Adam The God

This exchange is probably my favourite one. Gave me a good Sunday morning laugh.

Love Southland, much better than the hell hole that is Chaddy.

Any of those the same muppets, the smug ones that thought they'd win easily prior to the match? So glad we beat that mob. One of my best mates is St Kilda, so that will do me very nicely, thank you very much.

That throws out our forward structure. If they're making a change, it's Melksham for Fritsch. I wouldn't be rushing Fritsch back though. I'd look at Harmes for Jones. I'd keep Pickett in the side. I'd also look at Corey Wagner or ANB too. Pickett may well get rested for the 4 day break and come in for the Freo game.

Really looking forward to the post comments, @Queanbeyan Demon. ?

Leadership this year. Brilliant. I really liked the 'we're nowhere'. That's the way it should be. And that sort of talk should resonate through the group and encourage them to keep pushing until the very end.

Gee, it was good kicking straight. Weideman and Petracca nailing the goals that they did were clutch. Fritsch will have a bit of trouble getting back into the team with his unreliable kicking, lofty 13 tackles and 11 1%ers for the year.

Well, not in part. They were bombing it in because they couldn't get through the zone. Whereas, we didn't have as many inside 50s because we kept turning it over at half forward. I'm not saying it was a flawless performance, but our team defence was outstanding. Agreed. And maybe the players implemented the plan this week too? Had we brought tonight's pressure last week, we win. I reckon they got at least 2 of their 7 goals from free kicks or lucky decisions that went their way and then led to goals.

I look at the 1%ers here - https://afltables.com/afl/stats/2020s.html Haven't updated them yet. Not sure about pressure acts though.

And yet he still says nothing about the game. No comment. Just that we won.

You're kidding, right? May was apart of the team was he not? He's part of our defensive set up. Our defensive system completely smothered their only game - run and gun off half back. That's Goodwin's plan to beat Ratten's one dimensional plan. The players executed, as they did against Collingwood.

Turn overs were dreadful. This is the area of our game we need to clean up. Clean those up, bring consistent effort like most of tonight and we take the next step.

I've read a lot of posts now saying how good the backline was, and yes, they were brilliant, but we play 18 man defence FFS. It was a team effort. We had stand out performances in May, Petracca and arguably Langdon too, but the team defended the ground and prevented constant slingshot most of the night.

Go you bloody Redlegs! Stick that one up you, half of Demonland! We totally took away their game and they had no answers. Everyone bangs on about how good Ratten is, made no moves at all on May, stuck to his plan (as most modern coaches do) and King wasn't good enough on May, who was utterly dominant bar two moments where he was outmuscled. Our defenders and defensives systems totally bossed them. Utterly choked them. Take a bow, Steven May. The best game he's played for the club, by some way. He's had a really great season. I'm happy for him. Lever was a handy support player. Oscar... vulnerable. Oliver did some important running early in the game, but didn't come into the game until the last. Showed what a competitor he is. Loved that moment in the last where he burst away from the contest and hit the next target. Petracca was incredible in the 1v1s and 1v4s(!), let them score one easy goal from the centre stoppage with poor defensive marking, otherwise he and May were the difference. That match winning goal was Dustin Martinesque. For all the talk about Butler, did a couple of nice things, but our systems didn't let him do it often enough and he only got it 11 times. Some really important stopping from Viney in midfield. Didn't get it a lot but his defensive role around the stoppage was vital. I was wrong there. Glad we played him midfield tonight. If he's going to play midfield, I reckon he needs to play the defensive role, unless Oliver is quiet. Langdon's run was great as usual, as was Hibberd's, before injuring himself. Rivers is a really impressive young player. Great poise, toughness and good ball use. Well done, Jason Taylor. Another Taylor Special. After a slow start, Wagner worked into the game and was well positioned a number of times, and ended up being a handy contributor. I think one of Salem's best games for the club. Really solid in defence. Good ball use. Spargo laid a couple of really important tackles at key moments. That last tackle near the final siren to ensure we got the stoppage and it didn't ping back the other way was massive. I thought Hannan and Kozzie really struggled, although Kozzie at least laid some tackles. Still, we didn't let their half backs zip off half back. I disagree with the sentiment that we had a lot of passengers. Hannan didn't do enough and Kozzie tries to be too fancy instead of taking the game on, but other than that we put in a really solid 3.5 quarter effort. I also disagree with what Jordan Lewis said after the game, about neither side really getting their game going. What we delivered tonight is our game. Our mids weren't on the top of their game, but they defended really well in tandem with our defenders and our forwards. We're developing ways of winning when our stoppage game is taken away from us. And that's team defence. And we beat another side who beat us in the clearances and inside 50s. Exactly as we did to Collingwood and very similar to what we did to Brisbane. The tackle count is a really interesting stat too. They beat us in that 36-47, so it was all about the defensive zones and how well set up we were. Every time they looked up, they wanted to go off half back, but couldn't. Every time they tried to switch, the zone migrated quickly across the ground. The players need to bring this every week. The game style wins finals. It's now up to this group to bring the effort consistently.

Because we haven't allowed them to play their only game, which is run off half back. We're not winning enough CP. I fear Hibberd down means we'll run out of steam. His attack off half back has been good.

Petracca needs to go through the midfield now.

Oliver has been trash fire in this game. Worst game I've seen him play.

His kick to Clarry that cost us a goal earlier was absolutely the right move, and Clarry went one-handed. That goal was totally on Oliver, not on Jones. Oliver looks low on confidence tonight.

We totally took their one game away from them and then Jones kicks across goal, in between two Demons, goal and completely swings the momentum. The play before that, we have them totally covered and Jack Viney clumsily hits Phillips above the neck, soft, but free kick. Goal.

I'd go one step further and say it relies on pressure across the ground. If our mids are off, it doesn't matter how much our forwards are bringing and the opposite is probably true as well.

Whilst speed is helpful against us, it's stoppage set ups and pressure around the ball that really counts. We get done on the spread, which is a work rate thing more than pace. We also fail to pressure outside runners adequately around contested situations. IMO the speed is handy, but it's overplayed in the case of discussing our game. Our biggest hurdle is consistency. We're horribly inconsistent. If we bring the required work rate today we'll win, if we don't, we'll lose. As simple as that.

Fair enough. I disagree that we needed to inject those you mentioned just to add pace to the side. Either the forwards and mids bring enough pressure or it won't matter. We clearly wanted attack off half back so brought in Wagner and Rivers, and Jones will add pressure forward of centre. Tomlinson will move to the wing. pushing AVB forward to add pressure with Jones. Our game IMO is based on 18 players running hard both ways and our mids and half backs using the ball well from stoppage or contested situations.

Fair enough. I'd debate that Bedford is fast though. I'm not against playing Hunt on a wing, but clearly he has been an inconsistent performer over the journey. As for Bennell, he's not involved enough and Baker is a young guy trying to develop his game in the 2s. There's nothing wrong with that. It's a standard development path. I think it'd be stupid to just play fast players simply because they're fast, if they're not going to get involved or be accountable to the way the team wants to play. I reckon Bedford will definitely see another game this year. It's just about consistent performance and the spot will open up. Particularly, given the condensed fixturing ahead.

I expected nothing else. They are one of the most arrogant clubs and for a club that's literally won a single flag, they haven't even made the finals for a decade and their supporters are talking Grand Finals. Are you serious? They also lack the self awareness to say something like 'stop Petracca, Oliver and Gawn and they have nothing'. Well, that's close to our whole starting midfield. Which superstars are we stopping from St Kilda? I'm normally not phased by what opposition supporters say on other forums, but there's always an arrogance to St Kilda supporters. I can think of 4 or 5 times where I've had run ins with their deeply smarmy supporters too. It'd be nice to shut them up and see them crumble and tumble out of the 8 from here. And also, no, there's very insight in all of those points.

I'm not sure I see the logic there mate. When he was 19 you wanted him and now that he's 21 you don't? He's precisely the sort of player that could add forward half pressure and dynamism that we lack IMO.