DeeSpencer

Alan Richardson was on to start the B game and he said Petty is one of Goodwin's favourite players, I don't think Goody or probably any of the coaches are the reason he isn't in the A side. He missed all of last year and had a slow start to preseason. It was hard to get a read on what Lamb was thinking apart from the plan to save at least the potential Hore spot for a mid season addition. Just from hearing a few comments I think Deakyn might be ahead of Farmer and as much as we could send Deakyn back to the Stingrays we could do the same with Farmer to Casey.

The zephyr Zephyr. We rushed our ball use really for most of the first half but we'd wasted chances in the first with the wind and then gave up a run of chances early in the second. A couple of settling goals all but evened it up before the half. Our 3rd quarter matched their 2nd, and the last quarter was a battle between our tired legs and the Tigers replacing some of their stars with fresh legs.

Our talls drop marks or spoil ineffectively which doesn't help the little guys. Rivers and Hunt probably get first crack because they have the speed and if he's in form Nev provides the strength in the air even if his legs aren't the same but it's far from a perfect group. I expect Petty and Bowey will be in contention for round 1 spots, even if they aren't lock down defenders. We might see Hibberd, Joel Smith and even Deakyn Smith early in the season too.

Surely you aren't suggesting Mitch Brown for Jackson? We could do with a 3rd key forward but we can't carry Fritsch and 3 talls who don't defend and don't offer a lot without the ball. It's an either/or M Brown or Tommy Mc and Tommy put the better case forward today. Jackson rucked a fair bit with Max going forward, it will be interesting if that's the case come round 1. Hopefully Pickett has enough time to be right for round 1, but either way I think it will be 3 smalls, Fritsch and the 2 bigs. The thing we do need is to get some marking or aerial contests from the rotating mids. Petracca clearly gives us that. And the other options will be some of Oliver, Harmes, Jordon, Sparrow, Brayshaw, Melksham who all have at least some size to create a contest.

I've heard from a mate that Geelong aren't manning the mark in certain parts of the ground. Instead they are remaining 5m behind the mark to allow them flexibility to move sideways.

Was hoping to see him have to defend more, because there's no doubt he's a guy we want in the team getting the ball.

Andrew Courtney, played well against North in a practice match last year, keen to see how he goes for Casey this year. He has a serious leap

44 keeps finding the pill, would like to know who he is

More positives than negatives overall I think. Line by line: Forward: Tom McDonald started well, faded out, still has to compete better when stuck under high kicks (punch Tom), but he looks confident to find space on the lead and hold a mark. If he can dish handballs more he'll be serviceable. Jacko didn't get much of it but showed his movement forward, he combined with Tom well early. Fritsch was solid and engaged in the contests. Spargo decent. Chandler lively and has talent, he won't always get much of it as he lacks top end pace but he knows how to use it and where to go. Mids: Petracca had a rough second quarter but otherwise was good. Oliver looked much improved. Sparrow and Jordon give us options and guys who will play their roles. Jones and ANB had chances, nice to see some variety. Wings still a little concern but I think both Harmes and Baker did the right running even if there's a lot to do on disposal and contest respectively. Defenders: Lever really came in to it after a horrific start. Tomlinson faded out of it, we have to keep him away from good forwards. Salem got more and more of the ball and was composed as ever. Hunt....up and down. His pure pace creates/shut downs problems but he can't tackle or read opponents well enough. Rivers looked a bit 2nd year bluesy, still can do some great work but can also be sloppy. Overall it was the area of the ground where I was most thinking we need to look at different options - Hibberd or Smith over Jetta, moving Sparrow back, Lockhart, Deakyn Smith even rather than Hunt? Petty or Big Majak at CHB if they can provide more than Tomlinson. Gameplan: We did well to stop and cut off chances were the Tigers overlapped which is where they cut teams to pieces. Probably would've liked to see us stem it earlier in the second but by and large we didn't get walked through and managed to keep our defenders in position. We probably didn't use the switch and our kickers enough. The new man on the mark makes it even easier to pass the ball around and we have to do a bit more of that. Otherwise we did get it to the corridor pretty well and use some really clever overlap to create holes. The forwards were found on hit ups not just looking for the over the top easy ones. It's our home ground that we've trained on for months now and we know the wind (and the travel, facilities etc). So shouldn't be a surprise that we got some advantage there and played it pretty solidly.

The long bomb kick outs need a plan for what happens next. Be it keep going forward, move it wide to one side or keep numbers in tight. It looks great until it goes back the other way just as fast. Id like to see the tall under the high ball just punch it to one side

Marking contests are hard but that wasn’t even it, was a ball bouncing around that he just had to kill. He’s Toumpas with pace to get out of traffic at times.

Every team will try to isolate him deep and draw May away. We need the forward pressure to stop that happening. He’s awful one on one. As is Lever. Mids got tired that quarter. And even more so half backs I think. Tigers work rate even when losing and in to the breeze is first class

His first quarter was dreadful. 3 turnovers in a row. Did lift a lot in the second

It’s not stacks on the mill for us whilst Richmond have free runners outside. It’s still a little like that. One Gawn contest at half forward had us at the drop whilst Cotchin camped corridor. But it’s not early 2020 or 2019 either

Probably even in terms of best 22, hard to get a read on the value of our outs

Harmes had a couple of stinkers but also made a few important spoils. Overall I’d still have him ahead of Baker who looks gassed after 5 minutes and can’t defend in the air at all.

Usual suspects making mistakes but the same can be said for Richmond. The promise is the structure has looked good. The only easy goals for the Tigers have been from some really good crumbing on the back of some poor spoiling. We’ve moved it between the arcs reasonably well and the shape around the clearances in particular is better. Why we didn’t add some mature defensive depth is beyond me. Not sure Jetta and Hunt are the answers. The coaches are spinning the forward and midfield magnets and something should shake out.

The Premium option as far as I know just gives you 3 visitor passes to the MCC for 3 low drawing games. Instead of paying $153 for 3 x 51 dollar visitor tickets you get them for $136. Now in some way it should guarantee that your guest can get in to those 3 games considering you've paid for them and it would be nice to know you'll also get priority to getting in to those games, but I don't think that's the case. If the crowds are heavily restricted and each game goes to a ballot system then it might be luck of the draw. EDIT: I didn't factor the 'general admission access to all games all Melbourne home games at the MCG'. If that means you get to dip in to the MFC members allowance for tickets as well then that does increase your odds. Not sure if that's the case, the wording seems unclear.

The cap is for footy departments not club spending

We leaked a fair portion of our stories through Clark, so hardly a surprise he likes the guy. That said, we’ve managed the media well I’ve thought. Mostly kept things in house until they were ready to go, made sure we got a fair hearing on our side of the story and also got our fair share of press. Good luck to whoever takes over in a year that will likely be chaotic again, could see a coach firing and possibly even the board under pressure

If we are reliant on young players to be the cake then we are in trouble, but a number of successful teams have had plenty of young players as the cream. Rivers, Pickett, Laurie and Bowey are flankers, almost by definition if they are picked it's not in roles that require brilliance or to be the most physical players. More will be expected of Jackson especially to start the year but his upside is that he doesn't have to do any one thing amazingly to play well because he's versatile. If Rosman gets a game then obviously he's in a physically demanding position but he seems physically ready There's also plenty of examples of young players stepping in and helping change the feeling of a side even if they don't make it through the full season.

It's disappointing but they've shortened the AAMI Community series to just the one week and now confirmed the interstate sides will play their neighbours to cut down on travel. Without the organisation of proper games, in decent time slots, with a sponsor and tv broadcasts I can see why they've called these effectively training sessions. In hindsight I think they could've quickly organised each club to distribute even a low number like 500 tickets per club with a simple covid and security plan and had a few loyal members at the games. It could've eased the disappointment on fans who miss out on games at times this year.

If the cap is at 50k then it’s likely they’ll be room for everyone in round 1 but the issue is if it’s broken down in to set divisions people might have to change categories to get in. There could be more than 11k MCC members at a Melbourne game, but not the full quota of regular MFC members, AFL members or Freo members. Each game might need waves of ticket releases to give people more chances to go.

He's always kicked to the left of the mark, but the man on the mark has always had the chance to at least smother it if it's low. This change means he won't even have to physically kick over the man on the mark. Players capable of jutting out late - see Petracca - can start their kicks lower and/or closer to goal. This rule stops players blocking the corridor. We're yet to know if the umps will still allow players to run 3m over the mark and then reluctantly take 1-2 small steps back when asked. That's the Hawthorn/Sydney tactic for the last decade. Ask for forgiveness not permission. The shambolic nature will be good if we use it win. Bad if it costs us. Hopefully for once our coaches and players are prepared.

Players will have to be disciplined and play to the whistle (or more accurately the play on signal), but it’s also going to take the umpires being very vigilant. Obviously coaches have manipulated the man on the mark by moving them inwards (and for years forwards). But there was a natural understanding that as the attacker moves sideways the defender can too. It seems particularly unfair to me that Buddy Franklin won’t ever have to kick over the mark again. He’ll always get to swing out before the defender moves to cover it.