The Taciturn Demon

He has. Not quite at the Adelaide and Brisbane level, but still very strong. And if he was responsible for the Pick 2 for Mithen trade... that's bordering on magic.

Not generally a fan of the colour TV away strip, but this version is a cracker. Both are great, but there's something about that Argentina blue...

He chooses Melksham as if he's some James McDonald-esque ultra-consistent team player.

As painted concrete tends to do.

I think this is a good point. Until we find someone who does the ANB role even 75 percent as well as him, others need to fill the gaps But I still err on this side of this: I think as supporters - or maybe this is just a Demonland thing - we happily wave away the enormous, glaring limitations of some while homing in on and becoming obsessed with the obvious limitations of others. I'd love Fritsch to become Tom Atkins with his tackling. I'd love Charlie Spargo to get 20 every week. I'd love Ed Langdon to learn how to handball. I'd love Tom Fullarton to go full early-2012 Mitch Clark. I'd love Jake Lever to be like Matthew Scarlett one on one. None of these things are ever going to happen. And as others have said, when you kick the ball as poorly into the forward 50 as we do (and have for years), a bloke who can make something out of not very much is absolutely gold.

Actual lol.

I can't wait to see more of this. One of the most exciting elements of his under 18s stuff was his ability to take a big contested mark up forward.

Definitely Turner. I'd love Tholstrup to be clearly in the best 22 as part of that change you referred to over the year. For me Melksham is nowhere near our best side.

Good call. Unheralded game. I've been surprised to hear so many on here talk about him in the same breath as Windsor, Langford and Lindsay. I haven't seen anything close to that. But I really liked his game on Saturday. Six possies is low, obviously, but as you said, kept presenting hard outside 50 and made smart decisions when he got it.

The Big Easy.

Oops. This example of "of-the-field" action just fell out of my images folder and landed in this forum. Oh no. I can't seem to delete it.

Hird at the end downplaying off-the-field actions. Genuinely funny.

Yep. That seems to have completely gone. He used to change games with this sort of stuff.

I think this is a really good point. From memory it (lack of strong middle-career players) was offered as a major (and plausible) reason for the team looking promising but failing to get all that far in the years between Roos righting the ship and the Flag - 2018 aside. We had some obviously very good players, but they were either coming to the end or just at the start. In 2021, we had: Gawn at 29 May at 29 Brown at 28 McDonald at 28 Viney at 27 Petracca at 25 Salem at 25 Harmes at 25 Lever at 25 Brayshaw at 25 Neal-Bullen at 25 Fritsch at 24 Oliver at 23 Also had numerous players in that age range who contributed during the season and could be considered unlucky not to get a game in the GF. EDIT: Just had a look at Geelong 2023 to compare and their "old men" tag was entirely warranted. Majority of best 15 players above 29.

- I have one simple request, and that is to have midfielders with frickin' laser beams attached to their feet! Now, evidently, that can't be done. Uh, can you remind me what I pay you people for? Honestly, throw me a bone here! What do we have? - Harry Sharp - [pause] Riiiight.

Oh my goodness. I had never noticed this until now. That's amazing... and hilarious.

I wish I could go into hypersleep. Wake me when we're good again.

I love Viney but few players carry an injury worse than him. He's had patches like this before where he's suddenly a shadow of his best self and then details of the injury come out. I hope this is another instance because three and a half more years of this as the best he can offer is scary.

Spot on. They're polar opposites. Back when Twitter was Twitter and mostly good fun, Bulldogs supporters would come together on selection afternoon and speculate on what series of moves - somewhere between moderately eccentric and bat**** insane - might be made this week.

If not our out and out best, very close to our most important.

[censored] hell. That's disastrous.

I've never understood the idea in corporate communication that you "need to respond" in a crisis, but that it's OK for that response to be meaningless. Not a single person reads something like that (or any anodyne corporate statement) and thinks "Ah, thank goodness they responded". It seems like the definition of box-ticking.

But Treacy's hands are incredibly good.

I agree with this, particularly the bit about Brayshaw and "it's injuries" excuses. (ANB is a massive loss, as well, and I think Joel Smith would be extremely handy at the moment given we keep blasting it high into the forward line, but there's no point lamenting the loss of either of them. Every team has unexpected or 'unfortunate' list upheavals.) Some of the talk after 2021 was well-intentioned but a bit silly, while some of it was just plain arrogant. I actually think Petracca is going OK. Oliver and Viney have been genuinely shocking to me. It's happened to Viney before and he's come back - I'm not sure if he can do it this time. But Oliver is an eye-opener. I knew there was a very good chance he wouldn't ever reach his best again, but he's an absolute mile from where he once was.

Well said. Burgess seemed to give Melbourne an edge in the Flag year, but he wasn't a magician. He went to Adelaide and since then they've finished bottom four twice and were unlucky to miss the eight once. The shocking last quarters may look like fitness. They may even have a fitness component to them, but they look to me more like a team incapable of dealing with the natural changes towards the end of a game as both teams fatique. We have really poor skills. They get worse. We have and massive problems with pressure around the ball (numbers to the ground ball, tackling, making space for teammates). That drops off further. We can't hurt teams on the turnover. That becomes more crucial (and theoretically easier) at the end of the game.