Kick_It_To_Pickett

Here comes the Laurie love again. We have seen the discrepancy between his VFL form and AFL form. He just doesn’t cut it at the highest level. Very solid VFL player. 

I’m n last night’s form we could easily drop the next two and slip outside the 8. Saints will be under pressure. We will have some key outs, none bigger than Lever.

The selling of a home game to Alice Springs always f…s our season. We could easily drop that to Freo. It’s basically a home game for them. 

Outs: BBB, Lever, Billings

Ins: JVR, Tomlinson, Langdon

Woewodin to play a full game. 
 

the midfield really need a complete rocket up the proverbial ! Are we plying as Narrm again? We never win as Narrm. 

2 minutes ago, deegirl said:

A wedding? For real?

His sister’s apparently 

We lost far too many of our premiership year depth. Look at Harmes, Jordon, Bedford and even Hunt. Then look at replacements - Billings Schache McAdam.

we still have Laurie who is t up to AFL level. 
 

we went backwards with our list. The loss of Brayshaw a huge factor too

Oliver’s lack of preseason, Tracc down on midfield form and Viney’s continue ball butchering makes our midfield unthreatening. 
 

the selection committee also has much to answer for. Brown is washed. Billings is terrible. We left out Fullerton and Hunter. If you were ever going to try Fullerton this was the chance. 
 

we now are without Lever next week. Langdon is at a wedding in London, supposedly: 

Embarrassing performance 

Very surprised that with Langdon out we have ignored Lachie Hunter. Worried about covering Langdon’s run. He is a workhorse. Love positive Lingers..hope he is ok

4 hours ago, MrFreeze said:

We took a risk to rookie him as I don't think he was in draft contention. As it says in his bio, he was plucked from obscurity. https://www.melbournefc.com.au/players/8630/oliver-sestan

Other talented youngsters get to train in academies or expensive sports colleges which would be a massive advantage in developing professional standards. 

He dominated in APS schoolboy football for Xavier. He was hopeful of being drafted. The 20 goals he kicked in the country was a game he played with mates in the school holidays. He was not that obscure 

3 minutes ago, Mel Bourne said:

No McGovern in the Weagles next week. 

Can we add Darling to the outs as well? Does he get a week for that high bump? The Collingwood player was falling down, but still elected to bump and got him high. 

2 minutes ago, MrFreeze said:

Interesting comment. He comes from a very different background compared to the top kids who have been crafted to be a professional like Windsor. Hopefully he can turn it around because the talent is there.

In what way do you think he comes from a “very different background”. The kid was a heavy set full forward before arriving at Melbourne and has worked extremely hard to trim himself down. Interested in justification for your comments

1 hour ago, Gawndy the Great said:

Losing Harmes, JJ and Gus in one season. They are 3 premiership players. And you wonder why our midfield has fallen off the face of this earth. 
 

Yea a little dramatic… but point to be made. 

Exactly this!!!

Harmes having a night out for the Dogs. Always plays well against Richmond. He’d be a handy mid for us now with Tracca going forward. We have no real midfield depth anymore

Read Demonland flat out, searching for the positivity to relieve my MFCSS. 

FFS..Laurie…if this bloke has another sub 10 disposal game and more clangers, I am done. It’s a nonsensical decision. The same pattern repeats…he can’t cut it at AFL level, goes back to VFL, has a blinder and is straight back in. It’s time to produce 

8 minutes ago, dees189227 said:

Well someone is going to have to step up & kick our goals. At least Brown leads up to mark the ball. 

Hopefully van rooyen can clunk them like he did last year

Petty.. it’s a make or break night for him to be honest. If it ain’t working, May have to swing TMac forward and Petty back

Has anyone else heard a rumour that Kozi won’t play on weds? Wife just had a baby..I’m I late to the party on this…haven’t had time to read through pages 

He literally was cleared because of his ‘good character’. He was allowed to bring Eddie Bettes and Indigenous elder to vouch for him. This is extraordinary. The rule of law is dead. 

Bailey Laurie AFL statistics:

Disposals:

2023

4,4,14,9,5

2024

8

the bloke has been a sub a lot, I get that, but no matter how you look at it, he is an underwhelming AFL prospect. He consistently plays well at VFL level, but cannot make the step-up to AFL standard. 
 

In the Sydney game, his poor disposals cost us dearly. You cannot get away with mistakes at AFL level that might be covered at VFL level. Turnovers are crucified at the top level. 
 

He had 5 possessions in the QF against Collingwood. We basically played a man short, pardon the pun, in that match. 
 

He can continue to build his form at VFL level. He is not required in the seniors at this stage. Great that he is laying tackles…but I am yet to see the same against AFL bodies. His tackle stats at AFL level:

2023

1,0,1,2,2

2024

1

I’m sorry, it’s a hard no from me. Much prefer the experience of Hunter, or to blood young Pup Brown

40 minutes ago, Garbo said:

Another fail by the footy department, going to miss ever more games on top of offering nothing that last 2 games. Could have been fit and ready to play tigers after the bye if we were smart 

Pretty sure they’ve said he won’t miss any football, provided all goes to plan

6 minutes ago, Jaded No More said:

Salem out for 4-6 weeks. Bad news for us especially with Bowey still out for a little while. 

Can you post a link to where that has been mentioned 

37 minutes ago, Jeremy said:

He’s had 3 pre seasons. No one’s saying he needs to be playing like Wayne Carey but he’s dropping basic marks and has no forward craft. If he doesn’t lose his man and is flying towards the ball, he has no tricks, very ordinary 1 on 1 and average at ground level. Who knows how good he will be at this stage, it’s up in the air, could go either way.

It’s the dropping of marks that is a worry. He has very hard hands at the moment. Gets to the right spot but can’t clunk them. If we could get Petty’s marking with Roo’s kicking we’d have a decent forward 

1 minute ago, DeeSpencer said:

We could potentially try man on man, Port did it against Essendon, but that’s Essendon. Man on man against brisbane probably just creates acres of space for guys to lead in to and opens the corridor.

There was a noticeable demand at times to push the half backs up and shrink the ground.

But the Lions are so well drilled at overlapping numbers and moving in and out of spaces to create kicks.

Even if we were getting smashed we only conceded 12 goals, only 10 to 3/4 time and the worst quarter for goals conceded was the first with 4.

Brisbane are going to posses the ball and move it well, that’s what they do. And they’re going to score.

We were completely smashed at the contest and had no flow in our own ball movement. The transition defending was a far lesser problem in the scheme of things.

 

Transition defending is one thing, allowing a ball to waltz in from a kick in and be systematically chipped all the way to the oppo half forward is another. That’s not transition. We were setup. 

I had a bad feeling all week about this match, knowing we had a lot of guys sore and banged up. 
 

what I cannot stomach Is Goodwin’s inability to change the tactics in-game again. We allowed far too much uncontested ball. Their ability to simply pick their way uncontested from their backline to ultimately hitting up a leading forward was really concerning. 
 

8 minutes ago, Jaded No More said:

Yep. I saw and reported a few comments on Instagram 

Humanity is trash

Social media is vile. However, some of the stuff SEN ran on its talkback was just as bad. Andy Maher was loving it.