Adam The God

Is that you OD? Have you taken over Ernest's account?

Yeah, I wouldn't say he's quick, but he's another option for that third tall role, which tells me that they don't think Hore can get the job done. He's probably got more toe than Hore though and he'll need that given Essendon's quicker forwardline. Wagner's strengths for me is he does take the game on as you've said, runs with it and can play a sweeping role that turns into offence. He's not my preferred back, but he'd be ahead of Hore and the reinvented backman-turned-forward Joel Smith. His kicking is a little iffy, but I like his composure. As for Petracca, I'm glad he's kept his spot. He got to the right places last week. I'm glad they're backing him in to rediscover some form. I reckon he'll click this year. Bookmark it.

Disagree. The same plan won Richmond and the Bulldogs a flag. It's not a garbage plan, particularly when you have such a dominant ruckman and midfield. The debatable point for me is whether we've built a list that actually compliments that midfield and game style. I'm beginning to feel that we need to invent our own style that uses the midfield dominance, but doesn't hand the opposition a slingshot back the other way to their own attack.

It felt like the last two seasons under Goody his selection views usually aligned with mine, but now that he's doggedly sticking to the game style he wants us to play, the selection is becoming less aligned with how I would pick the team. But he's the professional. I too though, worry that we won't have enough pace at ground level and surely, even though Jeffy can struggle defensively and physically at times, he can't possibly be any worse than an ANB. I think we should have picked Jeff, but maybe he didn't quite get up? All speculation.

I still disagree. We lose and he says, we have nowhere to hide. I don't see how this is a bad thing or how his comments are going to hurt. If anything, it should drive our group to thrive, not drown.

I disagree. His comments resonate with me. I don't want to hear him come out and make excuses. He's saying there are none and that's what I want to hear from him. I'm sick of our mob from Gawn down, talking the talk in the media and then not backing it up. Jeez, poor old Goody can't do much more. Damned if you do, damned if you don't stuff.

Interesting that Wellman and West are the two that are probably the most compelling bits of testimony, and both of those guys are outsiders, with allegiances at other clubs.

Glad to see original OD is back. The end of last year and all that positivity from you was unsettling. You add a bit of negative balance to things.

Our kids did dominate their mids in the middle, but their mids ran harder and used the ball better when they got it, hence the 80 point loss. I don't think we can paper over this fact.

Agreed to some extent, but I like the media getting stuck into us, because it means there's expectations and rightly so. Lift your game MFC.

Sorry to digress here, but why can't we edit posts anymore?

We're all frustrated mate. I think as a few have no observed, fitness is playing quite a part in this. The ability to keep your feet is reduced if you're not fit enough. It's painful to point us things like fitness because it never seems to effect other teams like it has us, but @rjay posted a good article the other from Clarkson in 2009/2010. The article talked about the difficulty of having so many pre season operations at the end of their premiership year and he said that it impacted their ability to back up their title defence. I'm sure we hoped we'd be able to be around abouts, but at this stage 2019 does not look like a realistic year for a premiership tilt. But who knows. Collingwood (with a simple draw mind you) came back from An ordinary start to last year too. We'll know if finals is a possibility this Saturday morning.

A lot cleaner means they hit up targets and were clean in possession. What do you think it means? I was referencing Salem being used as an outside player and that without gut-running and clean ball-handling, a player like won't be much use. Of course their frontal pressure was better than ours in off the square and in the midfield, and in our forward 50, where they constantly pushed us wide or made us kick to contests that could easily be spoiled or halved. I've said all this before. You're clearly taking umbrage to the rain comment, which was made in reference to Salem''s ability to be clean by hand in order to receive on the outside. I made no reference to any other players...

They were a lot cleaner and better structured. That's why they won the game.

I'm not entirely sure to be honest. Salem is rarely a player I notice, although I love his attributes. The rain was pretty oppressive and made ball-handling difficult. Playing an outside role needed real gut running and I'm not sure any of our guys have that yet. I don't think Salem has anyway.

We are playing exactly the same game style as last season.

He was solid throughout the match. I can't recall him losing a 1v1. It was a bit of a Nev Jetta performance but he was playing tall.

It's the complete opposite of what you were saying mate. You implied a bunch of our supporter base has a lack of mental resilience if we have a problem with the loss. PD was saying something very different.

If he can't get a game this year, I'd say he'll be delisted. We desperately need outside run, so it'll say everything if he can't get into the team.

I think the pattern is simply about taking your chances when presented. I maintain that had ANB goalled twice last week, we'd have been almost out of sight and it's a different game. Had Fritsch kicked that one in the third against Geelong, it's game on. It's certainly not an 80 point loss. The last two or even three seasons against Richmond has seen us completely dominant the territory battle in the first quarter and fail to put that dominance on the scoreboard. Richmond have got out the back for various reasons (defence being too high and aggressive last year) and have taken their limited opportunities. That's what good sides do. We see so often in modern footy, a team completely dominate the other, but fail to put in on the scoreboard (and thus put on scoreboard pressure), and eventually the opposition take it down the other end and kick an easy goal with limited entries. It breaks spirit and fails to put pressure on the opposition. Start taking more of those chances and these patterns won't occur.

We disagree then. But remember you did a go at me and others. It reminded me of how the bearded deals with people too. And I'd say, the way we fell away to Richmond was a bad sign. And the way we struggled to run out the game against Brisbane was a bad sign. The writing was on the wall, as @rjay aptly put it. I agree with everything here.

Maybe in 2020 mate.

Look, I agree with this too. I think a side that wins the clearances and inside 50s as we do, certainly doesn't represented a bottom 8-6 side. We just need to tidy up our structures and ball use, and we'll beat a lot more sides. (Yes, over simplification, but you get my drift).

No, I don't mistake it. We all process things differently. As I said in another thread, my tendency in the moment is to get incredibly frustrated and to blow off steam. But it then doesn't take me long to want to analyse where it all went wrong and how we can change things next week. That's how I deal with it and I'm not going to begrudge you for how you deal with it. I'm not a religious person, but there is certainly a parallel between religion and my love of my football club. I go every week and I am so fully invested on a complete faith basis. I have to have faith that my football club will come through in the end and that the journey to get there would never be as fulfilling without all the [censored]. It's why in the past I have despised bandwagoners. As I've got older, I've understood some people have better things to do with themselves, but I love footy. And I love my club. Being a Melbourne supporter is truly resilience-building and it's funnily enough something I'm very proud of. That my family and I have stuck thick through all this [censored]. Without being overly dramatic, it's why Demonland offers my religion so much. It offers a place of community and mutual understanding of the football trauma we've suffered. I hope we can all one day experience what almost every other club has in recent memory and it will be so sweet, to stick it up all those doubters and all those smarmy opposition supporters and clubs, who over the years have had so little respect (and rightly so) for Melbourne. These thoughts continue my faith in the Melbourne Football Club and that's how I deal with defeat. I'll get this published by Penguin. Another bloody book from me. Apologies everyone.

Yep, unfortunately where I'm at now. It worries me that a reasonably level-headed and reasonably positive football fan like yourself is at that stage, but how can we not be, after years of pathetic performances. And until we are consistent for more than one year (and I wouldn't even say 2018 was a consistent year), I don't think the club and its stakeholders could possibly/reasonably expect the supporter base to act or feel any differently.