Chook

Lid = Off

To me that's a clear goal.

"Sometimes you can look too deeply into a burnt piece of toast and see the face of Jesus." — Dwayne Russell Bizarrely this might be the most insightful thing he's ever said.

This is a worrying development. With Sheedy and Dodoro leaving Essendon, I fear their finals win drought might be in jeopardy.

I don't want to exaggerate, but it was about as close as you can get to watching a death happen on the football field. Short of the player actually dying, the Sachse incident would be the only one worse on the scale of impact to the player that I can think of. Supporters had to watch that unfold with the baying of Collingwood wolves in the bays, then sit powerless as the media and AFL world slipped slowly but surely towards the inevitable acquittal at the tribunal, then watch as the premiership cup was hoisted a few weeks later by the culprit himself, again to the baying of wolves in the bays. Dreadful and disenchanting in the extreme. I myself haven't recovered from that either. I don't think I'll ever care about football in quite the same way again. It represented a sort of "removing of the veil" moment for me, as if something dark and nasty was revealed about the game I used to love watching.

Early in the year I was extremely bullish about our season. That turned after the Brisbane loss when we couldn't win a clearance to save ourselves. I thought we'd lose to Freo but the manner in which we lost was a huge huge reality check. Season over there.

Last one out of the club turn the lights off on your way.

Far be it from me to approve of Hawthorn being good, but are there any non-Melbourne teams you'd be happy with being good?

Which club has sacked a premiership coach and won another flag soon after?

My excuse is a declining passion for AFL.

Giants didn't win a flag or make top 4 recently.

It's a real shame you can't rely on a 4 quarter performance from Melbourne anymore.

Disappointing to lose Tholstrup but we're very likely going to be better off without Salem and Sparrow on their current output. Last roll of the dice time for us this season, so Gawn Lever and May must all play if remotely fit.

SEN seems to think so. Garbage outlet.

I've voted Petty because I guess I (naively) assumed we'd resign Windsor at some point, but was pretty certain we'd lose Petty for one tenth of a pittance, which would have been especially galling considering his market value at the end of last year. I'm fairly confident we'll see a rejuvenated Petty and Oliver next year after a proper preseason, so it's very important we hold onto both of them. Their value is about as low as it can be at the moment, so a trade is the worst possible outcome (I don't buy the Oliver trade rumours anyway, but I did expect Petty to go).

The tribunal and inconsistent umpiring/score review process are leading causes of my growing apathy towards AFL. I barely watch games anymore. It's not that I hate the AFL or the game, because hate implies caring. I just do not give a rats about footy the way I used to, because there's no sense in committing so much energy to something that makes no sense and which you cannot control.

Woke up this morning resigned to a loss. I'm hoping we put in a gutsy display and keep our momentum, rather than just capitulating like we did in Alice. I'm pretty confident we'll perform OK but be shown up in the midfield and as a result they'll get too many easy entries into their forward 50. A win requires a tremendous performance in the ruck to nullify Jackson and Darcy, with AMW, Tholstrup, Pickett, Viney, ANB, and others preventing their midfield spread from getting easy transitions/turnover goals. Do that and we can possibly scrounge enough points to win, but it's going to depend on that high pressure midfield we've seen over the past month since the Lions 2nd quarter.

Ahh gotta love it. Crows were owed one after the Draper flop last time.

Completely disagree. Jackson's spread from the centre bounce was phenomenal in that 30 second patch in the GF, and is the best ruck work I've seen at ground level ever.

I think it would violate one of the main tenets of the thread, if not both.

Charlie Cameron will need to roll out the "good bloke" defence again this week after causing another head knock with his tackle technique.

With GC looking like they'll upset port Adelaide, there's a real chance we'll be in the 8 after this round is done.

They interviewed him after the game on Channel 7 and on Melbourne FC, and he looked like he'd just got back from a walk around the block when in fact he had just finished a game of footy having run almost 2km further than the next bloke. Absolute freak, and immense weapon for us when we use him this way (100% game time off the far wing running goalpost to goalpost).

My twitter feed right now is bizarre. It's 50% insane tweets about Donald Trump's attempted assassination and 50% proud Melbourne supporters pumping up Koltyn Tholstrup and the gang. I may or may not be tweeting on both topics myself, like a madman.

This one is going to be tough. Fremantle have the wood over us in a big way, and without a recognised ruckman against Jackson and Darcy it's going to be brutal. On the positive side, the whole side is starting to rack up some confidence and belief again, and would be absolutely primed to atone for one of the worst performances put in by this side under Goodwin a few weeks back. Van Rooyen will have to play majority ruck unfortunately - he's simply our best option in that spot, as much as I'd love to play him as a forward. No chance Gawn gets up for this you wouldn't think. Win this one and our finals chances truly are alive. Lose (as expected) and we're still in the hunt but it's going to be tough.