Deenooos_

Media really got into Fritsch’s head, poor bloke. He isn’t selfless, he’s just a gun!

Goo the [censored] deeeess

Why can’t Trac kick, holy [censored]!

I love Fritsch ❤️

Noo Lever!!

They don't know [censored] about [censored]. It is the most toxic media out there (all media is), always digging up nonsense everywhere. Social media has ruined this. No-one realises how much social media has messed with society and the mental health of players and or people in general.

Oh come on let's have a few months off please

Confident going into this. The key focus over the week would have been defence and pressure! Dees by 24 points.

Imagine now the club releases the statement that LJ has signed a 2 year contract with the dees. I could actually see it happening, not sold on anything yet. So many were giving up on Gus and look what happened.

I'm honestly not sure anymore where specifically I read about it but it was specifically mentioned and observed in sports where athletes not only require fitness and power but also skill i.e. Soccer, Football etc. You can just google around "negative affect of General Adaptation Syndrome on professional athletes", something should come up. I found these two diagrams quite interesting. We are clearly aiming to reach the "super-compensation" stage and maintain it over the next 8 weeks for finals. So basically reaching super-compensation and maintaining this level is the key and goal here. Reducing training too much and you lose fitness, train too much and you go into prolonged fatigue. Finding the sweet spot is of course in the hands of our High Performance coaches.

Can someone explain to me what the hesitation is for signing players on 5+ year contracts? We now have multiple Trac, Oliver and now AG but what is the problem, salary cap space in the future injury costing one player a season or two? Isn't signing longer deals allowing Melbourne to lower the amount they pay the players?

Yes you are right if there is also a large mental aspect playing a part then that’s another story and problem. However I also made a post earlier in the week after I read through some studies and experiences throughout elite sports where not only fatigue is a side effect of loading but also mental confidence leading to skill errors. These would no doubt contribute and affect a players psychological state onfield as their physical ability is somewhat hampered. But as Lucifer has said the fact it is being mentioned by Gus on air and Goody/Petracca talking about complacency creeping in also has it’s own merit. Let’s hope this is the main thing they have worked on this week reminding the players what the goal actually is, GF at the “G” to instill some enthusiasm back into the group.

It's happened too often now to not have been addressed though. Wouldn't the coaches have talked about this right after it happened a second time against Sydney or have we become extremely soft? A good side shouldn't give up those kinds of leads and it's been happening far too often to not learn from. I can't see us being that stubborn to have not learnt after the third time to be conscious of not dropping off that to me the only explanation is not being able to maintain our defence/gameplan for long enough due to fatigue. It's been happening to Richmond all year so you may have a point there, however we are a much better side than them and they are well past their peak. Are we a 1 hit wonder? Time will tell but while we haven't been proven wrong yet (to be seen Friday) I remain to hold onto the belief it is largely due to loading.

I hear you. As far as I remember we played awful football between rounds 12-19 last year but never seemed unable to run out games in second halves or got "run on top of" like what has happened recently. I think this was in large parts due to the opposition we faced vs who we faced this year. If anything we have played better this year as we actually had very decent leads in games whereas last year during the loading "affected" games we were just crap the whole way through. Funnily enough all of our losses this year have happened during our loading period (the timing of when we load is no certainty, just speculation) that we don't even have a gauge at where we stand against opposition when we aren't affected by fatigue, and as others have stated the Brisbane game was presumably after a short taper in-between our two blocks. This is why Friday night will be really interesting. There is no more loading happening at this point in the season but rather only maintaining the fitness we have. I feel comfortable assuming this based on the sheer difference in our running ability from round 20 onwards last year. How about we wait and see what Friday brings and if we can identify an ability to finish the game off strongly and not capitulate, otherwise there are far deeper issues with why this may be happening.

Because the inability to run out games by result of fatigue directly impacts how well we can execute our gameplan and beat the opposition. If you are constantly second to the ball it is not necessarily a result of lack of "intent" or desperation but inherently due to fatigue. I saw an interesting vision from David King on the watchlist pointing out our lack of zoning off the corridor and positioning ourselves so that teams are forced to bomb it down the line compared to last year. I tend to agree that that could be largely a result of discipline and unfortunately complacency. This basically "debunks" those posters who presume we've been worked out by teams avoiding Max down the wing or using short kicks through the middle to pick our defence apart. If we were to play with the level of focus and intense zoning like last year that crap wouldn't work for teams this year and they would still be forced wide. Get that back into our game and our defence is back to being rock solid but it is in the players hands to get back to that, the gameplan is clear just relies on the execution. Fitness will in large parts help in this way and we should now only be trying to maintain our fitness which was likely achieved by our last two months of heavy loading.

As a young kid I went to a few games when David Neitz was still playing and we were half decent. I remember watching us play finals in 06 and I was 8 years old and we went out first week and were poor for the better of the following decade. ever since and throughout my teens my football club who ran deep within my family (uncles, father) were incessantly poor going to many games expecting to leave disappointed yet sticking with them regardless. I never thought we’d be in the position we are now where we’re coming off a premiership and dominating the competition. If I’m honest all of the hate from opposition fans and the media looking at every opportunity to bring us down has really hit me personally and made me sad. I never lost faith in us remaining dominant but the dream and hope of half a decade of premiership contention infront of us is slowly dwindling with the likes of key cult figure AB and LJ potentially abandoning our club and maybe all the talk of our culture having truly shifted seems often to be just hollow words with all the May/Melksham shenanigans happening inseason too. But we are entering a new era where I think most supporters need to see multiple seasons of consistency to truly recognise the shift our Club has taken. This is a new MFC and I am happy to be apart of it. Here’s to many more solid years and potentially 1 or 2 more flags, go Dees ❤️💙

They can [censored] off tbh. They are so desperate to copy and be like us. Freo won’t be able to compensate us fairly if they both leave. say what you want but all this crap is going to define our season and if we go back to back. Unless this gets resolved within two weeks or Gus stays I think it’ll rattle the club. If both announce they’re leaving what is that going to do to our playing group onfield over the final rounds snd finals? Nothing good dare I say. so over it.

Well said, couldn't have said it any better. Wrote a similar post in the LJ thread. It speaks more to their character than anything else. They are already earning 5-7x the amount of $$ than any other average person working a normal job yet it's not enough. You can't buy success or loving teammates, that's a fact. Let's hope we're wrong...

Yeh what is this about? If you love the club and are loyal and enjoy playing footy in a successful team I don't understand the need to look elsewhere... One more concussion and the dude is toast anyway, idk but in the midfield you are more likely to get a knock to the head

What worries me about this interview is he really doesn't sound too confident in the team and if the ability to be hungry for long enough remains. It does certainly feel like the group is not in synch the way it was last year, but it has been evident in the games... wasn't a great listen tbh

Tbh if we lose all the remaining matches and just hold onto 8th we don't really deserve to play finals. I just really hope we don't blow top four now but going 2-2 is not enough if the losses are to the wrong teams. I think Friday night will be a statement game like it was against Brisbane after the bye. We should look freshened up and loading can be just about forgotten after Friday as it won't be happening anymore. Our form against top 8 sides doesn't really worry me because we played them all during rounds 11-19 where we had our slump this and last year. Last year we played 3 top 8 sides from r1-10, GWS, SYD and Geelong and won comfortably. This year we didn't play a single top 8 side from r1-10 bar the dogs which in the end was a comfortable win and they are barely top 8. Remember it's not "who you play" but rather "when you play them". - Collingwood should be slowly coming back to earth now as such large winning streaks are taxing both mentally and physically and most of their wins have involved considerable luck and could have really gone either way. - Carlton are still young and inexperienced and a little flaky - Brisbane we have the upper hand over beating them in our last 3 encounters and pulling their pants down at the G.

My take on all this Luke Jackson rubbish. I honestly don't think Luke Jackson is worth more than 600k per yr at the maximum until he proves himself as a consistent player. He is 20 years old and the entitlement is beyond me. Have some balls and take a look at your situation you [censored] [censored]! In saying that we do not know the real reason he may want to go home, but let's assume there is nothing urgent such as an ill family member who he'd want to be around. - He was drafted into a premiership winning team, unlike Freo who have not proven themselves yet, they could absolutely crap it in the finals. He could win another premiership possibly even a third at Melbourne. - He is being mentored by possibly the best Ruckman in the modern era in Max Gawn. He clearly won't learn the same from a 24 year old Darcy and certainly has so much more to learn from Max. - If he signs for only an additional 2 years his best years between 22-30yrs old are still in front of him. I mean come on have some perspective, you can take your $1M per year then, I mean he bought a [censored] house at age 20, money is in abundance here. - From what I've heard and seen he has a good group of friends surrounding him in Melbourne not the least of which are his bloody awesome teammates. So why leave now? - Moving clubs this early could potentially disrupt his development and career. Idk how it is in football but to me it seems you want some continuity as an AFL player, especially at such a young age and the connection he has built with the club at this point will have been wasted. He needs to remain in this uninterrupted environment until he has some more years under his belt. With all that said, I'm sure enough of his mentors, managers and advisors with their heads screwed on have pointed out all of these very reasonable takes on his situation and to be frank if he still decides to bail on success at one very good Club for a premature return to home you can't help the kid. Disappointing to say the least.

I agree that certain elements of our finals winning style of game crept back into our game on Saturday. One of them is scores from centre stoppage. We scored a total of 6 goals (afl average is 2 goals). You can't necessarily 'work that out', that is just sheer brilliance from Maxi and our mids. Add into that our forward pressure turnover game there's another 40 points scored. As for our defence, our two way running full team defence has been struggling lately but I have no doubt that we can patch that up if we can remain injury-free over the next 2 months and our fitness can be reattained. What you're left with is a pretty impressive offence with two powerful avenues to goal plus our solid team defence which can usually keep a team to 9-10 goals, 9 out of 10 times we win with this formula.

I wanted to say I am a firm believer in the loading and how it affects high octane athletes. I did some reading on how it is utilised in Soccer and other sports and the "fatigue" is a significant side effect during the "adaptation phase" that can not be understated and can have significant short term ramifications on performance. Not only fatigue was mentioned but also impaired decision-making, lack of skills and mental confidence i.e. fumbling as a short term negative side effect. All have been abundantly obvious within our playing group as of late. I have a question. Why were we able to beat WB and Bris in rounds 11 and 12 last year but were already appearing to be completely gassed at the same time this year against Freo and Sydney? - Is it possible we started earlier this season? and if so why haven't we started tapering earlier, imo we may have added an additional 2 weeks of training as it was so evident how much of an advantage superior fitness was last year. I only honestly have a hard time doubting any of our elite coaches and fitness staff (proving their competence last year by winning a flag) that they haven't taken everything into consideration and tried to prepare our players' fitness to the utmost level to go back to back. All the talk about us being figured out is nonsense, our gameplan is absolute finals footy and bullet proof if executed correctly. It was talked about so much "we want to do it in front of our fans", "we want to achieve sustained success". If we are truly falling off a cliff as many on here are saying than I'd have to admit those were just words and no action by the FD. I highly doubt it though, there's something brewing. Anywho I think this discussion can be put to rest by the end result of Friday nights game (or at latest the game after....) If (the way I think we will) we come out firing like we did against Brisbane in round 15 and absolutely run on top of the ground the one's who know will know. I believe the reason for your performance against Brisbane was that we had a short taper between loading phases. I actually can't wait for Friday as it will give us clarity on where we actually stand and can assess the state of our game properly.