mauriesy

Good luck finding any. They'll have to play above their normal game to beat us.

He rates the Melbourne list as: A-grade: Steven May, Christian Salem, Christian Petracca, Jack Viney, Jake Lever, Angus Brayshaw, Max Gawn, Clayton Oliver, Ed Langdon. B-grade: James Harmes, Michael Hibberd, Jake Melksham, Tom McDonald, Sam Weideman, Jayden Hunt, Alex Neal-Bullen, Bayley Fritsch, Ben Brown. C-grade: Adam Tomlinson, Oskar Baker, Marty Hore, Mitch Brown, Joel Smith, Kye Declase, Majak Daw. Developing Future AB: Luke Jackson, Charlie Spargo, Toby Bedford, Bailey Laurie, Jake Bowey, James Jordan, Trent Rivers, Tom Sparrow, Harrison Petty, Kysaiah Pickett, Need more time: Fraser Rosman, Kade Chandler, Daniel Turner, Deakyn Smith. I think this is mostly reasonable, but I'd easily have Fritsch as A-grade under his criteria, and possibly Neal-Bullen after his great season and improvement. Jackson, Spargo, Pickett, Bowey, Sparrow, Rivers and Jordon are well on the way to B (at least), I think they're already there. If not for his injury I'd swap Tomlinson for Weideman.

Yes, I never make any. It's like betting ... a pastime for the mathematically innumerate. 🙂

Buckenara's assessment of Melbourne is in the Herald-Sun today. At least he starts off with "... Here is the part where I eat my words. Last year, I made a declaration about Melbourne – and it hasn’t aged well."

Here were the Age "experts" picks for Melbourne at the start of the season: Jake Niall 11th Michael Gleeson 9th Peter Ryan 7th Jon Pierek 10th Daniel Cherny 7th Greg Baum 7th Sam McClure 12th The average reader's pick for Melbourne was 12th. So no-one saw Melbourne's significant improvement. Most had Richmond finishing top 1-3. Carlton, St Kilda, West Coast and Collingwood were also predicted to be higher than their eventual placing. They all had Sydney much lower, one had them 18th. The teams most got right were at the bottom: Kangaroos, Hawks, Adelaide and the Suns. By mid-season (July), the same "experts" all had Melbourne in their top 8, but still between 3rd and 6th. Most experts everywhere tend to put a lot of weighting on the previous season's finish and find it had to see improvement in some teams.

Picking the best goal is like picking your favourite child.

He's allowed to have his opinion of who he likes watching. And, of course, you can all disagree and make your own lists. Even though we've just won a premiership, MFCSS keeps popping out of the woodwork in all the usual manifestations.

He didn't say that. The Prelim final AFL360 preview show had Nick Reiwoldt, Jeremy Cameron, Jarryd Roughead, Jordan Lewis and Mark Maclure. Jason Dunstall was effusive in his praise for Melbourne in his post-Grand Final AFL360 review.

I would love a nice polo shirt for golf with just a premiers logo. Seems like they don't cater for old blokes who prefer subtlety..

You'll Never Walk Alone has been done to death.

I could search for "umpires" on Demonland and come up with thousands of results.🤔

Every time I eat a banana I'll think of that Christian Petracca goal.

Neither do some of our own posters when you read back through the thread. Very pessimistic for less than a year ago.

Gotta love Max. https://www.afl.com.au/video/679296/the-making-of-max-clayton-s-motto-they-created-harry-gawn-unplugged?videoId=679296&modal=true&type=video&publishFrom=1632301200001

Amazing how you've changed your tune after 5 years of negativity. "Why hasn't Goodwin been sacked already?" "You could give him 50 yrs but the club would be gone within 4. Can't coach, stubborn, bereft of ideas how to fix straightforward issues."' "No team has consistently won finals with a defence as weak as ours. It's objectively true yet a lot here think our defence is doing a good job. We can't defend once the ball goes into our back 50. It's simply undeniable." "It's an indictment on the club regardless of 'how far we've come'. It's failure pure and simple. Just like its a failure to lose like we did against Geelong. We are a mentally weak club. Supporters should demand more."

I don't know why that stupid right-wing term "cancel culture" gets brought in here. We all need to seek the truth. We should not be beholden to a Tudge view of history. Where I live, there are several streets in a number of towns named after pioneers who were likely involved in indigenous atrocities in the squatting era. There will be justificable moves to change the names as the truth comes to light.

We should have picked Wines. But Toumpas has done what few of us here have done ... played 35 games of AFL football.

Parish is a gun. But Oliver's a Howitzer.

It depends on how you count. If you count from the day after the qualifying final, we'll have played 1 game in 27 days. If you count from the day of the round 23 match against Geelong, we'll have played 3 matches in 35 days. Two more games in 8 more days. It suits whatever narrative you want to put forward.

TMac will be OK. He could have had two goals last match, both good leads, one a near-set shot miss and the other a kick from Neal Bullen that went over his head. (And we should have been 8-10 goals up at half time , there were gettable shots missed by Jackson (2), Petracca (2), TMac, Brayshaw and Langdon. There is lots of talk about Geelong's forward line, but I'd be just as fearful of Jackson, Brown, TMac, Fritsch, Pickett and Spargo (not to mention Petracca) if I were Geelong's backs.

Our free kick differentials this year. With a few exceptions, midfielders get them, backs and bulls give them away.: Baker 0-0 Bowey 1-6 Brayshaw 10-19 Ben Brown 6-5 Mitch Brown 0-2 Chandler 0-2 Fritsch 15-20 Gawn 31-29 Harmes 20-24 Hibberd 16-10 Hunt 16-19 Jackson 22-11 Jetta 4-2 Jones 3-4 Jordon 18-9 Langdon 14-8 Lever 21-22 May 14-17 McDonald 22-26 Melksham 3-10 Neal-Bullen 30-20 Oliver 41-44 Petracca 21-27 Petty 10-14 Pickett 20-18 Rivers 7-13 Salem 12-18 Smith 1-2 Sparrow 12-14 Spargo 25-14 Tomlinson 2-6 Vandenburg 0-4 Viney 22-15 Weideman 3-1

Be like Charlie Spargo! After going 3-7 last year, this year he's 25-14.

Nearly two-third of the Bulldog's free kick differential is four players: Liberatore 32-24 McCrae 41-28 Hunter 32-8 Bontempelli 41-33 It's a midfield thing.

Talking Carlton then?

Goody knows more in that interview than all the "expert scribes"!