DeeSpencer

Thought he had given up Alcohol for life. Or at least for the season. Failing to wait to get the all clear to be on holidays and away from the hub is just monumentally stupid.

The Sydney and Freo games with wind and rain and short breaks aren't a fair indication of our defensive system, which has worked almost all year. They are an indication that our midfield lacks run and skill to retain possession or forward movement in the wet and that our backline are incredibly flaky under adverse conditions. Plus a condemnation of the list that we couldn't shuffle in new players and play to the same standard. It's really hard to get pressure on a team when your midfield is gassed, dishing out nothing handballs and you can't retain possession from the backline. Our pressure was great for 3 quarters yesterday, then dropped off which is all mental application, getting way ahead of ourselves. Then instead of immediately settling in to a chip it around game plan to take the heat out of the game we give up 3 goals first. Because we lack on field leadership and we lack mental strength to know what to do - which is keep running hard and attacking but use the ball safely. We went in to ultra defensive not moving or trusting ourselves mode. Again, it's mostly mental but combined with a lack of run and skill particularly in the backline and midfield. The craziest thing about the commentary yesterday was hearing them say Melbourne need to go in to all out attack more. The thing we need to do is beef up the flanker and outside mid work rate and skill so we can be comfortable mixing tempos and using the ball far smarter than we currently do.

The problem I have with Tomlinson is he doesn't do anything that talls are meant to do and doesn't move like a small at ground level. So eventually the ball is going to end up on the deck and he'll get exploited. Essendon worked that out after half time. They kept Stewart and Daniher/Draper deep and knew that meant Tomlinson, Lever and Hibberd had to chase smalls around (and also that Smith was isolated). If Lever didn't take an intercept mark it was panic stations. Now if Tomlinson can learn how to spoil and mark like even an average 194cm defender then he'll be useful. But he's miles off that. We certainly can't be adding in another tall without great speed on the deck in Petty to the mix. One or the other. If it's not Smith, Hore or Wagner then we need to go get someone like Oleg Markov or Jimmy Webster to just be a competent mid sized defender across half back. Guys who are 188cm to play on forwards who are 188cm. Rather than Tomlinson who can't keep up when the ball is bouncing around, struggles to pick up leads too. Bennell is a pipe dream. If he works, great, but don't plan for him. We can't keep going with a one paced midfield without guys who are naturals are giving/receiving handballs and with poor kicking skills. Brayshaw's the only one in that group who has a nice linking running game but he can't kick under pressure. Harmes has the run but lacks skill too.

Doesn’t need a lot of muscle, needs a tank. The 16 minute quarters have helped him. Needs to match his mate Jackson once they get back to Perth over summer

But he won't keep kicking 4 a week because he just doesn't do that. Even 1.5 goals a week seems unlikely. Well done by him for doing it today but it's a luck of the draw thing. I'm defensive of Pickett who gets low disposal totals but whenever he's around the ball he's doing the right things to pressure or create. I don't think that's the case for Hunt and if he's up on the wing he absolutely has to find the ball. If you're wingers aren't finding the ball then you it's unlikely you're moving the ball or spreading well - we saw that, it's called Melbourne 2018. Langdon, Baker, Vanders played the bulk of the wing minutes, not sure how much Hunt did, but more time in that role without finding a lot of the ball is a worry.

Maybe we should just delist him for groping Petracca. I don't care at all that his hands were in inappropriate places. I care that he's been a complete moron at 3/4 time in a must win game. We thought we had the game won and played like it.

His best footy often came on the back of tagging or defensive forward jobs. Give the man an assignment and he'd do it. Tackling and defensive work were never a strength but when set a task he had the competitive ability and physical capabilities to do it. Now he seems to be down a yard of pace and even less interest in competing. He never liked putting his head over the ball but he would at least be brave in the air. Moving him on to the ball has gotten him involved in games but hardly been a success. I still think the wing would be a strong spot for him. Decent on the outer ring at stoppages, good one on one, strong mark, thumping kick. But he'd have to really buy in to make a transition back to a role he played a lot at Essendon but never really nailed.

The difference between our best 4 defenders and the next guys on the list is massive. And we probably have to move one of Salem or Rivers to the midfield if we want to fix the class issues there. Tomlinson is just plain ordinary. Can't mark. Can't pressure at ground level. Has huge mental lapses where he trails his opponent in to easy possessions. Smith does one great thing for 5 bad things. Hibberd needs to be replaced immediately, or at least sent deeper, he couldn't get near AMT when up the ground. Lockhart's gone missing and Hore and Petty have missed a year. Josh Wagner came in, did little wrong and then was never seen again which is weird because we've kept him around for years and never given him an extended run to prove himself one way or another. North just delisted half their backline and they're probably better players than we role out down back. St Kilda have a couple in Webster and Savage who don't get games who we surely have to think about. At the moment if it's not May, Lever or Gawn marking it or a clear 2 on 1 we're under intense pressure down back. As soon as the midfield dropped away the backline was screwed.

Best I've ever seen him balance up to kick on the run today. Nailed 2 difficult chances. They like to play him deeper as a forward. I don't think they trust his tank nor his smarts to get to the right spots - both in attack and defensively because otherwise he has such a trick bag as a high half forward with his ability to mark on the lead and to split a game open with pace. Seemed to play a bit more on the wing today but still only had 7 touches. Hmmm, hard to know what to make of it all really.

I thought he had a very good chase down tackle today. The days of Aaron Davey style 30m run downs are largely over. It's going from opponent to opponent in tight, without over pursuing that is important and he's looked as good as anyone. The ability to tap the ball on, gather and hit up Hunt on his left was sublime skill. In front of goal he's been dreadful. 7 goals 13 that should be at least 10 goals 10 even with missing some easy ones. But Pickett's so often sprinting in with the kick from a half forward position and we love putting multiple talls or marking targets like Fritsch deep so we can not be out marked. We could go to have Pickett at the feet of Weid and he'd kick more goals. Or we could find kicks capable of hitting up the half forwards inside 50 rather than always going deep as well. There's a lot of ways to get his goals up that aren't his fault.

Playing half forward, you wouldn't get near it. For 3/4's Essendon couldn't get a touch in the corridor. They were forced wide and slow. Koz was a huge part of that, whilst creating goals and unrewarded running. Look at the Tracc kick to Oliver in the centre where he stupidly played on and get caught holding - Pickett's streaming through half forward in a mile of space. The focus on possessions is missing all the good he does.

I think the tank has been an issue in years previous but his work rate has looked very strong this year and he's consistently been high up in the tracking numbers. Shaun Higgins was a flanker until his mid 20's. David Mundy the same. Both became genuine superstars when they went in to the middle.

If you replace Smith with someone who gets more involved in attack, leave Hibbo deeper where he's not as gassed and give the mids and Salem/Riv (and Lever, May) a much needed rest then Tomlinson's work rate isn't as much of a factor. I'm certainly appreciative of that part of his game but jeepers peeling off to get 20m kicks should be the bare minimum from every player on the ground not something special. Brown chased kicks to the wing. Good luck to him. But that won't happen against the Eagles. Remember round 1? The only way we have a hope in scoring against the Eagles is to have key forwards who can provide a contest. Which means they are willing to jump and compete in the air and Brown doesn't do that.

He does get tagged by defensive forwards every week. Every other side has a Spargo/Pickett/ANB type out to stop him. Once again in the top 5 for most metres run today, 3rd for us behind Langdon and Brown.

Depends on Rivers' fitness especially if/when the game reverts to full length quarters. He might not have the tank to do it in year 2. Otherwise everything I've seen makes me think he'll be a very good midfielder.

If at least one of Salem and Rivers aren't put in to the midfield next year at the expense of one of our bashers then we are kidding ourselves. If we don't recruit at least replacement level defenders to fill their void that will be a sign we don't know what we're doing.

Out: Tomlinson, Smith In: Hore, Lockhart We have to go small down back and live with the idea that they'll get us a few times in the air. Tomlinson is just ridiculously plodding, let Stringer do as he wanted, managed 0 intercepts. Smith could be a decent player at a club with a backline coach who knew how to coach. But Troy Chaplin has no idea how to use him. He has to be instructed to play back shoulder with an arm across and given 100 spoils with both hands every training session. Near impossible to beat one on one when he picks up the play, nearly useless when he doesn't. Hibberd to slide deeper where he's still useful rather than attempt to chase smalls. Out: Baker, Melksham, Brown In: Harmes, Sparrow, Jackson Baker's shown a bit but he's still iffy at the contest and unsure how to pressure. Would rather Harmes. Sparrow in to give us a defensive mid who might actually get involved in the game, bugger Melk off. Brown had a nice game chasing marks on the wing but if Jackson is right he needs to play.

Too heavy. Whether it's fat or muscle only the club would know. Petracca is an almost unique powerful player. Only him, Dusty and Danger can roll around as 90kg+ mids apart from the 190cm+ guys like Bont and Cripps of course. Oliver is far leaner than he used to be. Gus isn't.

Had the crucial involvement in at least 2 goals - the left foot kick to Hunt - a handball out to space for another of the running goals Don't worry about the stats, when we get a midfield with vision and reliable contested forwards he'll be right as rain.

Hopefully they get it right the first time. So many of our recurrent issues have been when they've deferred surgery and then rushed players back. At least Gus has time on his side to rehab from surgery, get it right and then get back to fitness. And honestly it could be a blessing in disguise because he's been slow and overweight for years now IMO. Might be a chance to fully rebuild his body and mind. If he returns with a frame like his younger brother he'll start playing better footy.

I can't imagine the financial gain would be a huge motivation unless he's made poor financial decisions along the way. There was that unfortunate negotiation in the media last year but I'm sure he eventually did settle for a contract in line with his ability and that would only be further reduced in 2021. He's along way from 306 games as well so I can't imagine that would be a huge driver and even 300 isn't guaranteed. He was far from good this year but also a fair way from terrible. More meh that anything else. If he wants to play on that's absolutely his right to express that. I don't think he should, but we're also very uncertain with the number of list spots and the amount of experience in or out of the list between now and the deadline. There is a possibility that we make a series of trades and delistings of other players that sees Jones more worthy of a list spot.

1. Eastern seaboard afl reserves 2. The VFA 3. A select group of NSW/ACT/Queensland teams too big for their state leagues Thats a very interesting way to create a competition. And the kicker is amalgamating the nab league teams in with all the teams in Victoria in a mess of a way. Personally I would’ve continued the NEAFL and VFL. The savings can’t be all that substantial. Otherwise go to Reserves and VFA and send the Southports and Sydney Uni’s back where they belong.

I don't care what the media say, we've worked on dropping our backline deeper to prevent easy goals. Apart from getting smashed by Port we've stopped teams scoring for most of the year. The inside 50 kicking in the first few rounds after the restart was really bad but that's improved since then. There's still a huge room for improvement but that's for the coaches. In terms of Mahoney's job as an administrator his role was more to bring in Richo to help get things on track and I think that's happened. Champion Data....please. Langdon was a good pick up and we've had a very nice draft class. Assuming we aren't afraid to make some more aggressive moves we should be far more balanced and capable of pushing and staying up the ladder. Pickett and Spargo was a very minor breach early in the process by young players, almost every club has had one. The Cairns stuff isn't a story, if anything we should've complained more about an absolute stitch up of a fixture. The other clubs based up there have been gifted a home ground advantage and it seems priority access to train on the oval that we weren't. Injuries were a massive factor and I would've liked to have bounced back better than we have but remember the 2007 injuries and the decade without finals? At least we're back in the hunt. Who is this highly rated person to come in? There's not many good football administrators out there and how many are keen to jump on board with Goodwin or with a huge 700k+ hole in their budget. The mid season assistant changes Mahoney made were proactive, something had to change. I understand that concern but bad clubs make more mistakes with too many changes than too little. I'd rather just see one last year of Mahoney and Goodwin than turfing one or the other.

Game plan - ups and downs but overall improved List - improved Covid breaches, sooking about hubs etc all seem to be doing better than a lot of clubs. Ladder position - 17th to 9th. It’s too late now to make a change that impacts the trade and draft period for this year. I can’t imagine the assistant coach situation being positively influenced by changing head of footy now either. If things go poorly next year then the Board and CEO will have to organise a more thorough review no matter who is in charge

As for the football department staff: Goodwin - give him 2021, too expensive to pay out and I'm not entirely convinced he doesn't deserve a fair chance in a proper season. Mahoney - Outside a contract reason or a standout candidate may as well link him to the coach and do the same. Assistant coaches - Further turnover seems a reality. Widely available candidates and Richo's had a year to work with Goody and provide an opinion on what is and isn't working.