Its Time Again

My theory on Melk getting another year is that pesky son of his who everyone loved so much in the lockdown bubble in WA must have been DNA tested and he's going to be a superstar and we need Melk to get 6 more games for him to be a father/son. Otherwise a bit surprising. But I'm sure I'm right. Smith can't keep getting injured forever can he? Unless he's me. Fully fit he's a special depth player with his versatility and potentially a very special medi sub for that reason. Hibbo earnt another year on the back of one of his best years this year until finals. On Grundy haven't we all learnt not to listen to the fourth estate on this stuff. I'd put money on us not paying a first rounder for him. We're in the box seat. However, past experience has taught me rule no. 1 in trading. Absolutely no matter what do not trade players in or out to or from Collingwood no matter what. I don't need another example to prove this rule.

Of course the other factor here is that Grundy has the total say on whether he goes or stays. If he says he'll only go to MFC and if Pies have to push him out to get whoever in they need then how much they pay of his salary and how low a pick they get back might be out of their hands if they want it to happen. Grundy can turn around and say ok no worries I don't want to leave anyway so I'm staying.

Spot on. There were a series of failures in the system this year that culminated in easy controlled i50's against us and away from Lever and May. For some reason I don't know we started to lose contests and clearances which is the starting point for our Game plan. (Our pressure rating dropped from 3 last year to 16 this year and 3rd for clearances in 1st 10 rounds and finish at 13th.) Once we lost these particularly in our forward half we seemed to have lost last year's brilliant defensive transition by the end of the season we were only better than North and the Eagles in stopping teams going from their defensive i50 to forward i50. That's a mind blowing drop off. Plus in losing those contests we were put under pressure which resulted in a lot more turnovers and statistically we ended up being right at the bottom for scores against from turnovers. Swans kicked 11 goals from turnovers. This loss of contest pressure was also evident in trapping the ball inside our own forward 50 so a lot of the transition started from there. I don't know why we lost our setup behind the ball especially in the second half of the season but my guess is we aren't set up for losing contests and that meant we didn't have time to setup behind the ball as other teams attacked ahead of us. Nathan Jones on SEN made a couple of interesting points. He mentioned how teams were easily scoring from our turnovers. Also mentioned that our inability to run enough to defend was not caused by lack of fitness but lack of efficiency. Someone else I heard also mentioned that you get a lot more tired chasing and not getting a result than you do running ahead of the ball and scoring. I guess the inefficiency includes how much we get it inside 50 but then fail to score so we have to expend a lot more energy to score than other teams. That might also apply to our inability to kick straight. For instance Trac went at 27% in Swans final and 39% v Lions. This can be partly explained by his injury but he hasn't been great all season and of course his kicking for goal has gone off a cliff. At one stage he was 19 goals 31 points and 17 out on the full. His percentage accuracy on goal was 28% which is the worst for the top 50 players. (These stats are coming from Robbo in the HS so take at your own peril) I reckon nearly all of that is a matter of some fine tuning not throwing the baby out with the bathwater. We're not that far off. Have a proper break this off season unlike last season. Come back fit and refreshed. Fix the forward system of delivery and leads although I hope getting Grundy doesn't signal that Goodwin's bomb it in strategy is going to continue by freeing up Gawn to stay down there even more as a bomb it in target rather than a leading target. Also hope they change this strategy to match BB's strength which is marking on a lead rather than being forced to try to mark in packs which was never his strong point.

I can't understand Weagles determination (if True) not to give up pick 2 for him. He's been in the system 3 years, proven himself under the ultimate pressure of a Grand Final. Won a Rising Star. Has 3 years of physical development and tutoring by the best ruckman in the comp. And he's only 20. Compared to what at pick in the draft. There's never a guarantee a pick 2 is going to prove to be worth the pick and then they have to be developed for 3 years or so before they will be a major contributor. Plus they desperately need to draft a ruckman to replace Nic Nat. I'd be grabbing the opportunity to get him with pick 2 with both hands.

I won't be able to listen live tonight. But I am looking forward to listening to the whole pod tomorrow as I am a captive audience from Melbourne to, you guessed, where else for a Dees supporter, Buller. But I assure you I will be back in Melbourne in time for Friday's game. Having watched T Mac on the weekend come back in and be pretty effective straight away although a bit underdone does anyone think he might be a sneaky chance to get into the team by the GF assuming we're there. Personally I think it's really unfortunate they have a bye this week which I think probably rules him out as he won't get enough game time to sneak in if injuries opened a spot up. If BB goes down you'd have to consider it though wouldn't you.

You're right . I'm sorry already I'm going to miss it. I did make it to Perth. So have to be thankful for minor mercies. But nothing will be better than watching those feral animals being put to the sword. Hope they are ahead for the first 6 minutes so they think they're going to win and then we put the pedal to the metal and obliterate them. Not that anyone needs to worry about denting their percentage which is the lowest top 3 percentage anyone can remember.

And Weideman and I know you're talking key position but a certain Clayton Oliver, Schache. A lot of quality players in that draft all the way through.

Agree. Clearances is one aspect of the game that shouldn't be as affected by loading as they start from a stop in play. As others have said all top teams are probably loading anyway. Up to round 16 we are a fair way behind last year's performance and they clearly need work to get back to where we were. Type Ranking 2022 2021 Centre Clearances 13th 7th Stoppage clearances 7th 5th Overall clearances 10th 4th We are behind our main competitors on clearances Lions 4th, Cats 5th and Dockers 6th. We are also 11th for Hitout wins percentage behind main competitors Cats, Lions, Dockers. Against the Cats we won hitouts 49 to 36 but still lost clearances by a whopping -18, 36 to 54. They doubled us in centre clearances 16 to 8 and stoppages 38 to 28. It goes a long way to explaining the loss irrespective of loading. Here's a stark stat from OTC. Trac and Clarry have delivered the ball i50 46 times in the past 5 weeks for a total of 2 marks. Trac 28 times for 2, Clarry 18 for "0"!! I don't have any stats to compare these to but it can't be good. All our forwards are also down on last year. Ben Brown has won 7 of 45 contests, I read somewhere that he's won 1 of 21 one on ones. He's played the same amount of games as the whole of last year 13, but isn't terribly off on goals 21 to 25 last year. According to OTC Jackson is the number one marking forward in the Comp yet he's only kicked 8 goals for the year. Kossie has kicked 20 at 1.3, last year was 40 in 25 games at av 1.6, Spargo 6 at 0.4, last year 18 at av 0.7, Fritsch 34 at 2.1, last year 59 at 2.5. This all seems mostly fixable. I don't know how you fix out of form players before it's too late but they seem to lay it on and off for clearances. It was a worry they didn't fix it against the Cats but far from panic stations just yet.

I get where you're coming from in all of this except your last comment. Even Goody acknowledges it has to get better. I don't agree with the philosophy that we're winning so ignore that the forward line isn't working as well as it should. I hope they are continuing to work on it and bring it up to the level of the mids and backs. That will make us virtually unbeatable. It has been a bug bear of mine for many years, however I have to confess that watching the Lions game was the very first time I've ever really thought that there the madness of our, as you call it, kaos i50 method might actually have a point. In that game we only had 3 set shots on goal but the Lions were chasing us all night because the kaos made us absolutely unpredictable, including to ourselves I might suggest. The result was they just couldn't defend against us. I could see for the first time that in a really tight GF against an elite backline our kaos could possibly stand up more than a forward line depending on clean leads and passes which if chopped down leave you exposed. The other thing I have to acknowledge is that despite being well down the ladder on a lot of these scoring structures we are 6th for points scored. Unfortunately 4 of the teams above us are in the 8 including Cats, Lions Tigers and Swans. Freo are behind by 112pts. It's worth noting that the Cats have already played Nth twice for 60pt and 112pt wins so their pts tally is skewered somewhat.

Thanks for the link to wheeloratings. Great site. I guess stats are only as useful as their interpretation. I take your point about the perception around Carlton's key forwards but personally I wouldn't be choosing Carlton as a benchmark, I'm more interested in the more likely challengers Cats, Lions and Freo. I don't understand why the focus isn't on goals scored per i50 rather than scores which includes points. You win games by scoring goals not points. On goals per i50 we sit 14th, only better than GC, Port, Ess & NM. Lions are 1st, Cats 7th, Blues 9th, Dockers 10th. On your point about us having a better forward structure because we have a range of goal scorers. So far this season the Blues are 18th with 21 but we are only 17th with 22. Freo are 3rd with 28, Cats and Lions equal 5th with 27. And we've had a turnover in forwards already this season which adds to the number of scorers. It's pretty obvious to me that in comparison to our mids and backs our forwards are not at the same level and clearly need work. Goody has said that himself in relation to the forwards and the connection from the midfield.

As I understand it he broke the all time record of consecutive wins from debut which used to be 14 when he reached 15 and I believe he breaks the record tomorrow for the most wins from debut including one player who had 17 but they weren't consecutive when he reaches 18. Surely that's all the incentive the boys need to get him across the line.

You can look at the table at the start of this OP. It's not relevant as there are so many fluctuations month by month. There are a lot of automatic renewals at the end of the previous year, then various catalysts for membership bursts caused by various events. There's no consistency to it.

60,735 From this time last year to the cutoff on 31 July we had an extra 4404 members. So if we match that rate we'll crack the 65,000. However, for whatever reason there was a jump of 1301 in this corresponding week last year which accounted for a substantial jump in the memberships.

Agree. If you choose to pin both a players arms and drive him into the ground then the dirt of care is on you to role him or do something else to protect his head as you’ve taken away his ability to protect himself. If you don’t do that then mostly you will be lucky if he is only concussed and. Or far more seriously injured.

This time last year on 14 May total was 46,896 and the cutoff total on 31 July was 53,188 so memberships went up another 6,292. So potentially there is the scope to crack the 65,000 target although it's not possible to know whether there are still that number of unsigned supporters out there or whether we've already milked most of them. In 2019 the previous record year before that the increase from this time to the 31 July cutoff was only 2,298. Let's hope the membership systems in place now are superior and we'll get there. The club is obviously being more creative with memberships now like the 6 game memberships for $66 which ultimately helps attract sponsors as the membership total goes up and hopefully helps with numbers at games.

Good point but this would maybe more relevant for teams in 7th and particularly 8th. Teams around 6th by then are usually in the 8 at the end. The line has to be drawn somewhere. Arguably teams chances of finishing top 2 or top 4 being compromised by an unfair draw, like Geelong getting Nth & Eagles twice is more of a problem.

The most logical way to get the closest to making it fairer is once everyone has played each other once then set who plays each other twice. The AFL proved last year and this year that you can set the fixture on a rolling basis so there shouldn't be a reason this couldn't be done. As for Cats, get a ridiculous home ground advantage without the penalty of having to play interstate every other week like the interstate teams. Plus that game is not a real AFL ground and with all the redevelopment there surely they could have fixed the width but that would have taken away that massive home ground advantage.

Good find. I understood the Bang Bang Bang and the French bit but no clue what the hell the rest of it was about.

I'd like to pose a question for tomorrow night. I'm wondering if other people fee like me that it still feels really strange being unanimously raved about in the press as the best team and unstoppable etc when for me it was less than a full season ago when we beat the Dogs in Rd 10 & then the Lions the next week that in my mind I started to think of us as a real chance to be contenders. It still feels surreal every time we're talked about that way. I keep making myself not take it for granted and enjoy every game and not get caught up in only thinking about getting to see this year's Premiership. I'd say the most fundamental thing to start with is I can finally "trust" the team to turn up and have a real go every week and not drop games they shouldn't. Also the incredible quality and depth of this list. Other than Robbie, I'm struggling to think of any players of the elite, even freak ability of Gawny, Trac, Clarry and Kossie (although in the company in his position of the Wiz and I'd say better than Davey). May is so elite not just in competing but his skill level and decision making. Lever as an interceptor. And to have all of them in the same team. I could wax lyrical for pages. But my point for discussion is whether other people are still coming to terms with how quickly we have gone from starting to think we might be in the mix to reaching such a high level and making sure they don't take it for granted.

Steven May on On the Couch tonight commented on him having done some good jobs the last couple of weeks. Fighting for his GF spot. (I'm saying the last sentence, not him.)

I was at that game. Only game in Perth I’ve ever been to. I happened to get down from Sydney for 3 games in a row that season which I expected to be losses. Beat Pies at QB by 4pts. Then reigning Premiers Dogs at Marvel. Then went to Perth and took my brother and nephew. Hunkered down amongst the only Dees supporters at the ground. So so sweet. Couldn’t believe it. It was Goody’s first season and by the end of those 3 games he was looking like the messiah not a naughty boy

Maybe it will all go in there. There was talk of that some years ago.

If we find out at the end of the year he wants to go to Freo it puts a very different light on their request for him for Cerra last year and Lobbe wanting to leave would have opened up the position and money for him. Now Freo have nothing to offer and he’s out of contract so we have a lot less to bargain with. Having said that personally I can’t see him going at the end of the year. We are in too much of a window for at least a 3 year contract extension. But weirder things have happened.

Just watched Burgo's Crows knock off the Dogs in Ballarat. Have to say work rate really stood out. I used to say there was a good Melbourne and a bad Melbourne. The good one ran and created options in defence and attack the bad one didn't and didn't do either. If you're not fit enough you just can't do the necessary running required in today's game. It's quite instructive to see how Burgo has weaved his magic already at Crows and how quickly they have become competitive. I'll never forget speaking to Flash at the 2011 B & F and he was saying Bailey was trying to get them to play a game plan they couldn't play. They were too young to have the running power to run up and down the ground the way he wanted them to. No doubt he was right about the game plan he just didn't adjust it to the players capability. This just reinforces what I said elsewhere about a big part of our success now being having a critical mass of players with enough years to be fit enough to have the stamina to compete with the best.

Interesting. I have no idea what stage it's at or how it's going but there doesn't seem to have been much progress since I took the photo below nearly 3 weeks ago on 2 April. I've just remembered I found out recently I know someone who works in there as a groundsman. Don't know if he actually works on Gosch's or just AAMI and others. I've put a request through to a mutual contact for some info on progress and will post if I get a reply.