Adam The God

Didn't offer enough AUDs, hey? Brayshaw is very good above his head and structurally understands where to be now, and that took some timr. I worry that it might take Rivers some time to get back up to speed, let alone does he have the tank, and then is Bowey as good defensively as Rivers?

I felt Jack was poor defensively in the Essendon game. Not at stoppage, but in transition. Got caught in the wrong position 2 or 3 times that cost us scores. I'm sure this was down to a lack of fitness, but if that's the case, he should have been eased back. I'll trust the professional medicos, and it's extremely clear that internally he is rated highly by our coaches, but I find Jack a bit of an enigma. He can bring some excellent attributes to our midfield and he has played some of the great games I've seen from a Melbourne player in 30 years, but his great games might be 2 or 3 a season, and then the majority of his games are middling to ordinary performances around that IMO. Do we use Viney as more of a burst player now that he's 27 with a banged up body, or do we finally looking at playing him more forward? I'd love to know if he played more forward time earlier in the year. It felt like we'd got a bit of a better balance in our midfield in the first few games, because he'd rest forward and attend forward stoppages, but maybe I was just imaging there was more forward time?

I worry about Bowey coming in to a big finals like atmosphere, but maybe we could try him against a Hawthorn? Flirting with form, I know. I think Bowey is being groomed as a Salem back up, but Hunt's position is probably his other go to.

When we look our best, we definitely have Rivers, Hunt and even Hibberd running off half back, but we can afford to hold those guys deeper if we can use our wingers quick enough, particularly Langdon. I'd love to know if the opposition are playing closer attention to Langdon. It's felt like it the last two weeks in particular. When we don't have his run, we don't tend to move the ball quickly. I agree with Leppitsch though. This was a big problem on Saturday. We constantly needed to handball to break the zone open. The few times that we did, we scored or got easy entries. If we're on against Port, you'll see us use handball a lot more to break open the zone.

Yep, exactly.

I've been a long time Viney critic, but I wouldn't be writing him off just yet. I reckon he'll play higher TOG against Port and lay 8+ tackles.

Didn't someone post that Cerra has agreed to terms with Richmond already? If he has, I wonder if he's rethinking those terms after the last few weeks.

Being at the ground, it seemed to me that if he was looking at the goals in order to kick towards them, it would have been hard to miss Trac standing there.

Yeah, which goes to my point about his decision making. I reckon a better decision maker gets his head up and spots up Petracca.

I don't think playing Petracca in the middle less will help our stoppage inconsistencies though. But I do agree that he's better as a burst mid like Martin. I'm not sure defending is his go at stoppages. Not for large portions of the game anyway. Maybe I've contradicted myself there? :P

Yep, good stuff. I think I agree RE mids tiring. I'm convinced we're using our carefully managed TOG to load within games though, rather than loading during training. I was going through the TOGs of all our young players (Spargo, Jordon, Sparrow, Kozzy) at quarter time on the weekend using the AFL ap and they'd all played approximately 50% of the first quarter. Looking at the stats by the end of the game, they looked like this: Sparrow (55%), Jordon (65%), Kozzy (67%), Spargo (71%) and Rivers (73%), with Harmes (72%) and Gus (75%). Viney had 77% TOG, having had 74% his first week back, so they're ramping him up for a big game this week, I'd say. In Round 10, Jordon had TOG of 59% (the loss to Adelaide) and still managed to lay a staggering 9 tackles. His TOG in that game seems to be a strategic decision in the lead up to the Bulldogs and then Brisbane games. In Round 9 against Carlton he played 73%. Against Bulldogs he played 70%, then up to 86% against Brisbane (as a wingman) and then back down to 57% the following week again Collingwood. We then had the bye and he played 62% (our second lowest TOG that day) against Essendon and 65% against GWS. Going from how we played him against the Bulldogs and Brisbane, and off a 5 day break, I'd expect him to play 70%+ this week. And while I'm on Jordon, his tackling pressure around the ball was super important through the first 11 rounds (he didn't lay a tackle against Brisbane, playing 86% TOG as a wingman, which I'm sure was more about keeping his width) and has plateaued since, only laying 5 tackles since the Bulldogs game. He was getting 5 or 6 tackles a week earlier in the season. Whilst Viney gives us good tackling around the ball, he's not as smart or as clean at Jordon and I think this is really impacting on our midfield as Jordon's dip in tackling numbers have coincided with lesser performances against Collingwood, Essendon and GWS. It's not all on JJ of course, but his tackling support to Oliver, Petracca and Harmes/Viney is vital and made us the defensive beast we were earlier in the season. But back to the TOG stuff. We've been managing Rivers in a similar way to Jordon. Against Adelaide he had 74% TOG, down from 81% against Carlton. For the Bulldogs match, he was up again at 85% TOG (I'd suggest we wanted to keep continuity in our back 6 for that game), and then against Brisbane he was back down again at 71% TOG and 67% against Collingwood. We then had the bye and he played only 70% against Essendon and 73% against GWS. I reckon he'll be up in the 80%+ this week against Port. It seems clear this is how we're managing 3 to 4 players a week from about Round 13 onwards, so it could point to our patchy form since then. Sparrow is playing very low TOG. Jordon, Spargo and Rivers are all being managed through this middle part of the season. Add the inclusions throughout the middle part of the season with Weideman, Brown, Viney and Harmes (who all had interrupted pre seasons or early injuries this year) who have all had carefully managed TOG. This means that Lever, May, Langdon, Gawn and Petracca are playing very high TOG every week to compensate for these younger players and the guys coming back into the team. It could well be impacting their performances. Even from a concentration levels perspective. If Gawn and Petracca are regularly playing 90% TOG as mids and resting forwards, I wonder if it's impacting on their focus at stoppages? Who knows, I doubt even the players can be quite sure what impact their TOG is having, but it's no doubt that we're managing loads throughout games. Apparently Goodwin has said we haven't been managing loads, so I presume he means training loads, so it'll be interesting to see whether Jordon, Spargo and Rivers can return to some form over the coming weeks. We desperately need them to if we're going to finish top 2 or top 4.

He burnt him. He was going for goal and the kick was nowhere near Trac who was in the other pocket. He just didn't see him or decided to take it on himself.

Surely you're not saying Jack has a high footy IQ? His decision making is repeatedly ordinary. In answer to the OP too, I'd be playing him 70% forward and 30% midfield, but I've been saying this for at least 12 months, and I doubt it'll happen.

For mine he still plays his way, which at times exposes our zonal set up, but long time critic, so take with a grain of salt. Jordon's tackling was far more important for our first 11 rounds than anything Viney has brought this year. I also think Harmes' effectiveness is reduced with Viney in the side, but I acknowledge Jack can at times play a pivotal role in setting intensity levels amongst our group. I think some overrate his presence though.

Bowey has spent the entire year playing back. He won't suddenly be brought in to play forward.

One tackle is Fritsch level stuff average wise, but Spargo, along with the rest of the forwards and mids had a poor defensive game yesterday. I guess we disagree that Melksham would provide more. Unless Melksham kicks 2 or 3 he's a liability by comparison to Spargo whose contested work is good. Each to their own I guess.

You'd bring in a good ball user who doesn't tackle for a good ball user who does tackle? I concur on Brown for Sparrow, but if you want to get Melksham into the team, it has to be at the expense of Fritsch. Another guy who doesn't tackle. This week I'd give Fritsch and Brown another go as our deepest pair. Melksham should have to work really hard to earn back his spot.

The main reason IMV that the Bulldogs are judged differently this year to us is that they won the flag in 2016 and it's got a bit of the Hawks 2008 vs 2013-2015 about it. That's why the likes of King are trying to tip a Bulldogs dynasty. But as you say, the Bulldogs' defensive system and personnel isn't good enough. Their midfield is excellent, but there should be questions at both ends of the ground for them.

I posted this in the Time To Panic thread, but it's just as relevant here: We dominated the Bulldogs and smashed Brisbane in the second half. They're our two biggest threats at this stage. They sit 1st and 3rd. We're certainly not pretenders. Pretenders are football teams that smack the lowly sides and struggle against the top sides. I'd put Port, Bulldogs and maybe even Geelong in this category, based on their performances this year. We've simply not turned up mentally for our three losses to much lower ranked teams and yet we could have won all of them in the last quarter. Are we a chance to slip out of the top 4 at the end of the season? Yes. Do I think we will? No. I'd expect us to beat Port, so it'll be interesting to see how we go. As for the Bulldogs, they've had a dream draw and one of their toughest assignments was West Coast in Perth and they ended up playing to a vacant house. Very lucky. I think the Bulldogs will come unstuck. Every time they've been challenged this year they've crumbled.

We dominated the Bulldogs and smashed Brisbane in the second half. They're our two biggest threats at this stage. They sit 1st and 3rd. We're certainly not pretenders. Pretenders are football teams that smack the lowly sides and struggle against the top sides. I'd put Port, Bulldogs and maybe even Geelong in this category, based on their performances this year. We've simply not turned up mentally for our three losses to much lower ranked teams and yet we could have won all of them in the last quarter. Are we a chance to slip out of the top 4 at the end of the season? Yes. Do I think we will? No. I'd expect us to beat Port, so it'll be interesting to see how we go. As for the Bulldogs, they've had a dream draw and one of their toughest assignments was West Coast in Perth and they ended up playing to a vacant house. Very lucky. I think the Bulldogs will come unstuck. Every time they've been challenged this year they've crumbled.

I reckon Mitch is a chance to replace McDonald if he keeps kicking around corners. Ben Brown will straighten us up and take pressure off Tom and Fritsch. We'll be alright.

It doesn't make much sense to me. If they were only going to play Brown a half at Casey, why didn't they just select him for AFL this week? I thought they were holding him off as a loading exercise, but it doesn't seem to make much sense.

We were horrible in clearance today, but where it was lost was the ease of clearance against. In other words, our post clearance pressure was disastrous. No one wants to lose clearance by 15, but despite what some say, that doesn't have to be a big issue if our mids can immediately force the game onto our terms by pressuring the clearance and ensuring there isn't a clean takeaway. However, the number of times we let them get clean clearance was not good enough and it completely exposes your defence. GWS mids were very clean by hand today and we fumbled everything. Post clearance is the stat that really matters.

Given the top tier was closed off, I could have sworn there was at least 20k there today. Bizarre really to see 16k flash up on the screen. And as usual, we were loud for the amount that was there.

Although I think Brown should play next week, that's two weeks in a row that we've had 10 or more marks inside 50 with a smaller forwardline. So we actually lowered the eyes well on a number of occasions, particularly early in today's game. Our forwards couldn't convert. That was the problem. Petracca, Fritsch and McDonald all missed simple shots that they would normally get. A quick further word on McDonald. He is a supremely frustrating player. His confidence is clearly shot off the back of only one or two poor games. That's all that it's taken to have our best set shot kick attempting that stupid snap around the corner. He was never going to kick that. It was always going to the left. We're now in an unfortunate but near desperate position of needing Brown to take the first/best defender and allowing McDonald to play second fiddle and Fritsch third. McDonald is far too inconsistent and flakey to be relied upon in big finals. I'm sure others have already written such things this year about Tom, but I was hoping a guy whose career is on the line at 28, could put a consistent 22 game season together. He won't. And now we must rely on a Ben Brown, who might take a few weeks to get up to speed again, to take the heat so McDonald can recapture some kind of form. And damn we miss Kozzy's creativeness and forward pressure. When he's absent we lack forward spark.