Bring-Back-Powell

That's a good point you make about Viney. Three of our four genuinely good performances of the year came against Brisbane, Sydney and Collingwood and Viney was absent in all of those games. He's then brought back in for the Port game, and the club regresses (who could forgot the dumb [censored] 50 he gave away to ruin all our momentum)

If they finish top 2 they'll win the entire thing IMO. The MCG is such an advantage to them due to the crowd factor and they usually play the ground to perfection. Can see them grinding out a win over Geelong in the qualifying final, and then knocking off Adelaide and Brisbane in the prelim and grand finals due to having 60,000 - 80,000 on their side depending on whether it's a prelim of GF. On topic, I wouldn't be surprised if we're having a look at Jye Amiss and Chol who both might be on the outer come finals.

I reckon we sort of missed Sparrow last week. The guy's not a world beater but he provides an outlet as a high half forward that can take a good contested mark on the wing to the 50m arc. He also bobs up for a 45-50 metre set shot goal on occasion. You know we've fallen to pretty deep depths of despair when most supporters are confidently predicting a St Kilda win.

Interesting that he mentioned Lever but not Trac who are both the same age. I guess the vibe is that Trac is either not seen as a leader or doesn’t want to be a leader of the MFC. Should things not work out with Lever I wouldn’t sleep on Disco if he jumps up the leadership ranks over the next couple of years and establishes himself as a staple best 23 player.

An Essendon supporter rang up Lyon on SEN this morning to congratulate him on asking some relatively tough questions on Goodwin last night, and wished the media would do the same with B Scott. I know that Lyon can't be brutal on Goodwin as they're essentially "AFL 360" colleagues, and Goodwin's doing the show a favour by sharing his AFL coaching insights. So his criticism that the club looked stale and uninspiring last week, we've lost to a bunch of nobody clubs this year, and the fact that we're not willing to change things up aside from Bowey going forward late was pretty good IMO.

Get on the blower to Will Haughton. He got JVR off on appeals in 2023 after Anderson yet again lost a case for us at the original tribunal hearing. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-11/afl-melbourne-jacob-van-rooyen-appeal-two-week-ban/102335210

Just make a uniform blanket ban. You concuss a player, you get suspended. Accidents are unacceptable. You could even extend that to TDK concussing May in his marking contest. It would save a lot of angst that we are all experiencing. The inconsistencies are atrocious. Fiorini, King and Pearce should have also been suspended for putting Petty, Whitfield and Byrne-Jones respectively into next month.

Yep. We get a massively in form Adrian Anderson, fresh off another tribunal defeat with Zac Bailey, as recently as last week.

I did some research and assumed Adrian Anderson was successful in JVR’s appeal against the Suns in 2023. Nope. He was unsuccessful at the original tribunal case. Another lawyer got him off at the appeals hearing. The bloke’s a complete failure. And we’re a complete failure for continuing to appoint him.

I know it’s not the point but he’ll only be genuinely missed for the Dogs game. He can’t play St Kilda irrespective of the suspension and lord help Goodwin if we can’t beat West Coast without May.

Quite surprised we won the pressure count which is often the recipe for success. Thought they had more of a dip than we did.

Shocking. Player is understood to prefer to play for Freo than West Coast should he leave.

Given our recent record at Marvel and our record against 11th - 15th sides this year, I think we all know where this one's heading. The only factors I'm clinging to hope are: 1) we usually respond after an especially poor performance 2) The two players that were responsible for 7 of their 14 goals in the Alice won't be there on Sunday.

I'm not joking about hiring Adrian Anderson. The Midweek tackle on Fox Footy mentioned it. I am joking about the 'somewhat of a win' comment.

In somewhat of a win, we’ve hired Adrian Anderson.

Shocked Gary Lyon didn’t put Ashton Moir in his AFL 360 MVP 3-2-1 votes for the round, given the over compensating his done against his own side for the entire year.

I think Goodwin's main issue this year is getting his side mentally up for the games against the mediocre sides residing in that 11th - 15th range. Every time we had a big win or a very meritorious loss to a good side, we've absolutely come out flat as a pancake and totally S T bed against mediocrity. 1) Excellent performance against GWS in round 1 - worst loss in years to North in round 2 2) Followed up our best 2 weeks in a very long time (Brisbane and Sydney wins) only to concede 6 quick first quarter goals to St Kilda and play catch up all day. 3) Put in our fourth best performance of the year on Kings Birthday to then lose a very winnable game to the mediocre Port Adelaide in round 14. 4) After beating North, the fixture provided us with a very kind 3 weeks of winning football, only to back it up with a pathetic 3 goal first half against a VFL team in Carlton. We also got schooled by an extremely average Essendon football club in Gather Round after showing some positive signs against Geelong in round 4. Goodwin hasn't arrested this trend and it's been mighty disappointing. It sounds like he's safe for next year, but if the decision was hanging in the balance, the Carlton loss should've been one too many. How we lost to a team missing 10 players (and it showed in the VFL game as we thrashed Carlton's seconds who barely had a listed player) is completely unacceptable from the coach and the playing group.

I can't see Joe moving down from Byron Bay, considering he commuted from there to Brisbane everyday in his Lions days. Why on earth would he retire from a premiership side, in contract, to then move back into the public spotlight at the MFC train wreck? The 0.2% chance that we would get him over the line is if he wanted to do Neale proud by playing for the club that means the world to his uncle. That's it. I do wish that we were able to convince Tom Hawkins to come to us for a couple of years, in order to assist JVR and Jeffo in their development.

On the Agenda Setters tonight Caro first said that H Reid’s parents didn’t want him to go to St Kilda or Melbourne, and then a little later in the segment she said his parents didn’t want him to go to St Kilda or North Melbourne. So I’m not sure if she meant us or North?

Mitch Cleary reckons we’re trying to get him out of retirement, per channel 7 news tonight. Melksham and Goodwin are links and his uncle had a thing or two to do with the club.

May is out regardless with concussion. Would prefer to keep JVR and Jeffo in the side but are they helping us beat these mediocre sides such as St Kilda, North (rd 2), Essendon and Carlton that is leaving our fan base disillusioned and angry after losses that we were expected to be wins?

I definitely saw a a hybrid of Wayne Carey, Johnathan Brown and Gary Ablett Senior when we saw the brilliance of Isaac Keeler in the Alice. Sometimes you just have to tip your cap to proven star forwards that get you on the day, as Keeler did to us.

Is Dan Butler available to kick another 4 or 5 against us? Or will it be a Higgins, Owens or Wood to kick a handful?

McVee would've started on their premier small forward in Curtis. Who knows if he spent time on Harvey throughout?

I heard that May is leading the reverse Coleman in goals conceded to key forwards. McVee must be leading the reverse Coleman in goals conceded to small forwards. Moir another small who just gone to town on us (apologies to McVee if someone else had the job on him but I'm not enduring that game again to verify)