P-man

Players playing today that didn’t play in that game: Weitering Marchbank Walsh Dow McGovern Casboult Gibbons Newman Cunningham E Curnow Silvagni But yeah, basically the same team. Also, I said the BALANCE of their list is better. Which it quite clearly is.

The balance of the Blues list is simply better than ours. Got their pillars sorted and have stocked the midfield in the last couple of drafts with quality inside and outside. And to think that C Curnow, arguably their best player behind Cripps last season, is still to come back into this side. They are set.

He’s on a hiding to nothing, really. Damned if you do or don’t. I understand the want to reach out to supporters and let them know he’s hurting as well. Fair play to him. Fixing the defence is a priority but the inability to score is almost as alarming. Our forwardline is complete puss atm. Certainly the delivery isn’t helping but right now nothing is functioning. We can’t buy a tackle in our attacking 50. We can’t buy a goal from a forward stoppage. On the occasions when we do have forward targets they aren’t working together. We seemingly have no-one that can take a contested mark. As others have noted, the absence of Hannan may be under appreciated. And of course there’s the purple elephant in the room. Or rather in the west. Somehow we need to craft something together that provides a better output than 2 goals in three quarters. We made some small inroads against Richmond. Let’s see if any more can be made against the Hawks. There is still much that can be salvaged from this season.

@McQueen - any new fishing gear?

This is amazing. One goal since quarter time which was from a Richmond mistake coming out of defence.

Andy, time to open up the draft and trades board ?

What really sucks about this is that the Tigers are playing like garbage,

Really feels like we’re missing Hogan atm. We don’t have a forward target. Weid is just standing there flat footed.

Harmes clearly behind held then. No whistle.

Loving Marty Hore. Great pick up.

Add Carey and I’m in.

Under a lot of pressure. The intent is there. Right now I’ll take that.

T Mac. Jesus.

Oliver starting forward?

Bloody hell. What a performance.

For god’s sake get the defence sorted out. It doesn’t seem that long ago that our defensive structures and quickness to set up used to be lauded. The ease with which teams are slicing us up right now is embarrassing. There must be some improvement across the entire team tonight. If it’s another field day for the opposition with our bunch of reactionary chooks all swarming towards the ball carrier with seemingly no communication or understanding of what they’re doing then pencil us in for bottom four because it means we actually can’t fix it. The other must is to crack in hard and win the clearance battle. It is inexcusable to have such a dominant ruckman winning hitouts for fun and losing the clearances to average midfields. And can we at least leave a couple of players sitting outside of the contest instead of seemingly every time the ball spilling to an opposition player unopposed. Oh and good luck Jeffy.

This is actually a dog’s breakfast. We can’t score and we can’t defend lol

Well the final against Geelong last year was fun. That may be the highlight for the foreseeable future.

Missed the set shot from dead in front. Welcome back Joe.

Barracking for the umps today. Can’t stand either of these clubs.

This game has arrived at just the right time to continue to build into the season. A less fancied opponent that has exceeded expectation going into the season and, given their outs, is basically playing to their potential. Conversely we have a fair bit of room for improvement, and if we can make another stride forward on the back of last week it will be a nice confidence boosting win. These ones are often nailbiters. Hopefully not the case this week. We should win and win well.

Bruce has his annoying quirks (the way he says “Sahlum” makes me want to reach through the screen and throttle him until he gurgles out “Salem” correctly), but compared to the likes of Dwayne Russell, Luke Darcy or, god help us all, Basil [censored] Zemplas, I’m often reminded there are a lot worse going around than old Brucey. Despite his many knockers he’s without question one of the greatest sports commentators we’ve ever had. I agree though that he should’ve left when Cometti did. They were a partnership that somehow worked. The chemistry with BT just isn’t there.

He wasn’t dreadful. I just didn’t notice him much. He kicked it straight to a red and a white jumper in the first half and I honestly can’t recall him doing a lot in the second. But I’ll take your word that he was better than I thought. I’d still be happy to see him swapped for Lewis. Re ANB, I think he’ll play better once the team is playing better. He’s a follower, not a leader. So let’s bring him back in this week (just jokes daz).

People are surely just looking at the name and not the performance when it comes to the Wagners. On that performance you could maybe drop Corey but not Josh. He was very good. Stretch was fairly disappointing I thought. If Lewis comes back in he’d be the one to make way. Jetta and Oscar the other straight swap. That would probably be it although Jeffy roaming at the feet of Preuss is a tasty prospect. If he can have a big game this weekend he could come in for Spargo