Bring-Back-Powell

Freo need to go 6-2 to make finals.

Do you mean we're covering Oliver from a statistical point of view? Or we're covering Oliver from a win/loss point of view? If the former I'd agree. If the latter I'd disagree as we're 2-3 without him and dropped extremely winnable games to mediocre sides in GWS and Freo.

Jackovich's arrival probably wasn't the best for Bennett's AFL career. Done by early 1993. Onto bigger and better things in the NFL.

Our accuracy at the start of the season was unsustainable. And there was a game we were lucky to win this year against Richmond where we shot the lights out while Richmond fell apart in the last quarter. I'd like to think this 5 week patch is also a compete outlier and our woes will turn around shortly. There's going to be a game soon where we'll be a tidy 11.2.68 at half time. GWS have been lucky. In 3 of their wins this year they have been outscored by the opposition which suggests to me that their record of 7-8 is a little flattering.

Well we somehow kicked 17 goals without him in round 1 with BBB, Pickett, Spargo and Gawn combining for 12 goals. These fellas are all going to have to step up in his absence and Trac will need to be a 50/50 mid-forward when Clarry returns and kick his 1 to 2 a week without fail.

Hopefully Fritta is back for the finals assuming we make it. The pre finals bye will aid his recovery time if it's a 6-8 weeker.

If things go south and we miss the top 4, then I hope we can somehow cling to 5th. Dogs would be the most likely to replace us as the 4th place side as their draw isn't particularly difficult. If we win our first final and the Dogs presumably lose their first final to Collingwood or Port on the road, then we'd play the Dogs in week 2 at the MCG feeling good about our prospects. That final would not be at Marvel despite the Dogs being the higher ranked team. Finishing 6th - 7th would probably see us playing Brisbane at the GABBA in week 2 (if we progress) assuming the Lions can't get the job done on the road in week 1 finals. No thanks.

How the ladder would look if the losing team with more scoring shots actually won in this years games so far. For example we lost to Freo and GWS with more scoring shots but beat Richmond with less: Brisbane 12-3 Port 12-3 Collingwood 11-4 Melbourne 10-5 Adelaide 10-5 Sydney 9-6 W Bulldogs 9-6 St Kilda 8-7 ---------------- Essendon 8-7 Carlton 7-7-1 Geelong 7-8 Fremantle 7-8 Richmond 6-8-1 GC 5-10 GWS 4-11 Hawthorn 4-11 North 2-14 West Coast 1-15 Clubs highlighted in bold would have big swings in fortune.

Trac's the key offender in this department but how many of our players miss snaps from close range (the in play ones rather than set shots) Any of Trac, Sparrow, Fritta and ANB couldn't nail a snap under pressure. The Sparrow one was from about 8 metres out. Kick of any these and we're singing the song last night. And Melksham failing to convert his elementary set shot snap on the boundary was infuriating, a shot that he'd usually eat for breakfast.

Any idea how many votes Viney is on? Seems to poll every week and yet isn't on the leader board. Would have at least 19 alone in the Collingwood and GWS games alone. Sneaky All Aust 40 squad this year?

3.12 and who knows how many complete misses from the Hawthorn game onwards. He started the season in reasonable fashion with 9.7 after round 7. Hard to believe he once kicked 26.6 in one of his earlier seasons (2017). Imagine the player he'd be if he went at 80% this year. He'd already have Charlie in his pocket in the absence of Oliver. With that being said, I hope he plays more minutes up forward with Clarry back next week. Under the roof, he'll snag a couple next week from 4 or 5 opportunities. As a club, I'll be horrified if we dish up another 7.18 / 6.19 type of score in perfect conditions next week.

Wouldn’t be the end of the world finishing 5th or 6th. Play a home MCG final week 1 against a good-average opponent as opposed to a Collingwood or Port away in week 1. Consecutive straight set exits will be pretty devastating if we’re not up to finals footy again.

It was disgusting that he was dropped after a career best performance on KBDay against this year’s (more than likely)premiers It was a complete lack of selection in integrity and the players must be confused on what the base level of performance is to maintain their spot in the side.

Our forward line is an absolute shambles at the moment but it wasn’t helped by a seriously in form defence in Taylor, Buckley, Idon and Haynes. The media put this defence on the agenda during the week, and sure enough they held us to 5 goals.

I bet the Freo Death Riders are licking their lips tonight. Gained a draft pick and saw the Dogs equal on us on wins. Enjoy guys.

Nice goal Bowzer!

A bit of pressure on Joel Smith today if he wants to keep his spot over JVR.

For the here and now it’s better if Freo win today. The way we’ve been playing since round 10 we need all the breathing space we can get in respect of top 4 and sides 5th-8th. I don’t understand the obsession with draft picks at round 16.

Anyone barracking for the Dogs to beat Freo doesn’t want us to make top 4.

Melksham could still be sub.

Happy BBB is in. The resting forward-ruck in Gawn/Grundy (which quite frankly isn't working) or Joel Smith has cost JVR a spot in the side. Why isn't Tomlinson in the side to take one of Riccardi or Hogan while May takes the other, and allowing Lever to do his thing on a lesser opponent? Where will Petty be playing?

This is definitely a channel 7 game for Victorian viewers: Hawthorn V Carlton - Foxtel, 1:10pm Melbourne V GWS - Ch 7, 3:20pm West Coast V St Kilda - Foxtel, 4:40pm I suspect Kelli Underwood, Dermie and Co will be hosting on Fox Footy in a studio reviewing the afternoon's games during each break. Hopefully that clarifies.

Valid question about Port and if you can largely stop Butters, Rozee and JHF, then you're surely going to beat them in a final. For example, in their loss to Collingwood in round 2 they had a combined 53 touches and 1 goal between them which was such a low output. Compare that to their win over Melbourne where they had a combined 95 touches and 4 goals. Butters and Rozee have only one year's less experience (5 years) than Oliver and Petracca had in 2021 (6 years), and it's fair to say that our duo dominated the 2021 finals series. Port's fortunes will heavily depend on Butters and Rozee but history suggests that may well have the maturity and experience to carry Port to the promise land.

6 out of 9 with 15 wins should get us top 4, but 15 wins has failed to get clubs into the top 4 in the past. And with the extra game, we may very well need 16 wins (7 out of 9 wins) if clubs just below us win almost every week, which hopefully they won't.

Collingwood appear to be in a flat spot and I reckon they'll be aiming to play better football and peak by August/September. Brisbane are starting to build after a scratchy 3 weeks prior to their win last week Vs St Kilda. Not sure they've peaked yet on a consistent basis. Port are a big question mark. They have been brilliant for 12 weeks but it's going to be something else for them to maintain their spot in the top 2 without having a flat spot and dropping a couple of games before finals. I hope we've far from peaked but we can't seem to find that consistency over the last 6 weeks and rattle off 4-5 wins in a row which we'll need to do if we want to be a serious player later in the year.