Little Goffy

IF ...Jake Melksham has booted 14 goals from the past three matches and is on track for a career-best season-goal tally ... THEN ...it's fact he's in career best form. Will be 34 by the time the 2025 season is finished. Will definitely be playing in 2026. Wonder if it will be with Melbourne. Aaaaand that completes the letter C.

Given his time at Casey, maybe Max himself was McInerney's kicking coach. Be a bit like like living next door to Federer and getting chess lessons.

Crowd: 20,347 at Marvel Stadium It isn't as if their supporter numbers suddenly disappeared. They just don't care about regular games any more. It is a small step to them just not bothering at all. There's a lovely old expression which gets applied to many things, but especially the collapse of systems and states, like the Roman Empire, the Stock Market or personal bankruptcy. "It occurred very slowly and then all at once" Their balance sheet looks strong but their main assets are basically pokies clubs, and of course owning their own training base. Essendon has been in the 'very slowly' phase for a long time, but could very suddenly become a minor club where the only recent history of interest is also of pure shame.

His first 150 games had him tracking to break every inside midfield stats record that exists. Clearance, contested possessions, tackles, handballs, even Brownlow Votes. Prior to the slump he was also shaping as a near-unique mid capable of stealing midfield intercepts on a regular basis. It has been almost exactly 50 games since the injury and form slump that has him being just a very good midfield, to the frustration of all, not least himself. Celebrate Oliver for what he's done. Don't lose the sniff of what another 100 games could be in the event he has his mind and body in good order.

The 'article' offers so little basis that I just snorted and moved on. Then the conversation here got a little more interesting about what we actually want to do as far as turning over the list and looking to fit new structures, so I began to look at our list on footywire and realised something. They're cycling through our list in alphabetical order of junior club. Obviously excuding no-brand players or 'too much of a reach' stories. Once Pickett (Woodville West Torrens) was done, they had to come back to the start to Lever (Calder) and Fritsch (Casey). That would make the next junk articles about Demon's moving or being disgruntled; Jacob Van Rooyen (Claremont) Harvey Langford (Dandenong) McVee, Rivers and Woewodin as a job lot (East Fremantle) And then we're back to the cycle of Petracca -> Oliver -> Petty -> Viney -> Salem -> Sparrow.

It'll probably involve a bloodstained note using cut-out newspaper letters saying "Fritta. is. not. going. anywere.".

There are two deep reasons Melbourne should be expected to defeat Carlton this Saturday night at the MCG. Firstly, there's nothing at stake. For a generation, and even at their lowest ebb, Carlton found a way to ruin seasons for Melbourne. Ranging from 2006, when the Blues managed two wins over the Demons and only one more for the rest of the season and in the process cost Melbourne a top-4 spot in a wide open premiership chase, to 2023 when the Demon's coughed up a semi final to the Blues in a manner which marked the start of a serious stumble. Not that it did the Blues any good. At a most elementary level Carlton are currently relying on too few to do too much, with determined but exhausted Cripps symbolising the crisis whenever he is thrown to the ruck. Many of Carlton's more capable players are somewhat one-dimensional, meaning that when holes are created by injury or form problems, there is little to provide a patch up. With each passing week the sensation grows that Carlton as a club is fully aware of the oncoming storm and chooses to sail without urgency or alarm directly into it, with the Blues' famously contentious factions all imagining they will be able to seize control of the wreckage. The second reason is named Sam. A 55cm project player with a powerful kick and an uncanny ability to escape traffic, Sam has quickly begun accumulating disposables despite currently playing mostly from the bench and is expected to progress to more of a flank position in the near future. His leadership qualities are already showing through, with a 100% win rate since being promoted from the In Utero league on Friday. Demons to win a game which will have more than a passing resemblance to whack-a-mole as each team tries to exploit or cover their holes, with perhaps the most interesting contest-within-the-contest being whether Max Gawn can decisively put to rest the AA contention of Tom DeKoning, who has gradually faded since his potent early season form. After Xerri embarrassed himself with the kind of undisciplined moments that you'd normally only expect to see from someone poorly self-regulating their emotions following a head injury the previous week (ahem) the list of real rivals to Gawn is growing thinner.

Now now, we've been told quite clearly that there is no media bias which weights against Demons, making them less worthy of protection or justice while also more warranted for retribution. Just once I'd like to see a Demon do a firm but fair run-through of an offender - Not to injure, but perhaps to humiliate - and give an explicit post game interview that "The AFL has chosen not to protect us, so we must do it for each other".

I missed the game on account of this weekend I ceased being the littlest Goffy. (Heart explodes) So I am just going on stats and a quick browse of match feeds and the like, but here's my impressions ready to be endorsed or correct; Max Gawn continues to be Max Gawn. Jake Melksham has kicked FOURTEEN goals in three weeks! For real? Bailey Fritsch had his best and most versatile game of this season and possibly last season as well. Jefferson made a meaningful contribution and Van Rooyen was involved a lot. "A Harvey Langford type player" Oh, yeah, as my brother pointed out, littlest Goffy has a 100% win rate.

9/7/2025: AFL Umpiring officially passes the "Poe's Law" test and can now be registered as a religion.

They're going to introduce a 'new' rule where if the ball is shown to be touched before crossing the line, or if it is unclear and the umpires initial call was touched, then the umpire's call remains. Just to give clarity for the future.

That 2010 premiership would have to be among the least talented premiership teams in modern history. Six or so brilliant runners (19 bounces per game! Almost double the highest number of any club this season) a good ruck, and then mostly role-players who got their job done up forward or down back, especially the talls. It just demonstrates the kind of advantage that fast and quality ball movement can give. Also [censored], lots and lots of [censored]. Allegedly.

You'd have to wonder if Hayden McLean might want to move for more opportunity. Was beginning to show something and then has gradually gone backwards ever since Grundy came to the Swans.

Geelong appear to be accelerating. There's a smoky 186 watch on this one. Obviously today's Geelong is not as overall potent as they were around 15 years ago, but they have a particular love of easy kills these days. If they are allowed to run around witches hats, the damage could be extreme.

Hmm... there seems to be two types of games so far this round. Type 1 Collingwood over Carlton, 8 goal margin at 3/4 time and the entire final quarter is junk time. GWS over West Coast, 9 goal margin at 3/4 time and the entire final quarter is junk time. Type 2 Dogs over North, had been tight until halfway through the third, 4 goal margin at 3/4 time, Dogs kick away with 5 goals to 1 in the last. GC over Essendon, tight game at 3/4 time, 6 goals to none in the final quarter. Hmm, or maybe there is just one type and the only real difference is 'how far into the game does the better team decide to drop the hammer?'.

I dropped in to visit the North-Dogs game in the third quarter for the exact ten minutes where North went from pluckily clinging on to knowing they were beaten. Glancing over the stats, that game must surely be pushing recent records for contested marks. Darcy 5, Lobb 4, Naughton 3, and a few others shared it around for a total of 19 in a game for the Dogs. Larkey's 4 and the rest of North adding 6 more for 10 isn't a low count, either. Only a few teams average more than ten contested marks per game, with most being around the 8-9 range. I think Sydney is lowest at 6.5.

I'm surprised we almost made it to the second page before that exact phrase was used with that exact emoji.

I have a suspicion that if you sliced our season so far into thirds, we'd be absolute bottom to start, then a little inside the top half for the second slice, and most recently sitting around 14th. But yeesh, Carlton... between this and the cascading injuries you'd have to wonder if they've completely bollocksed the conditioning program. I haven't seen fatigue and injury hit a club this decisively since [redacted]

His ceiling is a potent blend of Melksham and Neal-Bullen. Long way off it right now but so were Melksham and Neal-Bullen in their early years. Preseasons, confidence, development - the part that keeps me optimistic about Tholstrup is that the factors which could dramatically improve his output are realistically improvable.

I absolutely smashed it at marbles. Selling people's lost marbles back to them was basically my pocket money for chunks of childhood. Also ran a very strong barter campaign for when people wanted 'rares'. If I wasn't interesting in winning, I guess I could have played football!

Two off the top of my head; Tom Hawkins. Patrick Dangerfield. Prolific dangerous acts and outright striking incidents, but to this day have an unblemished record as far as media is concerned and almost as clean when it comes to suspensions and fines. Plus some guy I can't recall the name of at a club that isn't very important, who sends an opponent to hospital with a head injury roughly every 30 games, but still apparently smells like frangipannis and freshly baked bread.

The Kent Kingsley principle lives on. Meanwhile, should we be upgrading this thread from a Harry McKay to a more general 'picking over the Blue carcass' thread? Unfortunately we don't have much immediate draft value to offer them, and their potential free agency have all been signed up or are being offered a Mexican silver mine by someone else already, but surely some of their mass-injured demoralised players aren't keen to sit through a re-rebuild at a club with such a perennially impatient and entitled coterie-level culture. Kemp is out of contract but not a free agent. Had so many injuries and been played almost at random positions to the point where it is impossible to really know if he can make it at AFL level. Personally I see potential. Walsh is an RFA out of contract in 2026, in variable form (the drop from his early career is alarming) and currently injured. Hmm, actually, gee, there's not much I'd be trying to extract from Carlton. I do feel fragments of sympathy for the general Blues fans, but the silvertails, the board and its connections (which in the case of the Carlton board is almost like racehorse 'connections') and the actual club executive deserve every bag of ---- coming their way.

For sure we will. And maybe even some goals too!

Harry McKay would cost too much for someone who we couldn't have confidence in. Already contracted to 2030. Complex injury history. Lots of form variability overall, including his kicking at goal which drifts from exemplary to comedic and back twice a season. 27 years old and he's only ever cracked 50 goals in one season, compared to Ben Brown for example, who had kicked 60 goals in three consecutive season before injury put him on the outer at North and he came to us to pinch-hit for a premiership. I'd place more optimism in getting Van Rooyen back to form and lifting Jefferson's confidence. Oh dear, I just checked and McKay is listed as 'knee, 4 to 6'. The curse must be averted, we must not take him, for his own good.

The inability to google something before demanding answers and a pound of flesh is something of a clue.