Adam The God

It's interesting, because to my eye our kicking efficiency was really pleasing against GWS, but the higher efficiency was also padded out by those short uncontested kicks across half back to control the game. The kicks that we miss were those 15-20m short angled kicks coming back through the corridor or along the wings. Make those kicks and as @binman often says, you have a chance to chain for a score. Rivers is super unreliable and turned it over in these sort of spots, and has for 2-3 years now. He gives great bounce and has great penetration with his kicking, but isn't who we want trying those shorter kicks IMO. As often as possible, we need to involve Windsor, Lindsay, Salem and McVee from the back. Despite Salem lacking pentration, and even the ability to hit those angled kicks, what Salo does do is nails those 15-20m passes, which maintains possession and continues the chain. IMV, another guy that could really help with our forward entries and ensuring the chain doesn't breakdown is Melksham. I just wonder whether Fritta is playing the Melksham role at the moment, and that when Melksham is fit, it'll be between those two for the leading high half forward that turns and enters A50 as that final link in the chain.

And as @Little Goffy says, and I've said many times, Chaplin was responsible for our 2018 forwardline, the highest scoring forwardline in the league, with a huge and varied spread of regular goalkickers. It'll be a work in progress this year, but if it clicks early enough, we'll be a premiership threat.

Schwarta was a great player. One of my favourites growing up. That 1994 finals series as a 7 year old was 👌

I'm pretty sure he's responsible for ball movement and how we enter A50.

That's Chaplin's role...

Content going through the roof. Awesome stuff. Kudos to the club for this. More please. From a doco camera perspective, the camera work in those last few shots is really bloody good, capturing all the debutants with their friends and families without a cut.

So the MFC presumably leaked this?

But we have 2 of the top 5 best contested players in the comp in the same midfield, just need the outside polish to finish off the good work.

My favourite pass of his was the beautiful kick to Max on the lead. Perfectly weighted. Not many of our players can hit that regularly.

He played on the wing and at half back...

Yep, that's where I'm at. @Slartibartfast, you'll be happy to know that I see a spot for your mate as a KPF alongside JVR. 😄 I just think if TMac takes the best defender, can still bring the ball to ground, his being run off is really no different to defenders running off JVR or Turner, and it frees up JVR to get the second best defender. I'd happily stick with just TMac and JVR with the latter taking second ruck duties, but if they insist on playing three talls forward of the ball, TMac, JVR and Turner could work.

The basic shots I refer to are Max's from 20m out, Tom Sparrow from 40m out directly in front with a near dry ball and seemingly little wind, and Fritta's snap from 20m at the top of second. The latter is a goal Fritta would have nailed at least 30 times in his career, and would surely be 9.5 from 10.

We had 9 to 8 tackles inside 50 yesterday. I really don't think we lost because we had "three lumbering forwards". We lost because we couldn't convert basic chances in front of goal.

And coming from behind against Brisbane that year at the G.

Lindsay has wheels too, like Windsor, which is super helpful for breaking lines, because I think as others have stated, we were really good with forward handball yesterday. This means we don't have to rely on those angled kicks to shift or break zones. And our chip game was very similar to the approach Geelong tried unsuccessfully a few years ago.

I'm sorry but Rivers is not a good kick. Love him, but a very hit and miss kick.

Yep, I'm fine with us losing clearance numbers, if we're winning scores from stoppages. It then means we're defending from our back half and enables us to slingshot back in behind the opposition to a less congested forwardline. Likewise, potent clearances (out the front ideally), lead to 1v1s as the ball gets in quicker to our forwards.

Yep, I feel the same way about Lindsay as I did about Clarry after his first game, against the Giants, where they both picked up the same amount of disposals on debut. Unfortunately, in Clarry's debut we won by 2 points. Lindsay is gonna be a gun.

He was better yesterday with 3 tackles, mind you he was playing higher up the ground.

Greene played midfield in the last quarter. Our mids failed to track him. Maybe Rivers missed a hand over, but the bigger problem with Riv is his kicking. The rest of our backs went at 100% or in the 80s. He went at 63%. I called it in the second or third quarter, Greene was going to be the difference because we didn't have a match up for him.

I had no voice left after the game today. Don't tell me we're quiet. 😉 I've heard quieter Melbourne games. I thought when we got a few out the front clearances that led to scores, the crowd lifted.

Howes needs continuity IMO. Yoyoing in and out of the team doesn't help him or us. If May is fit, he goes to Larkey and Howes stays.

Spot on, we have very good DE. We let ourselves down in conversion in front of the goal though, as expected score shows.

TMac was terrific today, but he was playing on a beanpole 21 year old and should have outplayed him as he did on a number of occasions. Brave new world sans TMac if May is fit IMV mate. Not going to howl you down though 😄

In the back pocket? May as well try and unearth a player while we wait for McVee to come back, particularly given there's no option of AMW this year.