DeeSpencer

Pretty much all of those issues you mentioned were tackled with COVID changes last year. Majak played a scratch match with us last year! If the player agrees to go and the club agrees to let another side manage them for a period of time the benefits outweigh the negatives. State league call ups are probably the safer choice but you’re then impacting a state league club and you’re also having a mid season draft type exercise that could be harder to police. Purely for rucks I think the loan makes sense.

There’s no reason for clubs to carry more than 3 rucks and a forward/ruck. All 4 of those are out for the Suns. There absolutely has to be a system to allow them to add a ruck until the mid season draft. If a loan is the best way for that to happen then so be it. Id happily send Austin Bradtke up there for a chance to play for 7 weeks or so.

The second tier doesn’t interest me, but grass roots footy does. I’d invest in regional areas and work place laws so that people still have weekends and still live in the country. So many fewer young blokes play footy these days because they don’t have the time, money or inclination. Eddie’s plan on spending probably close to a billion dollars in the next decade for a Tasmanian AFL team is crazy. Imagine if that money was spent on country schools, country hospitals, country jobs in Tasmania. And a few bucks directly on ovals and change rooms. I get they need a team but the team should grow from the grassroots up, not from monumental investment.

20 round season - ok, whatever Final 12 - terrible Nt / FNQ team - unfeasible ‘Breakthrough team’ - a joke 40 million combined funding annually - ridiculous Brand new stadium in Hobart for 7 games a year - lol Brand new stadium having a roof because its cold outside - jump in the Derwent

Could be a 6 month post surgery scan

Petracca and Viney missed training according to the news, but Gawn said it was just precautionary normal stuff. Petracca can always play more forward, but if Viney isn't right that could be the change to get Melksham in, run him and the young mids on ball more. Jack played very well on the weekend but he's still probably a bit underdone from his minor break in training and we need him to find his absolute best form. Otherwise I'm still think Jones makes more sense as the change for Melksham if everyone is 100% ready to go. We need to keep that defensive heat to force mistakes from Geelong and get the game on our terms. Otherwise they'll just settle in to their kick-mark game with the backline staying deep and we'll struggle to score.

Would you light money on fire if you were him? That's pretty much what committing to staying does. It also probably becomes more of a story than the cliches. The cliches are useful because they really mean nothing. Until the club puts an offer on the table and rival clubs do the same there's no point worrying about any comments.

I have no issue with Petracca not saying anything, nor should he. He's contracted for the rest of this season which is has just begun and next. He'll be looking at his true big pay day and his manager will be telling him there's no point rushing in to anything now. We need to get Oliver, Salem and potentially Weideman locked away and then the club can go to Petracca's management. I don't think he's the kind of player where you'd even do a Wingard/May style pre agency trade either, you're going to keep him for as long as possible then work it out. I doubt Cripps is going anywhere but he and Carlton are still negotiating and he's the captain! With such a tight cap and star players keen on big deals it's a really tricky process.

Any break down on what those 1%ers actually are though? Because we had 18 more inside 50's and 12 more intercept possessions. I'm happy for a team to have 35 more spoils if it means we are dominating the inside 50's and marking everything at the other end.

Are you sure you aren't confusing Russell Jackson with Saints historian Russell Holmesby. Russell Jackson isn't old enough to be have been doing anything forever, plus he's been a little busy being a cricket writer and publisher.

2 of the umps through no fault of their own aren't within a mile of the play and the 3rd ump is still a fair way off the ball and partially obscured by Giants players running back. The speed with which players move these days probably does require a 4th umpire for this type of scenario.

Not sure we should be celebrating an injury. Weller took Viney on, that's what made that fun. Coniglio is just trying to evade Sparrow. Still it was a great chase and effort. Sparrow made Derm cry after he stood up for James Jordon getting a late whack in the head. I liked that. It was completely different to the push and shove after a player makes a mistake which I don't like

He’s played well at Hawthorn. I’d still like to have him, he could take Nev’s role and give us a tall and super quick defensive group. We’ve been lucky at this stage Tomlinson is more suited to key back than I expected. Hopefully it lasts. The super restrictive AFL rules on future picks meant we had to trade out a player to get a pick in to do the Kozzie deal. That and salary cap management that probably wasn’t ideal. Spending too much on certain players that could’ve been banked. Jason Taylor’s not perfect - he seems to struggle to get depth talls and outside mids but he’s clearly very good. The new question is whether Tim Lamb can keep shaping the list. Need to resign some big names and then manage some tricky trade ins and outs to keep building.

Really? Injured now but played well against us and pretty much every game he’s played in. Young and Serong were the safe picks in that draft but sometimes you need to take risks.

Both teams lost because they gave up the chance at Bont! But really I liked the move of 2 down to 9, we needed a more mature player to help immediately and we had to stop putting all our faith in 1 early pick. I always thought we gave up way too much adding pick 20 for only a late 40’s pick in return. For 2 we should’ve got 9 and Tyson out right. As for Kelly - he’d kill it playing for us on ball and on the wing. Maybe we’ll grab him if he can give up on his 8 year 8 million extension!

Underwood isn’t my cup of tea but she’s not the worst. Also it’s a more difficult job calling when watching on tv at a studio. Derm’s team is clearly the Giants. He knows all about them but what shocked to discover Ed Langdon is a good runner. Healy wasn’t too bad by comparison but hopefully he can return to his main hobbies of watching West Coast and complaining about teams not working hard enough.

Jones does some good by knowing where the ball is going and can link up well. But he mixes in refusing to take the first option and he does things that do my head in like standing and watching a May kick roll out of bounds for a deliberate where if he jogged over we get the benefit of the doubt. The unchanged team has also been nice but squad depth is important too. If injuries hit we can’t be needing a raft of guys without recent top level exposure. So I’d go Jones for Melksham this week, with Jones the sub and guaranteed his spot back the following week. Then it’s on Melksham, Sparrow etc to compete to stay in the side.

6. Langdon 5. Pickett 4. Gawn 3. Salem 2. Jackson 1. Viney

Jetta did it to opponents for years, if you've got the smarts and lower center of gravity you can control the contest. May usually has a similar weight but he does it to inexperienced young talls who have the best part of 10cm on him. Apart from one of the early 4th quarter goals I thought May did very well on Greene. Credit to the coaches as well for taking Jetta off him and redoing the defensive set up.

Both Davis and Coniglio aren't what they used to be but they were important players if the Giants were to sustain their game plan of flooding back, taking intercept marks, keeping pressure on us then counter attacking. They had a path to make it hard for us and were doing it. I'll rephrase. Surely no one is giving tonight a distinction. Some may give it a credit. I thought it was a pass. About 55%. Come back next week for a far tougher exam.

They did for a while until they started pinging Clarrie for retaliating. Proud of the way he composed himself. Not proud of his putrid kicking technique. Help him Choco!

Was using effort in the overall sense, but I thought the mental effort was lacking pretty much all night. Got jumped at the start. Coasted to a minor lead. Then gave up 2 goals to start the last. We ran hard and we had a crack but that’s the bare minimum. Skills and smarts were both poor for the majority. If the Giants didn’t have any injuries is any confident that we even win? They lost 3 leaders and important players.

They came to play but half of their side was heading to the bench by half time. If our players thought their effort was anything more than the minimal required we’re in trouble next week.

Biggest concerns to me: 1. GWS only had to switch once or twice to then open up all sorts of room on slow plays. Geelong will kills us if we’re so loose. 2. There’s still a lack of trust with the defenders especially when the ball hits the deck. Too much zoning rather than sticking one on one. Rivers has to stick tackles and Lever particularly has to know when to get up on his man. He gave Himmelberg way too much space all the time. Get up on him and halve a contest and trust team mates to cover back. Same goes for May when taking a small like Greene. Back Lever, Tomlinson etc to do the aerial contests if you aren’t in best position and stick on your man.

It was his best game at the contest and he went 1 from 2 on his long runs. 1 disaster. The other one hit Fritsch right on his eyes and he had his head whacked and no free. A lot of his other disposals were neither terrible nor great. He has to nail the big runs because they put our defenders all out of shape but he did adjust on the second one.