Adam The God

That looks amazing.

But even when we have been running and up and about, we've kicked to Jamar and either roved off him or tried to cause a stoppage. This suggests to me that we have little plan or direction from the coaching staff, as to how to clear the ball out of defensive fifty.

Exactly. The arrogance flows from the board, down to the supporters.

I think it would make more sense if Essendon actually created an alternate strip which isn't basically the same as the original. It's not a clash jumper if just about everything about it is the same. Essendon should cut out some of its extreme arrogance and wear a white jumper. We have too.

Exactly the same way we lost to the Kangaroos and West Coast. A lack of intensity, poor decision making and low skill efficiency.

This thread is basically one of the reasons I hate Essendon. The arrogance of that mob is world class. If anyone's got a right to play the history/heritage card, it's us. The oldest club and inventor of the sport.

Yeah, exactly the same plan as Fremantle, except Sandilands is a monster that has the height to out-mark every single player in the competition.

Grimes is a lovely long kick when he needs to be. A couple of times this season, he's hit one of our players from the kick out, 60 metres out. Certainly Grimes should be taking the kick ins. He can make a few errors from the kick ins occasionally, but experiencing this will eventually cut out these errors.

I think that's very harsh on Rivers. He showed leadership by constantly pushing back to plug holes and help out teammates. There's not a lot more he could do really. I agree with Bruce and Johnson though. Especially Bruce.

Yep. I've loved Sylvia's last 20 games, but he was lazy against the Eagles (not the only one mind you) and thus deserves a run in the VFL.

I thought I noticed Trengove running with him at one stage too.

Oh my god, yes. So unaccountable. Does anyone actually know who lined up on either? A couple of times I watched them carefully at stoppages and could not see an MFC marking them at all.

I completely agree. The game style we play requires precise disposal and hard running, without both it falls down horribly. Particularly, if the players running to create are flat footed.

At this stage it seems to be a very shallow plan, but not unlike Fremantle's plan. Kick it long to Jamar on one of the flanks and either cause a stoppage (boundary throw in) or rove off Jamar. If we do cause a stoppage, we back ourselves to win the clearance.

Agreed. Carlton at the top of the list and then obviously Collingwood.

Rose-coloured glasses or not, comparing Naitanui to Scully or Trengove is amazing. Both demons possess wonderful football brains and execute (almost always) their skills efficiently, whereas Naitanui (as some have said) is patchy with disposal, decision making and many other facets of his game. Being a brilliant athlete won't necessarily cut it for a decade at this level. He will have to improve his know-how, execution by both foot and hand, and keep himself involved in the game for longer periods of time. By comparison, Watts has all the skills, the decision making and will have the midfield at his disposal to forge an exciting career at the MFC. Do I regret we took Jack instead of Nic? I'd take Jack ten times out of ten.

Hmm. If we could kick 15 goals we'd be winning every week. We consistently keep opposition totals below 90 points.

I'd agree with the tag call, but I disagree with the second. So often (particularly over the past 2 or 3 seasons) it's been painfully obvious that he's the only one creating and that all his team mates have needed him to spark them. He's not playing behind the ball like he did last year. It's simple really. He's spending the majority of games in the forward half, where he doesn't necessarily have the room to be as creative (hence his little dinky passes). I'd try starting him on a wing next week.

So incredibly overrated though, it's infuriating. He's certainly exciting to watch, but he does one or two things all day and doesn't touch the footy anywhere else around the ground. Taking him pick 2 was such a gamble. If I were West Coast I'd have taken Hill.

Sums my thoughts up exactly.

He absolutely killed us. When a bloke like that plays well on you, you know you're in trouble. And who the [censored] was on Rosa? He had plenty of time about 7 or 8 times to pin point a pass inside 50. So many easy possessions today.

The umpiring was horrible as usual, but we didn't help ourselves a lot of the time.

Perhaps some of JB's disposal was slightly off, but whose wasn't? I thought he was probably in our top 5 or 6 still. He gave a contest, chased, tackled and harassed.

Once again we started poorly and it really cost us. But really, we didn't work hard enough all day. We didn't use the ball well, make the right decisions, all in all an ordinary day. Even more disappointing than the North loss.

I thought Jack played a decent game today. First game back, his hands were really good. I sit at the other end of the ground, but can anyone tell me did Watts dispose of the footy cleanly when he was tackled in the first quarter and rolled one through? From where I was it looked like he dribbled it through, just before being pinged.