Adam The God

I went down to the Essendon race to wave my scarf and mock them. Haha, love it. Hate Essendon and beating them is hilarious.

We played about 40 minutes of footy. We never looked like winning it and still can't quire believe we snatched it. Hopefully, this is the platform we need to go to that next level. Jamar was immense in the last 40, given Bellchambers had given him a bath in the first half. Grimes probably played the best game of his career. He should have kicked that first one, but made some good decisions today. After a one dimensional first half, McKenzie earnt his spot in the second half. He was terrific. Despite giving away two or three goals from clangers, Dunn was excellent. Then you have Nathan Jones, who was our most consistent player. What a leader.

According to a seeming Demonland rumour, apparently an opposition recruiter said 'don't be surprised to see Coniglio in a Melbourne jumper next season'. Or some such thing.

Re-signed until the end of 2016, I believe. Gun.

I thought Roos and the FD would have noted Gawn's inability to apply anywhere near enough defensive pressure the previous week. The same thing happened against GWS. When Gawn plays as a semi-permanent forward, the opposition towels us up. Their back flankers run off him at every opportunity. It's disappointing that the FD failed to foresee this.

Spot on, mate. The problem is, Roos and the FD should have known this was going to happen. It's what I was saying all last week. Maybe they rolled the dice and it backfired? Who knows, but I agree, he certainly should have been subbed at half time.

Bad move. I was sure they'd sub Gawn, but my sister noted that Jamar grabbed his knee before going off, so we assumed it was an injury-induced sub. All round poor selection. Shouldn't have played Gawn at all, but Jamar was at least halving the hit outs.

If he's up for it, I'd be interested in seeing him come as an assistant.

I dunno about having to combat the Essendon talls. I think they'll get shown up if they play all of them. The ball will be wet, with the slippery/dewy conditions of a 4.40 start. This certainly hamstrung us on Monday.

We didn't outnumber them unfortunately. Would have been nice, but no. It was more like 1 to 3.

Spot on, M. Agreed.

If anything, today highlighted what good ball users off half back can do for a team. Their top two or three possession getters in the first half (aside from Pendlebury) were both back flankers. I'd also argue Clinton Young was the most damaging player on the ground. We need pacey and skilled back flankers. At least two.

I thought we'd get to within 2 goals of Collingwood (perhaps it was more hope), but I'm confident we can knock off Essendon too.

Have to agree with this now, S.

They announced it on the scoreboard. I'd argue that it was our movement off half back that killed us. We'd kick to our defensive 50 and then slowly jog backwards, with their back to the play. Our delivery to the forwards was ordinary though, but it didn't help that by the time the ball was near our forwardline, Collingwood had flooded it out. We just didn't move it quick enough, which induced us to eventually turn it over.

Spot on, Redleg. That's why I thought the only change to be made would/should have been Dawes for Gawn. Was always going to bite us in the arse.

What I mean is that their little blokes would just scoot past him. He didn't lay enough tackles. Admittedly, that's not necessarily Gawn's fault. I think it was a selection fault. We went too big and our big guys struggled to have any impact on the scoreboard.

Spot on. Both times, Gawn would stand on the 50 metre line. He's got a lot to learn, does the number 37.

Matt Jones is one of the biggest offenders, IMO. What he'll do though is run back quite quickly, but he'll be facing the wrong way. By the time he's turned around, the opposition have set up. It's dumb football and it's really something that is drilled into footballers from a very early age. Never run with your back to the play.

I still don't think we've brought above 80 per cent intensity over the last two weeks. The tackle count is the indicator. We had ordinary tackle numbers for the Port game and managed a similarly low numbers this week. On the one hand, that means there's great scope for improvement with his group, but it's disappointing they haven't been able to bring the intensity of that Adelaide game or even the Richmond game. The benchmark for tackle count should be 65ish. You don't win games with 40ish tackles.

He was good in defence, but his kicking wasn't great. Handed them at least one goal on a platter. Thought Gawn was an absolute liability when the ball hit the ground. I would have subbed him for JKH. Grimes was better today, but one of his poor decisions cost us a goal. He was certainly better though. Frost killed him, but often Dawes was outnumbered 3 or 4 on 1. We cannot take marks out in front of ourselves. Our snail-like ball movement didn't help any of our forwards (see Salem and JKH). Yes, but the ball movement didn't help. We had, what, 35 inside 50s for the game? We kept trying to finesse passes all day and our blokes wouldn't put their hands out in front. I think the kick to the top of the square a couple of times would have been nice, rather than dinky little kicks that get spoilt out of bounds and rebounded quickly. I agree with all of that, PJ. The one I didn't give credit to earlier was Jetta. He was fantastic. Didn't have a particular problem with his game, but he should have nailed that goal. He usually would have. I agree with the bolded part. So many of our guys were sloppy when the ball was within their grasp. No one was clean. The pressure got to them and the occasion got to them, I think. The inexplicable call against Jetta that denied Vince a goal and would have put us within 4 points, turned the game. They then went down the other end, scored a goal and never looked back. Young sides need everything to go for them. Vince's goal may have swung the momentum our way and who knows. If he can improve his kicking to a solid level, he'll be A grade. If his kicking doesn't improve his ceiling is B grade. He reminded me of his old man today.

I thought Garland played his worst game for a long time too. He panicked under pressure at least three or four times. N Jones, Vince, Pedersen and Cross were our best, I thought. We just overused the ball at every opportunity, made poor decisions with ball in hand and struggled to take marks out in front of ourselves. Most of the players were trying to take chest marks. We took one, possibly even two steps back this week. It's even more disappointing, given how much our players talked up the game. They never looked like it after the 10ish minute mark of the second quarter.

We've heard it all before, O. That's why many are negative on this thread. We've won three games and now our President comes out and allegedly says this.

This ball movement is absolutely criminal. Tyson has no upper body strength. I love him but he gets caught holding the ball every week. We just keep taking the wrong option. We don't look like it. Disappointing.

Yeah, the ball movement is slow, but we're also overusing it when we have the numbers. Worried at the moment. We stopped half way through that quarter.