jnrmac

I read someone here saying that the irony for us is that Geelong have become Melbourne (2021) and we have become Geelong (2021) Geelong 2021 was boring, stale, predictable and safe. So they recruited well, changed their game plan, became more bold and daring and voila Premiership favourites. Its exactly what we need to do and Grundy doesn't add to that at all.

Goodwin is saying "we can fit him into our game plan" This is a disaster in the making. Would rather Weid/TMac as second ruck and find some good deliverers i50 to help Spargo AND a Key Fwd

Care factor -ve

A lot of allegations here are presented as fact. Clearly horrendous if half true but knowing quite a lot of AFL footballers over the years and their journeys at football clubs I am struggling to understand how it could possibly happen. We'd all like to see the outcomes of a proper investigation before rushing to judgement but needless to say if the allegations have any truth at all to them heads and careers should roll big time.

Fair enough. Sorry about being rude. But you did make a bold assertion that was untrue.

You made a bold assertion that is simply not true. Go back to your Tarot cards and make up more stuff

Max was injured for the second half of the year. Kinda debunks your theory.

The club is sure that TMac will be right for next year. The Grundy deal is a given apparently

He wasn't thinking of spending that much.....

That as much as anything demonstrates what a useless award it is

This is me. Will be passing the tix on

Good summary, some great performances by the AFL listed guys. As for Munro, he had had more tackles than most players had possessions! Have to say Weid played well. I am not a fan but credit where credit is due, he took on a much bigger opponent and at least broke even. He could possibly do that at senior level

Pretty sure they said on the broadcast after interviewing him that it wasn't that but a kick to the calf..

Sorry if this has been posted elsewhere but I searched and couldn't find it. I read somewhere that TMac has re-injured his foot and won't play today? Anyone shed some light? This doesn't sound very good for Tom who has had a history of toe/foot related injuries.. Can't help thinking of Trengove, Mitch Clark etc.....

So after much reflection, I have very little interest in this GF. If I was to think about what is the best thing for the MFC I would say Geelong winning is. This is a team we owned last year and they went away, licked their wounds recruited smartly and changed their game plan from the boring predictable, easy to set up against game plan they had last year. It got them close but they were found out. Sound familiar? We blooded 1 new young player this year for 1 game. I know that we had 9 players 22 or under to win last years GF but there was no renewal with personnel and no change whatsoever to our game plan. Boring predictable and taxing. 1. Any mystique about our much vaunted midfield was countered by many teams and is perhaps gone forever 2. Fast ball movement against us saw teams break through our impenetrable defence and avoid the intercept marking our game was built on 3. relentless pressure against us as the no 1 team saw us crumble in second halves 4. Our scoring from the back half dried up 5. Our fwd 'connection' was a disaster and nothing was done to fix it. Except moving a banged up Gawn to the fwd line which didn't work. 6. We learned nothing from our 8 defeats that were in essence identical. IN 7 of them we were ahead by at least 23 points. 7. Goodwin's mantra of not crushing teams but managing leads was a disaster once we became the worst 4th qtr team in the league bar NM and WCE. So. A Geelong win shows what can be done by making large changes to game plan, recruiting wisely and as importantly managing workloads (which we dismally failed to do against lower sides) And aside from that Sydney are so freaking smug, in players faces with 'toughness', pushing and shoving etc They deserve to be smacked down.

You are having a lend. We finished second with the hardest draw in the comp and only played North and WCE once unlike Geelong. We just bottled it when it mattered.

Good points. Brisbanes pressure in the second half was 214. Sydneys pressure in the second half was over 200. We crumbled under pressure. Our rock solid game style built for finals was a mirage. While that is a very high pressure number we should have been prepared for it and we weren't. Slow the game down,. Create repeat stoppages, narrow the ground, put the pressure back on them. We didn't do any of that. Red time goals are such killers. You toil for the quarter and bam give the other side a sniff. Infuriating

Good year? Some people live in cloud cuckoo land. We lost 7 of our 8 losses after leading by 24+ points. There is something seriously wrong with our method that has been identified early on and failed to be rectified. Even in our 10 early wins our form was ordinary. The coaching staff wear this one. You don't get many gilt edged opportunities to make GFs and we bottled it losing 2 games on our home deck and defeated in the same circumstances with virtually a full list. Garbage about the draw and players banged up is just embarrassing.

It's the boring and predictable game plan. "We don't know what Melbourne will do in any given game" said no coach ever. Poor teams can try to beat us but are not fit enough or skilled enough to go with us. Good teams have no trouble in grinding us down despite us leading by 24 points or more in 7 out of our 8 losses. Oh and kicking for goal has been an achilles heel for 5 years. Likely because of the way we bring the ball into our 50.

Where will the GF be played?

One potential problem when you are leading at half time as we did for most games this year, is that the other coaches make changes, fire up their team and change pressure etc. As the team that leads you probably don't make too many changes because things are working. Then as the game unfolds the oppo changes might be having some effect and we back our guys in to stay the course and finish the job. We almost NEVER make a change in this circumstance. Yet in the Saints game we were around 9 goals up at half time and lost the second half. In the Brisbane game a couple of weeks back we lost the second half after being around 10 goals up. Whilst we all like to bask in a big win its actually really poor that we don't use these opportunities to experiment a little or try something to snuff out an oppo comeback. And of course as the year went on we became known as a poor last quarter and second half team. Any coach worth his salt would be saying keep the pressure up they will break. The Sydney second half pressure was immense (over 200) as was the Brisbane second half pressure (over 190) Even in the Geelong game it was blindingly obvious in the first half that we were trying to break tackles and failing, turning the ball over under pressure and oblivious to the Geelong tactic of smashing May's kick ins fwd about 10-15m away from our crumbers. No changes were made We sowed the seeds of our own doom and more to the point suggests that Goodwin cant coach on match day.

This is my problem with Goodwin. He like many here identified the issues we have bit he was unable to fix them. Aside from putting Gawn and the Petracca forward what else did he do? he had ample opportunity to experiment against the WCE and North. He wanted to bank the wins though and backed his players to fix it onfield which they didn't /couldnt do. We blooded 1 new player Turner for 1 game and Dunstan for a couple. Many players went backwards including Lever, Rivers, Salem, Spargo, ANB, Jackson, I am struggling to see who improved? Maybe Brayshaw and Viney. Stubborn Simon wears this and needs to fox it.

Total waste. I along with many others are furious at our lack of progression and development At least 8 players went backwards. Maybe only Brayshaw and Viney showed improvement. BBB is cooked, Salem, Rivers, Jackson, ANB, Sparrow, Spargo, Lever all well below best levels. We blooded 2 new players - Dunstan and Turner for 1 game Game style was cooked all year. Stagnant ball movement, trying to manage leads and maybe only 4 games where we played a good 4 quarters. And a coaching staff that was clueless Not one single positive thing to say about this season.

Really? Your memory is shot. BBBs best years or "salad days" were when he kicked over 60 goals - 2017, 2018 and 2019..... Larkey played 2 games in 2017 and kicked 0 goals, didn't play in 2018 and in 2019 kicked 26 goals from 12 games.

One answer to this is that the first half is not the same as the 2nd half. And by that I mean opp coaches make changes. When leading you re less likely to make changes. And when opp coaches make changes to their structure, ball movement, pressure etc we were unable to deal with it. Totally static in the coaches box and we try to manage leads. And once a side knows their opponent can be beaten in the 2nd half it becomes self-fulfilling when they 'get a sniff' . We are the champions of keeping opposition in games because we never put the foot down. We try to manage leads. Its infuriating. In our last in-season game against Brisbane they won the second half. What message do you think Fagan gave to his players at half time? Last night we gave up 5 goals I think in the final minute of each quarter. WTF is that?