sue

To fill an injury hole, rest a similar position player who needs a rest, or stop team members from slacking off.

Only if the games were high scoring. Best illustrated by taking extreme examples: Lose by 1 point in a 3 points to 2 points game and your total for and against for the year hardly change. Lose by 1 point in a 5001 to 5000 point game and your percentage will be 100% since the previously accumulated for and against will be insignificant compared to 5000. Therefore losing by 2 goals in a low scoring match won't change percentage as much as losing by the same margin in a high scoring game

If you lose (or win) games which are low scoring the percentage change can be small.

A team can lose a match because of the umpires without it requiring a conspiracy. Just bad decisions (or non-decisions) at critical times. And then there are things like the umpires being too generous to the local teams in WA. I think that is generally agreed. Probably due to the crowd, but it doesn't require a conspiracy.

Yeah, of course. But these threads are for those who wish to discuss the outcome of likely realities rather than improbable dreams (ie win all matches and it's no problem making the finals). And the predictions get clearer week by week. Let's hope the predictions for the MFC don't get too clear too soon.

Ah, the AFL. Such a professional organisation. Actually an amateur organisation paying themselves 'professional' salaries.

Now there speaks an optimist.

If the AFL ran the criminal justice system, an armed robber who dropped the loot when escaping would get a lesser penalty than if he didn't drop it even if all other aspects of the crime were identical.

I dimly recall we didn't win any Brownlows during the great run of premierships in my youth and the reason why was we had so many good players taking votes off each other. Happy to see that happen again.

yep, and as I've posted earlier, I'm risk averse. If we make the finals outside the top 4, the season will be a success. If we don't make the 8 there will be wrist slitting all round.

The North result is debatable. The only really bad one was bloody Richmond not beating GWS.

While that is all very positive, I suspect failing to get into the 8 is such a risk to the club that it's wiser to hope that teams below us fail than hope we sneak into the top 4.

I'm not so sure. And then there is the 'I hate C'wood' factor. We still have to make the 8 so I'd prefer to play WCE when they are not desperate rather than plan on a top 4 finish.

It shows how petrified players have become about idiotic decisions by umpires that Gus has said: "It's funny. People might not believe it, but I didn't intentionally kick it out of bounds," Brayshaw told AFL.com.au. when it was so obviously not a skill error but a titanic skill disaster.

I doubt one win proves your point. There are many factors why we lose games, including the ones after Darwin and including the fact that we are often crap. But it's drawing a long bow to effectively say that Darwin has negligible effect. I bet the coaches would prefer we didn't have to play there.

If they paid that all the time there would be 300 frees given in a game.

in Q1 Adelaide player marks the ball. Moves his arms as if about to handpass it but doesn't move either foot an inch. Immediate play-on call from umpire 5 metres away. No wonder they can't deal with difficult decisions.

True. Furthermore who knows what mad rule changes the AFL will implement which may affect the style of play and hence type of player required.

True, but they are more likely to get the AFL to change the rules to ensure 'big' teams can kick more goals.

To the poster who said the AFL control the Friday night slot: The AFL wouyld be mad to do things which drive down the ratings because 7 would offer less loot for the next contract. It's in neither parties' interest to have poor matches, but it could well be that no matter how bad the blues are, they figure the overall audience will exceed MFC playing Suns etc. They may have got it wrong this year, but I'm sure the ratings mean cash which means ratings take priority and 7 will have a big say in that.

They have the advantage that every game they play is on free to air in Sydney, Canberra etc

I liked that way he kicked that goal in Q3. Marks on an angle, walks with back to umpire while reducing the angle, ignores the umpire trying to put him on line and plays on to kick the goal starting from where he shouldn't be. It has annoyed me for years that this is allowed, and annoyed me even more that MFC players didn't do this when other teams did. Cynic in me says watch out for 'rule/interpretation' change now that we have a player smart enough to do it. Though why it required much 'smart' is beyond me.

Great stuff. Interesting how during the cold war when we could have all been fried to ashes (came close several times) US TV could poke fun at their spies fighting the Soviets. I doubt they could run a comedy series these days based on a bumbling Maxwell Smart vs ISIS. So to keep on topic, if a player wears number 86, don't bring him in this week.

Sigh, if only MFC had the numbers: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2018-07-10/woosha-wants-a-meeting-with-the-umpires

I was pleased to see that loveable Scott brother whinge in the press about the 50m rule. I wish we did too, but I guess it is easier to whinge about 3 penalties when you win by 37 points than when you lose by 2. His remark below is right on. "It will frustrate me even more if the umpires say that technically they were correct, because if they were technically correct then technically you missed 20 others.