Adam The God

So is the plan too difficult to execute consistently? (I don't want to sound like too much of a broken record, but...)

That's because Port's tackling and frontal pressure across their half forward completely breaks down here. And then the zone is too slow to roll back to protect the middle of the ground and leaves the defence wide open, and space in our forwardline. It does show that the modern game is very much one of percentages. Drop your guard for a few seconds and it can be up the other end for a score against you.

Do you post when we win? Serious question. I don't recall reading much of you when we win.

Appreciate what you're passing on mate, that said I pretty much the exact same thing on how to beat us in the post match thread, of which I am not the first to do so. To use a bit of a footy cliche, Blind Freddie could tell us this. The point I disagree on is that our mids fall into double grabbers, poor kills or poor decision makers, at least anymore than most other inside mids in the competition. Notwithstanding last night, Oliver is a one grab player whose decision making is usually pretty sound (he's being made to kick more to take him to the next level - talks of trading him are the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard), Petracca has clearly improved his skill execution and therefore his decision making is looking better. Viney? Maybe, but on his night he is elite and has done it in big finals games, so I reckon the criticism of our midfield is rubbish. So I will be one of the voices of dissidence here, because I still believe in this midfield. What they turned in last night was pathetic, but the forwards weren't much better either. But what has become increasingly clear over time is that the system Goodwin wants us to play is unsustainable and the team has never been able to master any level of consistency of it over 3 years and almost half a season.

Well, there's the nail in the coffin, @Elegt. You're on the same page as the mighty O. Time to pack up shop. In terms of constructive criticism. I think Taylor's done a pretty good job, particularly with our earlier picks.

I tell my old man this all the time and he apologises profusely. My wife is pregnant and we've had an agreement for years that our children will support Melbourne, not her Hawthorn. So I'm sure it will be a cyclical event unless we finally win a flag.

It doesn't have to be all baby out with the bathwater stuff. I'd look at our midfield coach, I'd like at our forward coach / or ball movement, and the head coach.

Well, if you have watched the video with Burgo on the MFC website prior to yesterday's match, it's pretty clear that our fitness guys thought we had the legs in us. Burgo seemed to intimate that he had to convince the guys that they had the legs in them and that if we got the mental stuff right, we'd be fine, given the amount of kms we'd done over pre season and then the COVID mini pre season. I reckon a lot of last night was above the shoulders.

It's just a pity we have such a dominant ruckman in a way, because I agree. If you look at Nankervis or even Boyd when he was at the Bulldogs, McEvoy at Hawthorn, it's the one position that the powerhouses have never really had. Even Geelong with Ottens. I take it that Ben Matthews is entirely our midfield coach now, given Plapp is forward coach. We might need to look at this area, from a coaching personnel perspective, because McCartney was very good in this area and getting stoppages right.

See, this to me is shutting up shop. If the opposition exploits your strength, you have to look at how they and why they're exploiting that strength. If just about your entire game plan is based around this strength, then maybe the game plan is too one dimensional? Surely it'd be better to look at ways of making our strength more of a strength, not just avoiding it by not using it. Completely agree with your last paragraph though. They are all moves I'd make as well. They align with the one time we've been reasonably consistent as a team (ie 2018). I think if we know we're likely to get first hands to the stoppage, we need not rush our next disposal. Just keep resetting until we can get a cleaner clearance. Make the opposition have to revert to a plan B to get their hands on it. The new form of possession game. I'm sure this is too overly simplified, but we still undoubtedly have a dominance in Max. Therefore, let's go less attacking in terms of stoppage set ups, which enable us to defend or flip the switch to attack if appropriate.

Absolutely agree. Staggered they kept him after 2018, where it was clear he had no position and had slowed down in midfield stints as well. I still maintain I would have preferred Lewis continuing than Jones after last year, if it was about keeping some experience on the list. Which is the better experience though? A guy who's been at a club that's achieved nothing or a guy who's won 4 flags? Pretty easy choice for mine.

I think everyone has worked us out. I don't think Port are a particularly good side. We fumbled and fumbled early in the peace last night (never seen Oliver so sloppy - I'm not talking about his kicking, I'm talking about his fumbling of the ball) when the game was still absolutely there for the taking. Oliver kicks that one at quarter time and we're two goals down after being pathetic all quarter. But we made Port look like a top side. I think in the wash up, they'll end up being the equivalent of a top 6 team, but who knows, in a year when there are no stand out teams, maybe they'll make a prelim or a grand final. I doubt it though. As for us, we haven't tweaked enough since 2018. Yeah, we've brought in May and now Lever is fit, but what game style changes have we made in two years? At a point, you've gotta go, nope, this plan isn't working, let's try something else. There's no doubt Goodwin is coaching for his career here, but what other ideas does he have to implement other than let's win contested footy and convert that into scoreboard pressure?

I'd agree with this if I'd seen us slingshotting backwards and forwards. We didn't. With the exception of Langdon, no one worked into space all night. So we can't then blame the hard gut running we're doing forward of the ball when we turn it over. I think what you point out could be more applicable to us losing to Richmond or Geelong, but last night, we didn't slingshot either way. Agree with the dumbness of our play last night. Bringing McDonald into the side along with still playing Jackson and Weideman, I'm sure our FD were hoping our guys would use those taller guys as outlets more often than simply kicking to Max every time down the line. Absolutely agree with this. I've no sure way of knowing this other than results and what I see with my eyes on game day, but our guys seem to be comfortable with a couple of weeks of effort in a row and then they'll have a week or two off. This has been a Melbourne cultural thing for as long as I can remember and to me, it speaks to the vacuum of leadership at the club.

There are certainly more ways teams can beat us than ways we can beat them, that's for sure.

I reckon we have 2 plans. One is fully formed but one dimensional and the other is half baked and inconsistent. Plan A is contested, clearance footy as we all know. The half baked plan B is where we go long down the line to a contest with crumbers at the foot of the pack (see Richmond’s ball movement), with a wave of support runners or we look to hit up short passes from centre wing towards half forward. It is very rare that we get that last part right, i.e. short passes from centre wing towards half forward. We don't work hard enough or take the game on enough. Teams know this is an area of weakness and if they play 1v1 in a cluster, we won’t look to switch or use the ground to its full width. We were big on angles a few seasons ago, but we’ve never been good on width and we also (for mine) lose patience too quickly. Our kicking over 20-30m is also too inconsistent to play the chipping game Clarkson made so famous and successful. I do think Collingwood showed you don’t have to have brilliant kickers if you’ve got players who are prepared to work hard into space though. The problem with our brand is it is so labour-intensive in winning the ball in the first place, when we do then we don’t have the legs to work into space, with the exception of Langdon. It’s a massive problem and I think we got too cute with selection. Tomlinson’s running power is absolutely needed for the modern game and particularly our game style. I don’t think teams worked us out in the prelim, I think teams knew how to beat us prior to that game, we just managed to bring the pressure in the games we won (those finals against Geelong and Hawthorn, our pressure was excellent). But as soon as our pressure drops even 10%, we’re in trouble. If it drops off even more and we fail to lay tackles like last night, we get mauled. I think it’s too simplistic to say we have no plan B, but I reckon Plan A is too flawed and one dimensional.

This is a systems fault thing IMO. The system is too labour-intensive. Even with our alleged fitness increase, there's not enough room for error. It's all well and good to play the forward territory battle, but I just don't think the plan being sold is sustainable over four quarters, for 22 games a season. Even in our most dominant performance this year, we couldn't sustain it for all 4 quarters. Some of this is concentration, some of it is stupid errors leaving our defence open, and we do go into our shells too easily, but this is year 4 of Goodwin and he's still tinkering with the best side and trying to implement the tempo game to very limited success. Last night was mostly on the players, but for me it simply highlights the deficiencies within Goodwin's game plan and his communication.

You wouldn't. It was poor.

That's clearly not a comment on coaching then is it? He's talking about the players refusing to take the game on.

Wow, poor effort this post. So patronising and gendered. Would you dismiss Saty by calling him dad?

I spent the breaks watching Simpsons season 9 as I couldn't bear to listen to the commentary, but I've just seen the article and accompanying video in the Herald Sun that has Gary rightly giving the club at a whack at half time. It also has Jonathan Brown's comments about Round 1 2019 and that the players wanted to show something, instead Brown said we served up 'crap'. He's spot on and the blow torch needs to fire up. How could Melbourne players accept their vice captain last year being whacked repeatedly to the ground and roughed up without anyone flying the flag and then in the return game the following year, we don't come out amd hit them. We serve up arguably our worst performance since the 2018 prelim. It speaks to a worrying lack of leadership and that old soft under belly returning again. And I tell you what, there's no way a Clarkson side would let that happen.

Yep, thought that play was horrendous and is an example of when May panics. This is something that I've been pointing out for a few weeks now. He needs to get better under pressure. Having now watched that video with him post match, I like seeing him [censored] off. We need our guys showing a little bit of profession pride. Let's hope it's on the bloody football field next time.

I missed it too, because I'd turned off the train wreck, but if someone could let me know what was said, it would be much appreciated.

It was interesting seeing Jones very obviously decide not to handball to Viney when he was free on the outside at one point tonight. It was very noticeable.

I reckon Clarkson could get our midfield playing like his '08 midfield. They're similar in many respects. I'm not convinced Alastair has any new tricks left, but his current list is ordinary. I don't think comparing his current list with our list is that apt and that if he had a better list, he'd get more out of them. See Hawthorn's ordinary list in 2018.

You're having a big night, aren't you? Might be time to pop off to bed. Langdon wasn't our worst tonight. Reckon he was probably in our top 5 or 6.