Nasher

Out: Smith, Stretch (both inj.) In: Vince, Kennedy-Harris

Such a bummer. The outside run he brought to the team was just what the doctor ordered, not to mention good for him personally. Disappointed for us and him in equal measure.

Agreed. I wouldn’t expect it to be a factor in the conversation about a 25 year old though.

Yep - the old “if you don’t hate something, it must mean you love it” logic jump. Wouldn’t expect any less from you bub!

Personally, I hate it when players are criticised for their “demeanour”. If you think you can understand what’s going on in a person’s mind by the snippets you see of their face, you’re just wrong. You can’t. It also doesn’t matter if he’s never been angry on the footy field. Anger is a complex emotion and not everyone reacts constructively to it. If you think you can tell he isn’t taking it seriously because he’s not angry, you’re wrong. You can’t. Then there’s those complaining about his public comments about wanting to be the best. Watts was potted mercilessly about his comments that he moved on pretty quickly from losses, so we get a competitive, ambitious youngster in, and suddenly that’s no good either. People, honestly, stop going looking for reasons to criticise our players. It’s stupid to criticise Petracca now when he’s just played one of his best games of the year. It is possible to just enjoy the ride sometimes without needing to be pissed about something, y’know?

The go home was just an excuse to leave Brisbane, surely. I have to admit I struggle a bit with the number of grown men who seem unable to survive living a 2 hour plane flight away from their home city.

Do you take that view about people in general, or just football players?

Happy to go on record and say there is absolutely no chance, whatsoever, that he is going anywhere. Zero. No source, just confidence: belief in his character and belief that players would want to stay at Melbourne.

Why would he leave?!

Mate, I’ve been grumpy about people starting new threads when the existing ones would do since day one!

Meh. Next time just use the joeboy thread.

The slight cynic in me thinks some just like bagging players. Lewis was on a hiding to nothing with that play - he probably took the view that it was moving away from him too quickly, he was surrounded by opposition, and the ball was slippery, therefore his situational awareness (and significant experience in the game) told him not to bother. It’s unfortunate that two of them resulted in turnovers (a mark at half back and a kicking in danger free), but there’s a big likelihood the alternative result wouldn’t have been any better. It’s easy to criticise the player for what actually happened when you get to invent the counterfactual, rather than the player who would be held responsible for it. It’s a bit like those criticisms of Lewis over that “shepherd” that he didn’t lay. The word the umpires use for that type of shepherd is “BLOCK!”, preceded by a whistle and a point in the opposition’s direction. But again, we want to bag Lewis and we get to invent the counterfactual, so let’s run with it instead.

There would be a degree of setness to it. A few times I’ve seen Gawn smash it out to Brayshaw running at full pace. That kind of play has to premeditated. They would also have to plan for the unlikely event that Gawn doesn’t win the tap as well I guess!

I thought the same. We’ve been known on here in the past to give the players stick for attempting to be too cute and overpossess the ball in wet weather footy before, so it bemuses me a bit that now we’re hanging it on a player for *not* possessing it in slippery conditions. I thought Lewis was just skipping the bit where he fumbled the clappers out of it like everyone else was. Maybe I’m being too kind, but I thought he deserved benefit of the doubt too.

I wasn’t expecting him to be the huge possession winner he is. Has had over 30 possessions in 4 of his 12 games, and at least two of those where he didn’t were prior to finally being put in the guts. Having an outstanding season. I wasn’t as worried as many others that he wouldn’t hit his straps, but nonetheless it’s a relief to see him out the other side of the issues and playing with confidence.

Looking forward to this week’s edition of “All the Behinds (thanks to Haymes Paints)”.

Exactly. It’s Clayton’s logic to suggest we don’t deserve the top 4 just because another club failed to make it. It means *they* don’t deserve top 4. Anyway, I’ve said I don’t care how other club results affect us. Win the games of footy and ladder position will take care of itself; we won’t need to worry about the teams behind us then. I point blank refuse to barrack for Essendon or Collingwood. I hate them both and wish they could both lose.

There were a couple of moments in the last quarter where I’d released the obligatory “ahh” when our players clearly dived on the back of the opposition, only for the whistle not to blow. Phew. It’s not often you notice those - I must have been pretty relaxed at that stage. I feel it was pretty well umpired all in all, but my basis of that is that nothing they did infuriated me, which surpringly (not) happens a lot more often when we’re winning.

Current form? We just put in our most dominant performance of the season. The only reason this wasn’t a 100+ win was because the footy was a cake of soap. We are good enough to beat any of those teams so long as we “bring it” on the day. The hard bit for this team seems to be making sure they “bring it” every week.

Great to hear Vanders did well. There’s no doubt that if he can stay in one piece, there will be room for him in the senior side. The two sides this week kicked a combined 18.38.

I assumed Smith in the forward line was in response to the way Fremantle occupied our forward line, rather than our idea per se. It wasn’t going to be OMac, Frost, Hibberd or Jetta, so he’s th logical next choice. I can’t think of any other reason for it because he definitely did not look a natural forward.

What was wrong with Lewis other than the stray elbow?

Joel Smith spent most of the night getting in Hogan’s way tonight.

Yes he’s the only one. Obviously I don’t know if he’s the only one or not, but I definitely don’t share his view.

Was in Darwin.