drdrake

Suits game plan, if we are bombing long we need the forward pressure to keep it in there. Pickett, Bedford, Hunt front and square pressure to keep the inside forward 50m. We look balanced except for second tall forward that Preuss fills, the mix is a lot better

Fresh faces, speed about time

When you are talking culture and DNA of the club, this isn't a year by year thing it is who you are. 2018 was an opportunity to build into a period of sustained success, the facts are like we have for the past 60 years we fall back to losing. Winning is hard no question, to be a winning side over a long period is extremely hard. I will guarantee you Hawthorn won't be down the bottom half of the ladder for long, they will not accept this and put the right measures in place to fix. Good clubs don't accept losing, we do, winning is a celebration it isn't the norm, 2018 should have been the fire to ignite 2019 losing the way we did and almost getting there, 2019 should not have happened the way it did. The fact is our club sits back listens to everyone on how good we are and then we just go back to the norm which is taking the easy option of losing. We had a period of Jackson and Roos, we could feel the club was changing, strong leaders. The Pert appointment was an issue at the time, from what we read Jackson wasn't onboard with this call. Would love to have a dinner with Jackson to get his honest opinion on our club.

If it was a once off you can look for excuses but it is reoccurring. The swans just put in standard blue print to beat the dees, Sit back and wait for long bomb or turnover then attack from there.

I have been on Demon fan forums for nearly 20 years, I'm sure if I went through my posts after losses like last night it will be a pretty consistence theme 1) Club Culture: we accept defeat and over celebrate wins as we don't go into games expecting to win. It is easy for the club to loss as winning is hard. This is culture and for some reason no coach or administration over the past 60 years has been able to change this. We have shown glimpses over that period that we are on the right path to change this but then the losing culture is to strong and creeps back in. 2) Mindset: ties in with point 1 but work rate is a mindset, you need to be prepared to work hard to win games. We have to many examples that we just don't want to work hard enough. A player can control this, it is one of the things you can control in a game how hard you work. The ball might not bounce your way, you can't control that but working hard gives you a better chance to get involved in the game 3) Skills: there is something seriously wrong with our club. From an extended period of time we have been the worse skilled side in the competition. I know someone will bring up the AFL disposal stats that show we aren't but we are the ability to do the fundamentals of the game is an ongoing concern, especially when it matters, example Gawn and Langdon missing 2 goals 15ms out basically directly in front. 4) Development: Outside Petracca, who from our core group from 2018 has improved, excluding players we have drafted and traded in including Lever, not many in fact most have gone backwards TMac, Brayshaw, Harmes, Viney, Spargo, Melksham, Jetta, Jones, Salem, Gawn, OMac, Hannan. Then you add in the draft picks, no one from 2018 draft has been able to cement a spot, the 2019 crop look good but will wait and see what improvement they will get over the summer. 2/3/4 the coaches and players can control, point one is the entire club it needs to be ruthless from the top person down. points 2/3/4 are non negotiable start with that and it goes a long way to changing the culture.

WCE have the best Midfield in the AFL, NIc Nat, Shuey, Gaff, Yeo, Kelly, Redden and others great balance outside Gaff who is a pure outside mid the rest can play in close and get to the outside, a ruck that hits to advantage and mids take advantage off it. Ours just don't seem to be able to transition to the outside the ball stays contested or in the congestion of the contest.

It all starts from them, if we can't control the ball in the middle we have no chance of winning games. You are right on fringe players but the issue is we have no depth in the midfield so if these guys have off days we don't have options to go in there. If we can't win the midfield battle our positional players will have limited chances to impact the game. The bottom line is until we can get better in the middle, improve our forward 50m entries we will continue to put up results like this. Starts with Gawn/Oliver/Brayshaw/Petracca/Viney they got to get better ball into our forward 50

Bull, they are stars because they are unbelievable consistent players. They impact games and can turn the flow of a game. Tracc has the potential to do this but needs to do it consistantly. They make the players around them better.

The only stars in that list Danger, Bont, Martin. Don't get me wrong a lot of good players on there but Stars win matches and turn games over a number of seasons.

Yeh I do, these guys you mentioned are a complete class above any one we have. Cripps I don't see as a star same a Oliver gets the ball but just can't kick. The others you mention destroy teams, Martin is one of the best kicks in the game, Fyfe is the best all rounded Footballer in the AFL, Bont and Danger just win the Footy and get team mates the ball. The don't miss a no pressure 20m kick to a leading forward by 10ms. All those player you mention are blokes that will take ownership to try and take control of a game. We try hard but just lack that class player

Our Season will be over by Round 18 V Essendon, it would be fitting for Jones and Jetta to get a farewell game real shame for both players that this isn't in front of 50K at the MCG they both deserve this, they have stuck with a club that has offered up absolute garbage for a large percentage of their careers, both could have left but stuck with the club in a hope we will get our act together. Wouldn't be to many players in the AFL that would have faced as much as these two, admin issues, coach turnover, Tanking, the run of unfortunate Deaths we had and the mass turn over off team mates and finally a winning percentage that outside a couple of years is plain embarassing. Credit to both, they deserve better and show what amazing character these to have. Take nothing away from Jones and Jetta they have giving everything they could to this football club. Respect to both, I hope the club can show them the respect that they have shown it. Im guilty of Slamming Jones a number of times through his Career, never on effort always his disposal, but I have the utmost respect and admiration for this guy sticking with us and trying to turn this club around, unfortunately the club didn't let this happen.

Wouldn't Sam Weiderman like that type of delivery to him. Nearly all those goals was from an elite kick to a leading forward, our current crop of players would have missed him. Neitz was a match winner and our last star we have had

Our fake stars are the problem, winning the ball is great then missing the target deflates the side over and over again. May is the only player on our side that is A grade, we don't have an A grade midfielder. Until they can clean up their disposals they can not be considered as A grade, if last night was a one off you can say they just had a bad night but every week Oliver, Petracca and co just miss the easy hit up, turn it over, make poor decisions. We jump on board when it all works but even those games there are horrific turnovers by our so called A graders. When we play teams with hard body mids we struggle. The only reason Fremantle won't beat us is if their coach play Fyfe forward and not in the midfield, he will kill us like the Bont did and Fyfe is a lot better player than the Bont.

We need to drop this Viney into the Forward line, just because you can tackle doesn't make you a forward, he has zero creativity and will just cause the same chaos that we get in the midfield. I don't think it is a Brayshaw/Viney thing in our midfield, I reckon it is a Viney/Oliver thing they just get in each others way, both are not clean with their hands at the moment. As much as you hate to say it, you almost hope Viney takes up his Free agency option and leaves.

I would take 11 Dustin Martin Possessions over 30+ from Oliver. Dustin usually puts the ball into a dangerous position, something our mids need to learn. Petracca was doing this but the last few weeks when he has gone into the midfield he catches our midfield disease of over handballing and turnover kicks. It is almost like someone has told him to share the ball more and not take on the player. I think that 50% is a bit high, take out the 1m metre handball that hits a target and both would have been around 20% especially by Foot. Petracca has a massive ball drop which means on windy days he will struggle, he just lets the ball go to high, elite kicks guide the ball a lot closer to the foot before release.

Our midfield dont play team midfield it is all individual. We never seen any blocks making space. It starts the ball goes up we should know where Max is tapping it but there seems to be no communication from max to tell mids where he is trying to hit to. Then ball comes out our mids play like u9s everyone goes to the Ball and wants the ball. Again no one tries to block to create space for an easy exit, we allow pressure on the ball carrier 1m flick handball, repeat 2 more times before turnover our a bomb kick out. Individual effort not team effort. Forward line is the same, no one works for their team mate they all go to the same spot and compete for same mark. No blocks to create space no front and square. Seems we work on team defensive structure when we dont have the ball, but as soon as we get it we have no sense of the selfless acts to help out team mates. Credit to the backline they do work together to protect each other.

We will lose to Fremantle and finish the year with 4 straight loses, this is what this club does.

Totally agree, mindset and effort should be a given as soon as you cross that line you can control that. Our club over an extended period of time just can't do the fundamentals right.

Please no Tmac, no AVB, drop Harmes, ANB, Smith, Omac, Jones Bring in Lockhart, Bedford, Pickett, hibberd and Chandler Lockhart May Lever Rivers Tomlinson Hibberd Langdon Petracca Baker Melksham Brown Pickett Fritsch Weiderman Bedford Gawn Oliver Brayshaw Viney, Wagner, Chandler, Salem

You have to be able to execute the skill, you can practice but by the time you start playing afl your motor skills are already systematic. We have drafted to many players that just can't kick consistently, contested players who can win the footy but none that can kick. If this was a once off you would put it down to lack of preparation, but every week we just turn the footy over, that says we dont have players that can execute the skill

No, nothing to do with preparation, it is our players skills are flakey and even with out pressure we can't execute the fundamentals of the game. What has happened to Oliver's game, a few weeks back unstoppable breaking tackles running with the ball and kicking. He is back to fumbles, turnover kicks and 1m handballs

Its because our forwards are so out numbered you can't kick it forward

Can we please take our blinkers off, the players we continue to back are not good enough,let's see others Lockhart, Bedford, Chandler, Bennell, add in Hibberd and Pickett

It is plain and simple, we dont have 1 midfielder you can trust to kick the footy. In fact we dont have many players that can kick the footy at the required afl standard.

Forget the official stats our midfield group would have gone at 20% effective disposals, we just have no one in our mids that can kick. We fumble the ball and flick out 1m handballs. You can smack our not quite right players but our top end mids lose the games for us. Little pressure and just turn this footy over.