Little Goffy

Well, that game simplifies things. From here on, any niggle of significance and the player gets rested. Anyone not fit gets to take some time to do a mid-season pre-season, and spots in the 22 have to be skewed to commitment to the best methods even ahead of talent. Of course, the trouble with that is it will result in more blowouts and excessive use of caps lock in footy forums. We can only hope the club is mature enough to push through that and keep the focus on 2026.

I mean... 'unrealistic attempt but he touched it' it is a cool call, too. The trouble is, the umpiring gets inside our heads. A few decisions go against us and we stop believing we control our own destiny. Incredibly, has been a problem since as far back as the Daniher years.

Gee umpire, that was a big call.

Yeeeep, that one got me cranky. It was as if he thought just moving through the same space was enough, without any need to put the clamp on or make body-on-body impact. So many fumbles and slips and misses like that this quarter. Feels like we're getting 20% off the best from almost the whole team. Between that and the commentators it hardly looks like it has been a 3 goal to 1 quarter.

Fair point and true, but in the grand scheme of things to come back and bite us, a flag will have do to!

Omen watch - Port's dopey little fireworks blew smoke directly down the Port Adelaide race and into the rooms. Strong chance it'll set off their sinuses and inflame their sniffles. The Port Adelaide song played the second verse. Nothing good can come of that.

Hmm, 'get smashed and surely Hinkley gets the sack', makes me wonder if we should take the foot off the throat once we're about 4 goals up, just to keep Port middling for another few seasons. Of course, taking the foot off the throat once we're four goals up is what we do all the time anyway, so no problem, Hinkley lives another day.

Proudly flying the flag is no 'wee indulgence'! @Dee in a Kilt I salute you!

You've inspired me. Explaining the scoring system; "Dis a goal, and disapoint" Also "I've go next to a goal, but also next to nothing" It'll be a great night in the AFL corporate box. Legal vs Operations, decided by the umpiring committee.

There is no point to having the Essendon football club in the Australian Football League. For everything we might enjoy hating them for, we already have their spiritual mirror Carlton, who provide much more amusing nonsense and dysfunction along the way and whose fans at least have a soul so we know they are hurting. You could almost have a schadenfreude scale; How much to you enjoy/what margin does it take to really savour X team losing? Hawks I would feel some contentment whenever their fans were forced to sit through a final quarter with no real prospect of winning. Collingwood I would want to see them really get found out before I cared, but, yeah, I would enjoy that. Essendon... I would need Essendon to lose by at least 100 before it felt anything at all. They're someone else's cardboard box on the shared stairs. Of zero interest in itself, just a minor obstacle you wish someone would get rid of.

We actually engaged in a kind of time warp where we got Steven May's best four years in exchange for Jesse Hogan's worst four. Full credit to Hogan, he's currently on target (so very, very on target, and for the second consecutive year) to kick more goals this season than he did for the entirely of his unhappy and injured 2019-2022 period. Remember that Freo traded him to GWS for pick 54. Like so many stories of football success, GWS presence in the finals is built on Fremantle's failure to engage with a top-talent player and having to trade them away for peanuts.

"Straight kicks in or straight sets out."

Looks like GWS either didn't get the memo, or are the only club which did! 8 goals straight to half time, against 8.10 by Brisbane. Annoying because GWS slipping is kind of our last gate into the finals, so it would be helpful if they kicked a little more sloppily. Cadman and Hogan with 3 each, I suspect we have another exhibit for the 'let forwards be forwards' campaign.

One must recall that Picket Fence is a professional revolutionary dedicated to the global overthrow of Goodwinist regimes, and all intermediate happiness is merely a barrier to the one true happiness of a Goodwinless nirvana.

Personally I think it is cool that they are having a traditional round where the football is only on the actual weekend.

I instinctively like him, think he can develop into a solid versatile defender. Unlikely to be a superstar but neither are a great many players who build 200-game careers and are part of important moments.

Surely Petty back, May forward.

Well, that does cheer me up. Realistically Pickett is one of the all-time greats of the 'small forward who slides through the midfield' role that has become crucial in the contemporary game. This contract is also an emphatic reminder that there is life after this season and something to look forward to. Now we can also begin to really enjoy watching the All-Australian match-up, which is currently Pickett in the smalle forward plus midfield role doesn't have any close rivals for performance. Jamie Elliot and Jack Higgins are the 'small forward only' competitors. Pleasingly, Toby Greene is not on the pace this season, and even tiktok is starting to think Nick Watson is a bit overrated. I have no reason to mention Watson except to mention he is not worth mentioning.

But seriously, Pickett in my mind ranks somewhere in between Cyril Rioli and Gary Ablett Jr., now that he is showing that ability to play up the ground as well. In fact, he has actually put together his highest goals-per-game run at the same time as taking the extra time in the middle. As an exercise, slot him into this line up of small forwards published end of last year, and remember he has only just turned 24. I for one hope that the Van Rooyen / Jefferson combination can build up to provide the tall structure which makes life more fun for the little guys. afl.com.auBetts, Breust and ranking the top 10 small forwardsThe team at AFL.com.au has come up with a list of the 10 best small forwards of the AFL era

Imagine being stuck on the list at a football club that has just scapegoated and sacked your father for not magically transforming a full cliff-dive rebuild into an instant return to contenders? That would be vintage Richmond, I must say. Fun fact: between Tom Hafey and Damien Hardwick, a Richmond coach (not including caretakers) was more likely to coach less than 50 games than more than 50 games. 7 below 50 games, 5 over 50, and just two (Tony Jewell and Danny Frawley) cracked 100.

link https://x.com/_684148249_/status/1802217029308715466 Max Gawn is not lone. @hasumpstuffedup was 100% in agreement, 50m penalty. But instead the player who took the mark was called to play on before they were even ahead of their mark. Coincidentally, the Magpies won by a point after "Zac Fisher got one last chance to win the game for the Kangaroos, but his hurried snap in the dying seconds drifted wide." One wonders if a set shot from about 20-25m out might have gone through.

Max Gawn has been quoted that not only was he surprised to be called to play on, but actually was anticipating a 50m penalty due to multiple Collingwood players encroaching on the mark. The audio is unclear in the 'last two minutes' video about when exactly the play on was called, but there were clearly three Magpies inside and not leaving the protected area.

I mean, I know calling holding the ball against someone who has been tackled and then sat on happens sometimes, but normally they at least check that the player being pinged is actually the one holding it, instead of literally having the opponent pressing it with both hands against their kidney. Deeply true. Only commitment to club keeps me anywhere near Australian football now.

Bed bugs for the lot of them. These umpire-influenced games, in the wider context of deep institutional biases, really drain my love of football. I would guess this that this weekend I watched a total of 30 minutes other than our game, and it'll be less next weekend. My football watching has dropped to; Demons Checking on Carlton just because my brother is a blue and likes to chat football sometimes. Literally no other club interests me. Why bother even hating? Even for the Demons I no longer seek out a pub if the the game isn't free to air, just listen to online radio while doing other things. I used to inhale football news, watch three games a weekend, never miss a Melbourne game, and routinely wear my scarf just because I enjoyed a bit of random street banter about football.

To b fair, ballerinas get on with it through all kinds of pain and injury without so much as a sharp intake of breath.