Adam The God

Yep, if we can get a first rounder for Weideman, I'd do it. But that's by the by. Brown should be in the side for the rest of the year. Sam shouldn't get another look in. injury permitting. I'm not convinced that's quite right. Gus definitely played some wing and JJ definitely played some half forward. I'll have to watch the replay again.

It's still terrible coaching. BBB could have kicked 20 past outing against them. You play two defenders on him then, not your best interceptor. Dumb, dumb coaching.

Jack had a great pressure game, but some posters value ball use and decision making too. For the most Jack's ball use was terrible. But higher TOG and working his way back, if he plays the pressure game and stays within his limitations, he'll be a valuable asset to our midfield. If his pressure is down at all, like it was last week, and his ball use continues to be ordinary, he's a liability. I don't think anyone can deny that. Actually, this is a great call. I had him pegged as a bit of a Brad Sewell clone, but I think he's cleaner than Sewell and can totally see the Selwood comparisons.

Haha, you beat me to this mate. Bizarre coaching.

Oh and then he even had him in the ruck. Maybe we should try Lever in the ruck... ?

Also, wtf was Hinkley doing with Aliir? Firstly, he starts his best interceptor on Ben Brown. That's a win for Melbourne as they lose his intercepting. Then he moves Aliir forward...? Mind blowingly poor coaching.

Oliver, Petracca, Jordon, Viney and Harmes. If they click, look out. I have a funny feeling it's not far off.

Is 19 tackles inside 50 a record for us? Well done, Redlegs. We forced the game on our terms constantly and Brown’s inclusion despite not kicking one, had a brilliant flow on effect to the rest of the forwardline. It wasn't a perfect game from Ben as he was pushed under it a few times, but I thought for the most part he was outstanding. Petracca probably could/should have kicked 5. Ended up being a mammoth game. Max's best game in the ruck all season IMO. Oliver was brilliant too. McDonald was clutch and put everything together tonight. Petty, May and Lever were terrific. Viney's pressure was up, but his decision making and ball use too many times is a real liability IMV. Harmes improved as the game went on but he is another Viney. I think we need to persist with Viney and Harmes in the team together, because if they click, our midfield is going to be unstoppable. I was confident going into tonight and I'm glad I was right. A massive massive win. Let's hope the Bulldogs and Geelong slip up this week.

We clearly set ourselves for this game, didn't we? JJ back up to 75% too, and this week it was time for Rivers, Spargo and Jackson to play limited minutes.

Any particular reason why?

I would have [censored] us last year. We didn't turn up in that Port game. He's looked decidedly average this year IMV. I'd back Petty to take him.

I watched the Port v Suns game a few weeks ago and saw Gray injure his knee. Hadn't realised he'd gone in for surgery though. With him missing and Boak in doubt, with Butters no certainty to come back in, at the very least coming back from injury, it has to tip the scales our way. How much do our guys want to make a statement about our 2020 loss to Port too? Given Port's forward set up is anchored around Dixon, if we keep him quiet, you'd have to think that'll go a long way towards us winning.

We lost by a point and Fritsch missed from the goal square.

Players seem to have a very myopic view of other teams and he may not have seen their decline coming...

Completely agree. We needed to handball and break lines to break open the zone, but didn't. To your point about our foot skills being poor in our losses, I'd say our goal kicking in all of those games has been woeful and is the key reason we haven't snatched those games when the rest of our game has otherwise been off. The Adelaide game Fritsch missed two from essentially the square and the Collingwood and GWS losses saw us miss regulation shots we were getting earlier in the year. I remember many of us, myself include, saying earlier in the season that our goalkicking would eventually cost us games this year. IMO, it's now cost us three wins and almost cost us the Essendon game too. That said, there's no doubt that Geelong and particularly the Bulldogs are wonderful kicking sides. Not sure Port are though. Brisbane have some wonderful kickers like McLuggage for example, but also have some pretty ho hums distributors by foot that are no better or worse than our mids like Zorko, Neale and Robinson. I hope you're right about the training loads, rather than it merely being just TOG management. There's no doubt we've struggled physically and intensity wise since the Brisbane game. I don't think it's a case of being the hunted, although maybe that's a mental and even physical toll that we're not giving enough weight to here. I think it was Salem who mentioned in his post match interview that it's good being a team at the top, because we need to experience this as a group. I feel like Goodwin has said similar things, so perhaps the mental has bogged us down too?

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