John Crow Batty

A key factor to our improvement is of a generation of best 22 home developed players now reaching the sweet spot of experience and games played. Salem-115, Petracca-111, Harmes-107, Brayshaw-103, Neal- Bullen 89 and Hunt 83.

I get the impression opposition teams have been sacrificing their own game to try and beat us. How many times has Lever been tagged this season? They certainly respect and fear our defence.

We only concede an average of just over 27 points per second half of games.

Only 2 forward 50 tackles compared to their 10.

I noticed that too. There seems to be a lax interpretation for Geelong infringing. In one chain of play starting deep in Saints forward line going to the wing I saw an unpunished clear throw and two blatant dropping the ball events all committed by Geelong players. And I only watched 5 minutes of the game.

There are only two clubs in WA. They can’t take back every talent who has moved East and will have to pay big if they do. The reality is most will stay East. We may lose a required homesick player but so could 16 other clubs. There are limited opportunities.

Confirmed that Weid will be in this week.

At least we know that Weid will be pumped up to perform. I expect 20 possessions, 4 goals, 6 tackles and 3 contested marks inside 50 from him.

I believe they should get a priority pick with the caveat that they also move permanently to Tasmania.

Apparently Mummy has been caught again on camera “accidentally” dropping both knees to the back of a prostrate Zac Merrett last round which only invoked cricket chirping from Mr Christian.

Don’t they grow ganja on the Tiwi Islands?

If there no injuries to replace then resting up to too players could be considered. There are quite a few waiting for a chance to prove themselves.

Would like to hear the other parties story for balance and CCTV footage might be a more reliable indicator to what happened.

Both Brown and Tmac have awkward looking kicking techniques but very effective. They know what works for them and luckily their style was not coached out of them like so many who have “one style suits all” textbook techniques but miss too often. Good to see these two expressing their individuality with success.

Thats the kind of attitude that has caused us to be stranded in the doldrums for the past six decades. We need more chicken sacrifices.

Very good point. Players should enter and remain free of any greasy lubricants which are misused as an aid to enable slipping out of tackles. Selwood does it all the time using his drippy greasy arms to slip tackles up over his shoulders. Not much different to a cricketer applying Teflon on their bats to hide small nicks. It’s a form of cheating. Surprised the AFL is not cracking down on the practice. Umpires should be telling offending players to dry towel the oil off and pay a free kick for non compliance.

Under rare circumstances like when we need to cover a key defender injury, he’s not getting the ball and others are kicking goals like what happened last week it’s appropriate. He got back into touch and performed very well covering for Tomlinson. He can be a seriously good defender but his current upside is as a forward. It’s great we are blessed with his flexibility.

Interesting to see how Brisbane goes. They are going for five wins in a row after losing their first 3. Looks like they will be a serious contender to challenge us.

Joeboy - unrealistic lofty standards.

Sydney were the highest scoring side before this round. We kept them to their lowest score of the season so far. Another big win for our defence.

The yin and yan of the game means they might have dropped off somewhere else. But I agree we need to be better where we can. We are not Richmond yet with a dynasty.

Marks inside 50 was the difference. We lost just about every other key indicator or just broke even. Thanks Tmac and BBB. Tmac was brilliant and it was only by sheer luck that he is still playing with us. It was obvious he was playing injured in the past 2 seasons. We should have treated him better. Last night we played the hunted role as in the previous week. Sydney applied more pressure than other sides have dispensed all season. We were resilient but we have to get back on the front foot to being the hunters again. We can’t play on the ropes all season.

Richmond were relatively poor winning centre clearances in their flag years and it didn’t bother them much. A pattern I notice is that we concede too many goals in the first few minutes at start of games and start of quarters before we lock down.

Going for 10 wins in a row from late last season. When was the last time we did that? All comfortable wins but we haven’t truly smashed any sides nor has any other team taken us to a close finish. Swans have a tradition of dishing out kick sand in face humiliation to us when we are looking good. They seem to lift when they play us, like they espouse to a big city Sydney/ Melbourne rivalry which we don’t click to. I believe they will be our greatest challenge so far in our incredible start.

I found that last nights game was very similar to ours against Richmond despite opposite weather conditions. Richmond bullied early and were very dominant but us and Geelong managed to resist and turn the games around with fast moving pressure football and Richmond folded. Richmond don’t intimidate as much as they used to do. Now it’s more bluff than true dominance.