Bring-Back-Powell

Collingwood are going fine. They win most of their MCG games. They'll win half of their interstate and Marvel games. Before you know it they'll be 16-7 and in the top 4 at the end of the year.

This would be an ideal result and more realistic to contemplate than a win. If we're losing by 7 points we've either played a brilliant 1.5 to 2 quarters and gone to sleep in the other 2 (similar to the second loss to Brisbane last year), or a repeat of the GWS game whereby both clubs trade leads and momentum all night. Either outcome hopefully gives us some confidence to roll the Dons next week. Another 10 goal loss and I don't know where we go from here. A triple figure loss and I do know where we go from here.

Heading to the game. Highlight of the night I expect will be the McDonalds, KFC or Hungry Jacks on the drivr back home At least we were accurate that day and were generally efficient going inside 50.

Agreed. Johnson offered us next to nothing last week. In order for us to finally win a game, we can't carry players who simply don't impact.

If Kozzie doesn't make a lick of difference tomorrow night, then we really are up the creek. I think he's our most important player on the list given the attributes he has to offer. One only needs to re-watch the Port game late last year which demonstrated how one player alone (4 of 7 goals/ 21 touches as a mid-forward) could keep his side in the game.

I expect Max to have a big one tomorrow night. He's not playing on any giants this week (Xerri, Wits etc...) which are starting to cause him issues. His 2 opponents are not rucks by trade, and it's up to the mids and Max to have good synergy with his expected hit-out dominance.

Lever and May haven't played a full game together since the GWS game in round 19 last year. It's no wonder our defence has been disorganised and a shambles. Expect Miers, Close Stengle and Mannagh to have an absolute picnic.

The line should be 60. Geelong at GHMBA should theoretically be a much tougher assignment than Gold Coast at the MCG.

Agree with this. Trac missed a ton of pre season (running around the boundary line doesn’t count) on the back of missing half a season. I expect him to be back to his best in the second half of the season and hopefully we’ll be the beneficiaries of a few wins. Gawn’s in awful form but he too missed a month of training. We’ll be firmly rooted in the bottom 2-4 next year if Trac and Kozzie depart.

Agree with this. Hasn’t really fired a shot since the grand final and has tallied a meagre 8 brownlow votes compared to Josh Kelly who’s had about 95.

Yeah, Fritsch played the best of his 3 very ordinary games last week, so he should have the opportunity to build on that. We are a complely impotent side this year, so we need our proven goal kickers out there to help. And it's up to the senior coach to maximise each player's strengths. I have a gut feel Lever misses again this week. You can usually get a feel from the injury report and the fact that he didn't train today... Is there a mandate at the club that doesn't allow us to give Fullarton a senior game? Started the VFL season with 3 goals and 8 marks per game. And last year when we literally did not have a ruck available, he still wasn't selected.

Doesn’t sound like Lever’s a certainty at all according to the injury report.

Perfectly acceptable suggestion. I thought with Kozzie in a small forward goes out, but yeah you could easily drop Billings.

Has had a terrible fortnight. Absolutely so far below his standards it's not even funny. His ball use is rock bottom and has had 3 clearances in 2 games. For reference he had 9 clearances in round 23 last year V GC when he played a near career best game. Needs to step up as a leader of this club.

In - Lever, Pickett, Windsor, Turner Out - XL, Henderson, AJ, Howes Unfortunately JVR to second ruck. AJ not up to it IMO. Fritsch, JVR, Billings and even Viney should be on notice, The latter having a sneaky terrible start to the season with his ball use and the fact that he's had just 3 clearances in 2 games. For reference in round 23 last year he had 9 clearances in the one game (V GC)

Just needs to work on his awareness as I reckon he got done holding the ball 3 or 4 times on Saturday. Otherwise, it's fantastic/terrible that Langford's rising star nomination and Lindsey's ACL escape and round 1 performance have been the only source of happiness thus far. You just knew that as soon as the ball left his foot that he'd nail that goal. He deserved a better celebration than he did from his teammates but they'd all checked out at that point.

Probably scenario 3. We're not quite at Fitzroy levels or Melbourne circa 2013 to allow a 120 point loss.

Four scenarios I can see happening: 1) There are five golden tickets in the world and we found one of them (without the help of Veruca Salt's Dad buying 90% of the chocolate bars). We somehow pull off a ''backs to the wall'' miracle win. 2) The performance I was expecting against Gold Coast and occurred in round 1. A well fought out 4 quarters with the lead ebbing and flowing all day, but we just fall short. A performance they can take confidence in with 3 bottom 6 sides coming up in the next month. 3) A replica of rounds 2 and 3. A mistake riddled 3 quarters and then give up in the last. A 50-75 point loss with no signs of improvement. 4) the players make a 2011 like statement. A vote of no confidence in the coach, the game plan and even off field leadership as we simply don't try on the way to a 130 point loss. The coach's role becomes untenable.

We have less members than St Kilda and Bulldogs and 2,000 more than North who’ve won about 3 games in 5 years We should be ahead of those 4 clubs all things being equal.

Likely to be our only one and only for the year aside from maybe Collingwood in the last round.

It's genuinely shocking that we're miles worse with Trac and Oliver back into the side. Every Melbourne supporter pinned their hopes on these two. My expectation was 11th -14th due to our forward line on paper. So I'm not shocked we're going to miss finals. I am shocked about how bad we could potentially be this year, and how bad our talented players such as Gawn, JVR, Fritsch, May and Viney have been. If these players can lift to somewhere near their average, then we'll start winning a game or 2.

On the assumption Kozzie, Lever and Windsor are in..... So the only certain outs for Friday night are McVee and ANB from a team that beat the then undefeated Geelong to be 6-2 and be 4th on the ladder with the 4th best percentage, and only 1 win off the league leading Sydney. How can you now be talked about as a bottom 2 with minimal turnover?

Some sample quotes from the Adelaide Bigfooty forum from today’s game: “ANB been poor.” “Even ANB trying to do too much.”

Chris Scott did a very similar press conference tonight to the 2021 prelim with respect to not revealing potential excuses to the loss. I wonder if he was referring to the humidity you pointed out. So Geelong have gone from having a bye and being fresh into this week (per the original fixture) to now coming off a 6 day break in punishing humidity. Not that it matters in the scheme of things…:

This is such 2012/2013 loser talk but if we can contain the margin to around 6 goals, then maybe we can instil a bit of confidence heading into Gather Round and maybe jag our first win of the year. Geez how we’ve fallen off the cliff since that Saturday night in April last year when we beat the then league leaders Geelong.