praha

Nothing is a guarantee imo. Goodwin would struggle to keep his job if we missed finals next year. End of the day, next year is irrelevant because we've missed a prime step in the development process. Finals was so important. We blew it. 2018 could well be our 2011 just based on the way we lose some games this year.

Don't even care. The season ended on Saturday.

It's very worrying. The big question is whether we over achieved or under achieved. I hope the latter. I think we'll play finals next year but today has turned out to be a huge failure. The likes of Jones, Watts, Tmac, Viney, Gawn, who have been there since the worst, are all top 22 at most top 8 sides yet they are losers this year. The club must be absolutely filthy on itself. This is as big a [censored] up as it's been in for decades. From a financial and business standpoint, this weekend has hurt the club BAD. After hearing PJ pregame yesterday, he does a good job of keeping a distance between off and on field. But he must be furious. The bloke can only do so much. This is why I'm certain we'll see certain players up for trade. You can only go through this so many times. We need to rid this club of loser stink. Goodwin and co will be majorly under the pump this off season.

The North loss was undoubtedly the key message. Once we lost that i just knew the season was shot. I like to think it's a development phase and we'll break out of it, but it was the way we lost to North, GWS and Collingwood that has me worried, combined with the Brisbane performance. It was almost too familiar to matches in the later Bailey years. That's what worries me. I hate to say it, but our "rebuild" still involves kicking out perennial losers. I'm not naming names because I've said them enough on here. We are still in flux and will stay in neutral until we make big decisions on club favourites.

One moment stood out in the 3rd. We got spanked going forward and Trac was 1 on 4 and forced the ball out. Gawn and Jones both lingered around, no words, no urgency. Just jogged away. Trac had to pull himself off the ground. Jones is trade bait. He was shown up yesterday and it was ugly. We got Lewis to set standards. Jones just doesn't fit. And Gawn is developing worrying "through the motions" behaviour.

Lol

Stop complaining about the umpires you losers! WC was always going to win today. Start pointing your fingers at the club and stop looking for excuses. This is a colossal failure. A massive choke. A massive indictment on everything Goodwin and Jackson want to achieve. We've broken a crowd record this year and missed the finals. Celebrate that all you want, PJ. The MFC is still a losers club.

End of the day, regardless of how bad the umpiring is, the bunch of losers we support cost themselves a finals spot. You can [censored] about the umpires all you want. End of the day both Melbourne and Eagles played teams with nothing to play for. Melbourne choked. Eagles have risen. The umpires aren't the problem. The league isn't the problem. The losers you pay hundreds of dollars a year to watch are.

Adelaide giving away Melbourne-esque free kicks.

If ever you thought there was a conspiracy against Melbourne, that holding the ball aginst Eddie proves it. Awful call

Unfortunately the schedule just didnt work in our favour because of last week's games. Richmond was alway going to get 7 days because of the late Perth game last week. However given the ladder position of Freo and Collingwood, it would have made more sense to swap the Essendon and Melbourne games. End of the day it was a flip of the coin. It was a tougher turnaround for us because we played a co-tenant. The only game that could have been swapped was these two games. Essendon has an 8 day break. It's an astonishing oversight by the league.

*cracks knuckles* The Melbourne Football Club acts as an interesting basis for the critique on the transition from amateur to professional athleticism in the modern game. Is the club's recent failures a byproduct of cultural vulnerability, or is it merely part of the long, rebuilding grind? A question that has plagued Melbourne supporters and the broader football community for years, the answer is perhaps a combination of both. The notion that Melbourne's current playstyle is too demanding of a young side may be true, but that still raises questions about the club's habits and cultural behaviours. Inconsistentcy is perhaps a better gauge of team youth and inexperience -- inexperience may make it difficult to play consistent football -- and a tough play style that relies on the sport's fundamental non-negotiables shouldnt be part of the problem. Let's say it is part of the problem: it would then pave way for questions of cultural influence on the playing group, and the so called "soft underbelly" that continues to plague it. A player may ask, "Why go the extra mile if the Melbourne way always leads to failure regardless?" It might not be as direct a question but it would subconsciously affect approach and urgency to demanding play styles. Ultimately, professional sport is a team game, and so good individual performances tend to get smothered by poor team efforts. The "3 word play analysis" gauge tends to paint an interesting albeit inaccurate representation of the big picture, as 22 average performancrs can still get a team over the line if the team structure and style is upheld. There's no definitive answer to either question, but it is perhaps easier and more relatable for the fan to say the "losing culture" is the major drive of the problem. We can't possible know if the cultural issues of past years have gone, because the club is still in flux. Yesterday was a step forward and back, because it once again opened discussion about the club's purpose. The End (?) No idea of word count.

Tackling isn't a habit. It's a fundamental component of the game itself. If 22 games in you're still talking about turning non negotiable into habits, i feel sorry for Goodwin. We've been developing for years and we've failed miserably at a critical time. Momentum and incentive and those little things that fuel passion and urgency seem to work for every other team except Melbourne. I think a lot of people are understating the significance of yesterday. We didn't lose yesterday because the competition is hard. We lost because we're Melbourne. When will things go our way? We should have been walking away knowing we'd be playing finals. Instead we walked away wondering how an Afl team on the verge of its first final series in 10 years didnt lay a tacke in the first 10 minutes. Bruise. Free.

From the AFL website: "Despite blowing a golden chance to put an exclamation point on a thoroughly encouraging season and seal a finals berth – the first since 2006 – the mood was light and, well, kind of positive after the 16-point loss to Collingwood. " "...some club insiders dared to believe a loss could turn out to be a positive, as it would increase the chances of a Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval fixture, rather than having to face the finals-hardened Swans in Sydney. "

Aside from Essendon who hasn't won a final for 13 years, those clubs have all fallen down, come back, rebuilt and made finals in the 10 years since we last played finals. We've been trying to break this funk since the last time all of those teams were last winning finals. It's one to be middle of the road, and you have to expect poor losses. But we lost to Freo and Hawthorn after being outright favourites. We lost to North. Twice. We barely got over Brisbane. Port may struggle against top 8 sides but they've absolutely smashed some teams this year. We may very well play finals this year but we're still a team of losers and pushovers. The performance today is a mirroring of the end to the 2015 and 2016 seasons. Only Melbourne could win two more games than the season before and put in a leas enjoyable yeah. I've felt genuinely angry like 5 times this year. It's tiring. Today was the kind of game loser clubs lose. We're the new Richmond. It made me cringe when I heard they were upbeat in the rooms. You just got pansied by a team with nothing to play with and you're upbeat? Get [censored]!

That's season.

I might be overrated WC but they'll win by 5-6 goals imo.

Petracca had 23 touches kicked 2 goals and had 8 score involvements. ANB kicked 2 goals and similar game to Trac. They both arguably kept us in it. Way too lenient on Jones and Hunt. They were both awful.

The year is on the edge of being a failure. We're 4 years into another rebuild. West Coast will blitz Adelaide by 6-7 goals tomorrow. This will be a colassal failure. Jones, Watts, Tommy Mac, Tyson, Harmes, all need to be used as trade bait. I'm sick of perennial losers stinking it up and costing us when a big game is on the line. I could handle a mid season loss. Today was the final straw. Get rid of these [censored] hacks.

What a major disappointment.

Time left?

Strangely, we outnumber Collingwood supporters today. By a fair margin.

Aaaaand that's season. Jones' body language says it all. Hands on hips. Head down.

Can't see us winning.

Grundy was alone for 30 seconds.