Little Goffy

Okay. I'm going to say it. I suspect that the only thing keeping this club from ripping itself apart at the seams is the unity of the players and Goodwin. I suspect it is Neal Daniher level stuff going on with the effort to keep the off-field silly buggers, white-anting and astroturfing as much as possible out of the heads of the players. Either way, I can only hope that the most active and ardent supporters of the club, many of whom are to be found on this site, can recognise that it is time to be the good teammate and not be spitting kerosene on the pockets of hot ash permanently embedded in our club.

An interesting claim given we averaged 7th highest for attendances in 2024, and our two designated 'blockbusters' were both in the top 20 largest crowds for the season. Getting tired of people with vendettas just making [censored] up to suit their bile.

The people claiming we're stuck on the old game plan are driving me nuts. Against North we had half a dozen goals directly against us due to errors made through overzealous or misjudged attempts to hurry the ball through the middle or play on aggressively from defence. Players caught from behind, running themselves into trouble, being too ambitious with a kick, handballs off to a run-past while still unsteady landing after a mark. It all happened. The errors at high speed up the middle exposed our defence and prevented us from getting the priceless fast inside 50s. Multiple scores missed out on, and multiple scores against us, and very high fatigue (physically and psychologically) from having to sprint both ways without reward or comfort. It's not rocket science. The effort to fundamentally change the gameplan was on full display and on Sunday the team struggled to complete it all day and then imploded in the final quarter. It's a tale as old as time, and often told by impending premiership teams, too.

Just replying to show appreciation for a calm opinion. I do wonder if there's some quiet, unappreciated genius out there somewhere where a club isn't performing. The Paul Roos scenario?

The white ant thread.

Easily our best on ground. I mean, seriously, he leads us for marks inside 50, goals, score involvement and metres gained, is behind only tall defenders for 1%ers, going at 75% disposal efficiency. Has been our only clear winner on the ground.

I can't shake the worry that playing so many games as a sub can have undesirable effects on a kid's progress and confidence. Fingers crossed that he gets to leave a memorable mark when he does come on.

West Coast's old guard a a few unknown kids really putting in a bold first half in what could have been a 186 contender. Y'know what, good for them. Now that Fagan's got a long-earned premiership I'm happy for Brisbane to wobble a little here and there. Interesting that Reid just having an okayish game and West Coast doing well anyway. Could be an important moment for the club.

Scores are officially nice. Meanwhile, these commentators are reminding me of when I discovered that Robbocoholic becomes bearable if you speed up the audio to 1.5x. I think 1.25 would do for this pair.

One of Spargo's quiet strengths is positioning himself in places where the opposition would like to go, so that they have to find a different, less direct path. It was something Angus Brayshaw was an absolute master at, too. Could have made a difference against GWS but I suspect it will be even more valuable against the less experienced Kangaroos. I'm glad there's a lot of love for Charlie because if he gets a good clean run at it again he is a really valuable contributor.

By round 12 we will have played 4 home games against interstate teams, one 'home' game against Essendon in ADELAIDE, and the Saints at Traeger Park for some reason, against a total of only two homes games against victorian clubs. North are almost as screwed over as we are, but not quite. St Kilda and Essendon won't be thrilled, but it certainly isn't as bad at ours. Even Richmond at least get to play an interstate team in the corprorate junket round to Barossa. And Carlton continues to stand firm as the undisputable evidence that for 20 years at least the fixture has been determined by politics, not 'entertainment value', 'competitiveness' or even 'commercial draw'. We need to stop hating ourselves. There's nothing wrong with just acknowledging the reality - The Australian Football League decides commercial and competitive arrangements based on informal back-room networks of favouritism.

Chances are they're about to lose. Also, Chaaaaaarrrlliiiieeeee. Chaaaaaaarliieeeeeeeee. Charlliiiiiieeeeeeeee It's a magical leopleurodon, Charlie!

No real joy in watching Richmond getting pummelled, but Joe Richards doing fine out there for Port is a nice reminder that Collingwood gave up Richards, Noble (who is also doing fine at Gold Coast), pick 36 and, best of all, their 2025 first round pick in order to acquire a player who is, sure, pretty good, but no Xavier Lindsay. I choose to add a celebration of Noble & Richards to the death ride of Collingwood's first pick. It is more wholesome that way.

Essendon down by ten goals at 3/4 time is always a joy. It is starting to look like Adelaide have got their act together and are getting real results out of a forward line which has been 'talent and potential' for a few years. Conescutive 20+ goal games is notable no matter who the opponents are, and I don't think either of St Kilda or Essendon should be assumed to be just pushovers. It'll be up to a hard-defending side like us to work out Adelaide, contain their scoring and hit back as they fatigue. Could be important because at this stage Adelaide are looking very much finals-bound.

Darcy is beginning to shape as a genuinely likeable genuine champion. Didn't realise he was 208cm now. Just 1cm off Gawn. Seems to be slightly longer limbed compared to Gawn of the neverending thorax. Like Dustin Fletcher with an extra 10cm! Looking forward to future Darcy-White match ups.😁

I was going to ask about that. I got the distinct impression that the frees for Collingwood started relatively even and then just accelerated in Collingwood's favour. Missing that blatant attack on the legs, basically killing the game, is just the perfect cherry-[censored] on top. At some point the Pies fans also need to be copping fines for not returning the ball to the field. It has clearly become a little side game for them, something to tell their cousin-wife about when they get home.

I think the move to Geelong is inevitable. Only the Cats can offer Lord a manor and estate. On the serf coast, too!

Yeah, see, the precise point I'm making is that you need to get a grip on the constant obnoxious stream of 'We'll all be ruined and let me tell you who to blame' because there are actual frustrations and obstacles in the world. It is spectacular that your lack of self awareness reached this point. Take a good hard look at yourself. Having recently experienced the frustrations of IVF, and being acutely aware of how much worse it could have gone, and being in awe of my wife's magnificent resilience and lack of sulking throughout, I feel like I've gained a refreshed lack of patience with people who act like their constant dreary sulking gives them some kind of moral authority.

Poor Essendon. Must be a shock for them to realise even in 2000 there system didn't quite work. We're talking about a game where you're considered highly efficient if you get the ball to a teammate 3/4 of the time. I can't help picturing the total meltdown you'd have if you ever had to go through IVF.

I'll double-check the author but I think it was Isserson's analysis of the first world war and the problem of overcoming 'defence in depth' which described the way assaults evolved after the initial thrust as being a matter of 'the attackers mounting a desperate defence while the defenders press the attack from all points'. I'd say it is a strikingly strong analogy to the way a forward 50 entry decays within moments of the initial penetration. Isserson's solution (and the conventional approach by mid WW2) was to attack with as much depth as the defence - an initial wave to achieve the breakthrough is followed by and effectively relieved by a second wave more suited to holding positions gained and pressing further, while the first wave takes a half step back to cover flanks and prevent any cauldrons forming. To press the analogy home, it would be a little like having tall forwards stay 'home' ready and fresh to contest for the ball, and then when a forward stoppage occurred they would move to patrol that ring around the 50 ready to intercept/contest the dump kicks, while extra grunts and runners move inside 50. Strangely, this would mean that once the ball (and about 20 players) are inside the forward arc, our main forwards would be outside it! On a different but related note, every strategist worth mentioning notes the value of creating uncertainty by sending detachments to ambiguously menace positions which the opposition must defend. In football terms; keeping a forward or two inside attacking 50, no matter where the play is at the time, causes the entire other team to have to think about covering them, and run to positions to cover ALL the potential ways that forward could be a problem. So, there's my two cents. True forwards should be kept home and fresh as possible until the actual crucial moment of the contest. Just being there puts implied pressure on the entire other team. After that contest, when the swarms arrive, they should be the ones providing the intercepting ring. The way clubs use forwards at the moment is like the manager who assesses performance on 'hours attended' rather than actual output. Like telling fire-fighters to wash streets all day and then being surprised they struggled to haul people out if burning buildings. Rant over. Apologies.

I really don't think there's much to be impressed about getting a couple of friends to come to a game when there are only two teams in the city. Your chances of knowing someone else who is available and supports the same team is 5 times higher than in Melbourne, and all local sports coverage includes your team in every broadcast. There's also generally just one game a week in the other cities, so literally everyone who just wants to go to a game of football is there. I'd invite everyone on Demonland to mentally add up all the non-Melbourne games they might go to in a season. Is it, say, once, in a whole season? Because even that would work out to 50,000 attendances a week just in little old Adelaide. The Gabba's official capacity is 42,000. Brisbane did not pass 35,000 in the home and away season and struggled to reach even 30,000 during 'winter' up there. Most Swans games had crowds around the 35k mark. Their four 40k+ games were against the Blues, Cats, Giants and, indeed, Demons. Crows got 29,800 against GWS last season, so... that's fun. Port got 27,500 against Richmond, and except for the showdowns they barely managed to crack 40,000 in the H&A season. Western Australia is a special world of it's own, but you'll struggle to convince me there's anything amazing about 40-50k a week when you've got an AFL mad population of 3 million split between two teams, and all the advantages noted above. I don't know why people are so obsessed with 'proving' that there's something wrong or weak about Demon supporters, but I do get irritated by entirely disingenuous use of numbers - or 58ers case here, just imagining numbers to suit your feelings.

21st century Carlton problems in a nutshell.

I like your optimism. It's like Michael Voss commenting that he might get sacked at the end of the season.

I don't have asperger's but I do have much-loved copies of Mahan and Corbett, and my brother has even visited the Vasa in Stockholm, so we might get along. MAFS, though... hmm... that's a whole other spectrum. Is your son familiar with Drachinifel on youtube? Mostly a more modern steel-hull era coverage but does some great walk-throughs of the evolution of naval shot, shell and armour. Did you know they actually had to grade armour protection ratings differently for ships intended for colonial service in warmer waters? 😃

Truly wild. Half the team didn't get ratings that high across the whole game, and that includes players who had a pretty respectable day. Another single quarter rating I find interesting is Langford's. He didn't look like he was having a great time of it but his actual rating would put him in our best six if extrapolated to a whole game.