....We are far from playing at our best though! Win , lose, or draw we all are different in the way we support this team. No need to lay the boots into those that might have some doubts. We are all Demon supporters and love this team no matter our differences!

So the trick is to keep appealing until you get the desired result? Had this been one of ours we would have just accepted the verdict. Different rules for star players at big clubs....Farcical.

Spargo to ruck if it don't matter. Wholeheartedly disagree with your view on this one.

Yeah so Collingwood paying 300K per year. i should have phrased it better! LJ on 800K+ or Grundy for 700K....Most good ruckmen play into their mid 30's. Jackson may be worth more in future but there is no guarantee he becomes a better player. His next contract will quite likely be the biggest he ever signs. How long is Max signed on for lol? He is just one knee reconstruction away from being a ridiculous contract also. Most good ruckmen play well beyond 31. In fact they be just starting to hit their peak at this stage. Big guys take a long time to develop. I don't think 5 years is a huge risk to take. Got a lot of good footy left in him.

Gawn is bit all over the shop with his ball drop. Can drop it almost from waist high at times, spins the ball, and has started running an arc again from close distances which is totally not right. Petracca on his set shot also spins the ball incessantly....Very rarely does he get any momentum, walks in, does not kick through the ball and they can end up anywhere. Try not spinning the ball and jogging in at least, you need some momentum to kick the ball well. Jogging in will give him less time to think. 100% his yips are mental. He can be a lovely kick in field play just playing on instinct. 20 metres out directly in front i would put both at around 50% chance to make the shot. Most players would do better than that with their off foot. 20 metres out directly in front you should be able to kick 90%+++ easily. Both have major flaws in technique...It is not repeatable for either.

Well obviously good ruckman don't equate to Premierships...You need a lot to go right! Last year how many AA players did we have in contention....We had a lot go right! Getting Grundy will not stop us looking for forward players. Fwiw Jackson is being touted as getting 800K+, Grundy on 700K with Collingwood paying some of this for the next 5 years. There is an extra 100K a year to spend on that big bodied forward we need already. Personally i see that as a net win, LJ is promising but no way he should be getting as much as Max or more than Grundy at this stage in his career. We would need to pick up a developing ruck also, but they come pretty cheap and not much is expected of them early on.

Yeah i don't dispute that there are cheap offerings and they may become the number one ruck for their team. Honestly though, out of those listed how many have come close to Gawn or Grundy output over the years. Personally i don't rate many/any of those mentioned above, they have all got some pretty big flaws within their games. If we get Grundy i am sure many will change their tune when it comes to appreciating him. We apparently overpaid Lever/May/Langdon IIRC going by many on this site. If Max was up for trade would he be worth 700-800k a season? i am glad supporters are not the ones recruiting, wildly under-rating players from opposition teams apparently is a thing we do!

Bowey needs to come into the team for his clean hands, good decision making and creativity. After last weeks second half you could raffle him for Rivers/Hunt or Hibberd. Honestly we had one bloke that did not panic when the heat is on, and that was Salem....We need more! Watched Joel Smith really closely last game for Casey. He presented pretty well at the ball, laid a huge tackle when way out of the contest. That tackle is the type of pressure we need in our forward line. He was so quick to get there and the tackle really hurt the opposition player. I would take the risk and insert him into the team.

Currently our 2nd ruck option is Weid... We are screwed if Max goes down! For 700k a season which would be less that LJ's contract, we will get more out of Grundy. Rucks often go fine into their Mid 30's. The talk of all these other promising young rucks is twaddle....Most are not available, and most won't be good for years. Even Preuss still looks pretty hopeless....Good ruckman there are not many in the league....We would have the 2 best in the league going by recent AA selections. Would be a fearsome prospect for any team to come up against. *We will still be trying to recruit a good forward regardless of what happens in this space.

Yeah i totally get that because we generally keep teams to low scores. The difference would be much larger if we actually hit up the easy targets. We are not taking many marks, we hold it in there for long periods and get very little reward for our entries. I know we can be so much better than we currently are showing...the 2nd half fadeouts are in part happening because we are getting not enough rewards for all the forward half dominance....We play with so little trust at times, way too many safe/gameplan options of slow and wide, then into the pocket. Most of the top teams seem to have a field day intercept marking then rebounding from there. i stand by the we look amateur compared to many other teams in this regard! Our forward craft is below what i see at local footy at times. Makes me wonder what the forward group do together at training! *Do we train to simply bomb it to the pocket for repeat entries? It should be a last resort if nothing else is on. Unfortunately it seems to be our go to play. Would love to see a heat map of our forward entries and the position the ball is kicked to. Would almost put money on that we would be tracking close to 50% bombed to that little area deep in the left forward pocket

Langdon and Amon on either wing would be awesome....Really rate him, elite field kick, has pace and skills, works really hard both ways.

If he is willing to take a dump in pay to around 750-800k i think he actually makes a lot of sense. We were going to pay LJ upto 800k on potential. Grundy is actually the better footballer in the ruck by a country mile. If we want a tilt at repeated flags over next 2-5 years, Grundy would work. Currently 3rd in line for ruck duties at Melbourne is Weid.....Max will need the help after LJ goes!

We should have multiple ideas on how to go forward. Plan A should be to hit up the obvious free targets, Plan B or even C or D should be to kick it to that pocket, but definitely not plan A. We look amateur in this regard to many teams.

i think Laurie has shown enough to warrant a few more years in the system. Reasonably high draft pick with some class, nice distributor of the ball, shows poise and good decision making, also kicks goals. To me he looks like a much classier version of ANB or Spago.....We need connectors and i am sure we will look better in following years with guys like Bowey and Laurie actually showing some care in delivery. Poise and class is something we severely lack....Last week it felt like we had one bloke that did not panic with ball in hand....Salem.

If our gameplan is to burn teammates in better positions we are going nowhere. Selfish, predictable, boring, lazy, vomitworthy. I am sure the instructions are if there are no options on....kick it to "that" pocket...surely you take the easy options if they are on though. Too many are not even looking, just blazing.. At training they are constantly hitting up players from 15-40 metres. It is our plan so we are predictable to each other.....But it has become even more predictable to the opposition. i can't remember the last time someone like Kozzie/Spargo or ANB took a mark on a lead into space....there has to be plenty around as generally we have 10 players in that hot spot. Cut out the predictability going forward and actually start pressuring the ball carrier we can still win the whole thing. If we continue to be lax in these 2 areas we will look back on this season as one we let slip. Get it right players/coaches ffs.