Adam The God

Oliver is a beautiful kick, but clearly our plan was to bomb the ball forward quickly and create a spillage (or offensive mark), or/and then get to the foot of the contest. Problem is, we didn't do the last part. And when we managed to get to the foot of the contest, we weren't clean. I was at the ground and this bombing inside 50 game was so evidently a directive from the coaches box. It seemed to happen even more when Clarry went crazy in the last quarter, which to me says that we wanted to keep playing our system at all costs and at the end of the night, we just didn't work hard enough to lock the ball inside forward 50. That said, some of Clarry's kicks went to 2 on 1s. He can get better (like the rest of our mids and forwards) at kicking to the advantage of forwards. However, I can't think of a better kick for an inside midfielder in the competition.

I think if we were 0-22 you wouldn't be panicking, mate, but that's how you roll and it's an admirable trait.

I think some teams try to turn other teams strengths into weaknesses. Our inside 50 dominance is clearly one of our strengths, as is our ability to win clearances. If you don't have those strengths, then you surrender the inside 50 and set up to repel and play slingshot. Geelong are brilliant at this and have literally played it for close to a decade now. Since Hawthorn have reinvented themselves, they do a similar thing.

Look, I think both of those articles have a bit to do with it. It's very heartening to read Clarkson discuss it in 2009 and how injuries curtailed their premiership defence. What I find frustrating about this is we didn't even make a Grand Final. In that sense, we probably resemble Geelong a little closer, although situations are always a little different. I was thinking last night as another easy Geelong goal flew through in front of us that Geelong's 2007 was relatively similar to the start of our 2019 campaign. Big things were expected of them and they came out and lost their first game to the Bulldogs by a similar margin to our Port defeat. The next week they came out and buried a weakened Carlton and started their great run, and the rest is history. Absolutely our list needs work, but even when you've filled all your holes, you can never stand still in a professional environment like the AFL. It must be about constant improvement and Clarkson has shown the way here. Having watched our first two rounds now, I think we should be mixing the control game style with less chaos. We have KK and Salem, Hibberd and May, who are all good kicks of the football. Even Oscar isn't terrible. We need to use the athletic attributes of your favourite Frost, Hunt, Hibberd and KK to spread the opposition and make them work to get the ball back off us. Short of going backwards from centre stoppages, we need to value possession a lot more. If we can spread the opposition more, we can drastically improve our forward entries when the time is right in the play, instead of allowing teams to sit back in the holes like Geelong did last night. Problem is, we haven't really played the control game style since Roos and I wonder if it goes against Goodwin's DNA.

He did yo-yo in and out of the game though. I reckon he's still another week or two away from putting four quarters together. I agree with most of this, but what it underlines for me is that we have to persevere with Petracca one-out. Had it not been a slippery, wet night, Petracca would have taken 3 or 4 marks that bounced off his chest or hands in the rain. Not saying he was good enough by any stretch of the imagination, but his intensity was good, even very good at times. I thought he really lifted it. He, along with Melksham, are our best users of the ball going inside 50 and inside 50. Right now he's clearly bereft of confidence, but I'd give him one more week in dry conditions (the forecast for Friday is 27, so hopefully easier conditions) to build on the intensity. He made some howlers by foot last night too, but he wasn't alone and I'd much prefer we give him another week to gain some confidence. The forwardline I'd go with next week is McDonald, Weideman, Petracca, Fritsch, a resting Oliver or Brayshaw and Melksham. I'd play ANB between the wing and half forward (use his run to lock the footy inside 50 ala the first final last year or use his run for defensive transition if we lose centre clearances); Salem and KK (the latter needs more games in his legs) on wings and at half back to deliver inside 50; and I'd play Hunt on a wing too. The disposal by ANB and Hunt is questionable, but their running and pace needs to be utilised better up the ground if we're going to play a territory battle. The biggest problem with McDonald forward is he never lays tackles, so they know that by exploiting McDonald, they can run off him, which means we have to send our attacks through him more often, so that it doesn't allow his man to get off him. I like Petracca as a focal point too and I actually believe it will come for him. If you look at De Goey and Petracca, one is absolutely full of confidence and the other is completely bereft, but Petracca's work rate was there last night as I watched him closely. He just needs to string a few performances together and he's not alone there. My point here was that the better place to kick the dump kick is to the 30m hot spot, not the goal line, where it can easily be rushed. I agree that we need to be lowering our eyes and hitting up leading targets. We also need to combine moving it quickly with smart ball use. Last night I actually can't fault the game plan of moving it quickly and long to our forwards, problem was it was kicked to 2-on-1s too often and not to the advantage of our forwards. That's rubbish. How would you know? All we've got to go upon is that until the last two weeks, players that have come into our system have thrived and developed into better players than when they came to us. I think you might be lacking in a bit of empathy then. It's pretty clear that people use Demonland to vent their frustrations rather than the real world. This is a lot healthier IMO then getting [censored] or throwing punches at the footy. You don't personally see how getting overly emotional about footy online does, but that's you and how you deal with defeat. Others need to vent. I have not a single poster on ignore and don't plan to. I simply disagree vehemently with what you said and that's fine. Throwing out lines, whether you think they're simple or not, still have meaning, so if you can't handle criticism don't put them out there. I think we can remain objective based on the output of JLT 1 and 2, coupled with Rounds 1 and 2, and state that our pre season absolutely has something to do with it, but that our system is broken and that unless we fix it quick smart, we won't even make the 8. If you'd prefer rose-coloured glasses and blue-sky dreaming that's fine. I'd prefer to identify the problems and debate the best ways of fixing them. That is my natural way of dealing with defeat. I don't like to give up and I find it difficult to respect people who give up. Likewise, here. Perhaps, this isn't the best way of fixing the problem, because our positives last night were offensive work rate, winning the clearances, inside 50s and getting close in CPs and even close enough in UPs (we've won games with greater differential than what we had in UPs last night), and none of these hold answers to why we lost by 80 points. It's the things that didn't work (the 'negatives' as you might put them) that hold the key. Fix these and we might be in a better place.

And this is the danger of passing comment on a match without seeing it. I find it staggering anyone would try. The above is not entirely true. Gawn and a few of our mids did bang it on the boot from stoppage, but we did have plenty of link up play by hands through the midfield in tight, but our entries were ordinary from there. And being at the ground and actually watching the game, although we did get caught in defensive transition a few times early on, most of their goals were not goals out the back ala Richmond and Hawthorn last year. They were hit up short passes to forwards inside 50 where our mids or defenders failed to shut down space. It was very different to those Hawthorn and Richmond losses in that respect. The only similarity is that we dominated the ball, but not always forward half play. Geelong constantly pushed us wide in our forward line and had their taller defenders at the top of the square (we didn't kick to the 30m hot spot enough, it was mostly to the goal line - something we do too often), which meant we were very easy to defend. Without a brilliant KPF who splits packs and worries defenders, they were safe all night. That said, I agree with the rest of it. Stop gifting games to players who aren't ready and if we lose to Essendon it will destroy our top 8 chances.

Scott is still playing the same system he's always played. Last year they were slightly arrogant with the inclusion of Ablett forward and didn't add enough pace to their forward half, but their game style is essentially unchanged since 2012, which is set up to concede the centre clearance and slingshot back the other way. Our dominant players are mids and without extra pace in the forward line, we'll struggle to lock it inside 50 unless we start to lower our eyes more, as Geelong did on practically every occasion they went inside 50 after quarter time.

This post is absolutely spot on and echo my sentiments precisely. ???

I agree with all this, Steve, but it sounds like you're being a little negative. Are we finally allowed to say the signs are not good now are we?

I find this super patronising. Did you go last night and stand in the rain and the cold for three hours? If you didn't, I'd take a seat from this discussion. It may well be that you sat at home in the warmth of your house and then maybe switched it off at half time, but as someone who goes every week and cops the smarmy abuse and derision of opposition supporters, it's pretty rich to read a supposed Melbourne supporter refer to other Melbourne supporters (particularly those that go each week and have for years) as having a "lack of mental resilience". I utterly hate this line of thinking, particularly from our supposed own. The fact that the majority of us are still here is an absolute testament to our resilience, after years of pitiful performances and like last night, thoroughly embarrassing scorelines. Have a bit of pride in yourself and your football club. An 80 point loss is unacceptable any way you dice it, and if people are upset and can see the writing was on the wall, as rjay did (and I certainly did after JLT2), they're actually being analytical and realistic about what we're delivering and likely to deliver, and what that means for the season ahead. Go and level your lack of resilience comments at Carlton supporters who won a flag in the 90s but many have jumped off since or Essendon, who made finals two years ago and have all jumped off after dominating the late 90s and early 2000s. They are the supporters with mentally weak attitudes. We've the longest drought in AFL history and we won't be winning the flag this year either. Sometimes in life you need to look at what's in front of you and admit when there's something drastically wrong. That doesn't mean we should stop going along and supporting, but it does call for realistic debate and discussion, and deriding people for their mental resilience and telling them to "take a deep breath" is not particularly helpful in my book. Now the rant is over and I'll take a seat.

This bit seems incongruous mate given you turned it off yourself at 3/4 quarter time.

I generally agree with this mate, but remember when commentators were saying we needed to start to put the foot on the throat of opposition teams and bury them when we had the chance? To be a good football team you need to take your chances. We've been pretty good at this for a while, but ANB last week misses two very gettable shots that would have had us up by 5 or 6 goals and who knows. Good teams make this happen. This week the perennially overrated Fritsch misses a soda from 15m out when we have all the momentum at the start of the third. Moments later, he inexplicably kicks across defensive goal and kicks it on the full. Selwood goals from the resulting free kick and instead of turning the screws and making it 3 goals the difference with almost a half to play, and with centre clearance dominance, we're five goals down in the wet and it's game over. None of the other top teams have players that are regulars like us that make momentum-killing errors like these. I thought we'd get back on the horse and perhaps in dry weather we'll be a better shot, but our game style is busted and we have no forward winners. We've definitively taken a step back and that upward trend was always going to be difficult to maintain, but we're not making the top 4 this year. That's done. History tells us this, particularly with our percentage. If we can get our game together next week then we're a chance for the 8, but without better ball use and forward winners, we're going nowhere but down. How embarrassing to be rooted to the foot of the AFL ladder again. Geelong have surrendered centre clearances and played slingshot against sides since Scott started coaching. This is not new and we should know how to counter this. The wet weather undoubtedly helped them, but that doesn't explain an 80-odd point drumming. We stood in the rain in general admin until the final siren, but knowing the game was over half way through the third brought back memories of 2012-2016. I could see the work rate was there for the majority of the game. We got caught in defensive transition countless times, but I'm most concerned about our coaching, structures and ball use. Oliver is a star. ? Gawn was great too. Viney and Brayshaw did some good things. Our defenders were reasonable, but we leaked far too many easy goals in that first quarter and late in the game. That's team defence. I dread to think about next week. If it rains, I'm telling you right now, we've no chance.

My concern now is 1) We don't have focal targets and 2) our forward entries are so chaotic they're more unpredictable to our own forwards and we therefore become more predictable to the opposition. Our game plan always breaks down in the wet. That's unsustainable. I can't remember when we last won a game in the wet. If you look at what we've done over the off season in terms of tweaks, you wonder if we've changed our game style at all. I'm disappointed in the coaching group at this stage. Tonight's scoreline was the most embarrassing scoreline since 2017 or potentially even the final round of 2016.

Migrants won't go for average teams for long. They might support Melbourne when they initially choose but people are easily poisoned into following the big successful clubs. Without flags, we have a ceiling IMO. We need to brush off the lack of respect tag and for 50 years we've been at the bottom. That can change with a flag or two.

Yep. We'll finish on 52 or 53k I reckon. And next year we aim for 70k again and all being well, we'll get past 55k and maybe even 60k. I think that's our ceiling until we win some flags.

To be fair, that is what being politically correct is about. It's just been hijacked to have a negative connotation by snowflakes who also hijacked the term snowflake, when it was originally used to refer to people like them - people that want to be free to say whatever they like, without consequence. Funnily enough when we're children, we're taught that the words that we use mean something and have consequences. Eddie McGuire is of that similar ilk who thinks he should be able to say whatever he wants, without consequence.

I completely agree with this. He needs to stay forward permanently and have a role to play. I concur it should be as a deep forward.

I agree with all of that, mate. He's lazy and a show pony. I think if he puts it all together though, he'll be equal if not better, than De Goey.

I'd look at 2 or 3 small forwards. Bedford will be interesting to see this year. I'd also debate your point @Diamond_Jim that we haven't drafted in any superstars. Oliver will be one. He's already a star. In twelve months, Brayshaw will join him.

Kids bash Weideman for Christmas?

IMO people are going the early crow on Petracca. Let's reassess at the end of this year. Statistically, he's very similar to De Goey, but the Magpie is clearly ahead for goals. I'd keep him out of the midfield rotation for a few weeks and get him to play as a permanent forward. Keep it simple, because he actually makes the easy look difficult and the hard look easy at times. I reckon he'll be okay and I think given how close they are statistically, it shows you what Petracca's ceiling is if he can get it together, because De Goey is considered a 'star' and he is due to scoreboard impact.

Absolute crap. Nice and cynical world you live in, Biffboy.

Well, you need possession in the first place in order to get the footy into dangerous areas to pressure and creating scoring chances. We rely on our contested possessions to gain metres and then pressure the opposition into giving up scores in their defensive 50. Same idea as Richmond, except their play was/is based more off slingshot, given their centre clearance work was/is ordinary.

I disagree that we don't have the personnel to implement the control game style. Collingwood's kicking is pretty ordinary at times. This was even demonstrated last night at times and I don't think they could have played much better as a team. The key to the control game style is that the kicks are going to uncontested situations. It's far easier to nail a kick to an uncontested position rather than kick to the advantage of a team mate where there is less room for error. There is a tendency to bite off more tha you can chew with a contested kick and the contest can be halved easily if the kick to advantage is not precise. A lot of it's about spread IMO and that's where Collingwood's speed is helpful to their list and suited to their game style. Whereas, we've built a list around contested beasts whose contested possessions will stand up in finals. Given our lack of speed (particularly in the forward half), it makes perfect sense that we adopt a fast and chaotic style that can be implemented directly after winning the contested possession. The problem with the chaotic style is that it solely relies on much more taxing work rate to execute pressure and when it is non existent, as it was last night for Richmond, or even slightly off, the game style is severely compromised. The control game style however is less taxing on the team in possession of the ball and just requires spreading, but makes the opposition work overtime even to regain possession. I think we could play the control game style and we were playing it at times across 2015-2017. But given our lack of contested marks and our lack of speed, I would potentially still lean towards us playing chaotic football. However, given our seeming lack of fitness at the moment, it might actually be better to try the control game style (with less fitness needed) for a few weeks until we've gained some much needed fitness. Ideally, I'd like us to cultivate a third unique style. It'll be interesting to see if we change things up tomorrow.

I completely agree. I just think OMac is worse. I'm not actually sure what he brings.