Dr. Gonzo

We could play them twice (home AND away)

These are the little things that bug the [censored] out of me about the club. You want to earn respect, stop letting the AFL push you around

Great points all round

Gill was already quoted earlier in the year that one of the AFL's priorities is to help in the "rehabilitation" of the Essendon Footy Club.

I agree - but you were also saying on BF that unlike other Melbourne supporters you were supremely confident that we would handle the Blues with ease. Hindsights a great thing, but reality is we should have won that game, regardless of the disparity in age/experience. There is also a disparity in class which was in our favour but the one disparity that mattered was in endeavour and they killed us in that aspect of the game yesterday. I'm not slitting my wrists though, we are clearly tracking in the right direction and as you say the age/experience profile of our list means there should be continual improvement over the next few years. I still have faith in the clubs short-term future I'm just annoyed we lost yesterday when it was so predictable - I thought the Essendon game had weeded those performances out but it seems it's harder to eradicate that culture than I thought. That culture has existed as long as I've been following the Demons which is since 1987/88.

Yep we didn't want to work hard and Carlton did, that was the difference. Even when we started to win the ball we just bombed away, stark contrast to our last two games. They wanted to do it easy yesterday and thought it would just happen but I think they got a rude awakening.

Maybe when you're unable to think more conceptually.

That's your opinion, mine differs.

We lost it with our poor delivery/decision making going forward - Pedersen definitely would've helped by contesting the balls that did come in and offering a chop out kick for those that didn't.

Agree completely. Oliver couldve spent more time in the middle I thought too when we were getting killed there. In the last when we need to win the ball and kick goals we had one of our best ball winners in Oliver stuck in the forward line and one of our best shots in Watts playing on a wing. Was a bad game by the whole club today.

Pedersen would've been a big help especially for that get out kick. He crashes packs and makes and contest if nothing else, Weideman looked lost today

But why would you flirt with form? 3 changes time a winning side when only 1 was required was stupid, especially considering the weather and dropping hard attacking triersifor a 2nd gamer and a bloke on his last legs who had barely done anything all year

10 wins isn't successful, it's a par. Not bad but not good either.

3 changes was bad too. Pedersen and Harmes for Weideman and Michie was wrong wrong wrong

Blues wanted it more which is an indictment on the team. We're they looking ahead to next week? Think it would just happen for them? This was every bit as bad as the Essendon loss.

There won't be many finals played at Docklands and none that involve two Vic clubs unless there's 4 Vic finals in the first week (which is unlikely).

It's worked out for them in this context though where the result is in their own hands

Similar to Essendon in 2001 tanked against the Tiges in r22 to get them first week of finals

Not ignorant at all just a difference of opinion. An AFL club has a list of 38 players to choose from. That the afl think they can dictate which players should and should not be playing each week is ridiculous. Why don't the afl just pick teams instead of the clubs if that's the case? Using your example what if 9th plays 7th and 8th plays 15th who are blooding youngsters for next year and going to serve up crud? You can't manufacture the outcome of games no matter how hard the afl tries. Having a bye before finals is such a ridiculous knee jerk reaction to a non issue (typical afl in other words) that's in my view it's barely even worth debating if not for its utter stupidity.

If we were in that position we'd have no one to blame but ourselves for losing unloseable matches earlier in the year. Take care of the wins early and you won't sweat on results in the final round.

They might have felt that, but they were completely wrong.

It's not as bad as people make out - just normal rubbish, filler and he ends with "Melbourne is a stock worth buying".

Fingers crossed we never have any injuries again and are able to run our best 22 out every week. Why even have 38 on the list?

The AFL is run like the WWE and I'm not even exaggerating.

Well there's no genuine champion teams this year so we have that going in our favour