scarlett

And a deserved debut drunkn. Dec has put himself clearly in front of new recruit pruess. Last year he would have good moments in quarters, so far this year it seems something clicked and is finding himself more involved between those moments. Hope he can continue his trajectory.

Disagree with you on kicking it to the hotspot, its flawed in that contested marks are much harder to take than one on a lead. Our forwards need to lead and lead hard to all different areas in the fifty, the ball carrier will kick to where the forwards are. With the players spread over the 50 and us not having any small forwards that crumb better than their opponents, it also clogs up their rebound and takes defenders away from helping and the defenders being under more one on one pressure with help further away! At present they rebound into open spaces in a big wave of players allowing easy hit up targets which result in controlled forward movement and good inside 50s which makes our back structures look under 16s standard. We went hard after players like may and lever, we dont need to go hard for a tom lynch, we need to go hard for the best forward line coach in the afl. We fix this it fixes the ridiculous opposition inside 50 goal ratio.

Why would we drop him, or worse trade him? Who plays forward with midfield minutes? We supporters give time for his team mates to find fittness and form but not trac because we hold him to that number 2 pick. He's not going to be the star many thought, but they seem to be measuring him against that imaginery level. He's always fumbled, always shanked a pass that looks easy by kicking it to hard, but normally hits a target and creates goals. He's never had the burst speed to dominate as a mid like a martin or dangerfield. What he has is awareness of whats happening and where the play will go, or when he gets the ball he will put it where his team mate should be running. He's able to execute what he plans most times because he can break through most tackles and is awesome at keeping his feet or give to a team mate while being dragged down. Doesnt have the tank so is better off spending more time forward but when managed right and not exhuasted is a capable mid who can turn momentum by winning contests and things normally happen when hes involved, this will improve every pre season but will never be a ben cousins or tom scully. Needs to work on his set shot. Coaches thoughts on goal kicking now seem to be better off to work with what youve got than try to reconstruct the entire technique, unfortunately i think he needs more than a tweak as he seems to slap the ball with his foot as hard as he can instead of kicking through it. Wouldnt hurt him to go out to a park and have a kick with fev, he held the ball different but I've seen him help out young players and makes it really simple and you could see the improvement straight away. He's a good half forward who started to look like he was ready to tear games apart, opposition players and coaches noticed this so put more work into him. Natural part of development, he will either rise above the closer attention or just be a good half forward role player who can sometimes be more. Most half forwards are inconsistent due to the position. If anb played like trac we would be saying good game. To those that say trade him, what would you want in a trade? No one will pay top price, then you risk losing a player that plays his role, for a lottery if you go to the draft with a high chance of said player not up to the same standard.

The way we kick it to a pack every time we go inside 50 makes it really easy for teams to rebound with little pressure because our 50 has so much space because all our players flew for the same ball spoiling each other. Their defenders know its going to the "hot spot" and set up for the crumb every time. Those first few clean possessions allow the opposition to move the ball forward the way they want. Making us run further defensively on a team that is already full of players with interrupted pre seasons. Making it easier and easier every time.

Keilty has been playing forward ruck and has been showing enough to be ahead of what pruess showed in jlt. Agree completely with leaving t-mac forward, but the effective disposal is also to blame on our key forwards and coaches, they need to make space for each other and charge out and demand the kicker to attempt the kick. Jogging around the forward 50 all flying in the same pack didnt work last year and isnt going to work this year. Which brings my next question, t-mac started well both games leading and taking marks all over the ground, but ran out of gas pretty quick and reverted to wanting it bombed on his head, he was always in the top group in pre season time trials, has his toe taken away his ability to get the miles in taking away one of his top strengths? Pruess in, would weaken our forward pressure way to much, its poor now. he struggled running out a half in jlt 1, Keilty offered more up forward and competed in the ruck, while smashing pruess around the ground. It would also keep at least 2 kpp playing as forwards stopping the opposition backman outnumbering our talls.

When he was fit he was normally best 22, and gave us something up forward. We offered a 1 year deal because of the injuries, saints offered 3 i think. I hope his body holds up and has a good career. But if i had the choice for a spot on the list between a fit kent and a maynard or hore, i would be picking dean any day of the week

Great crumb by kent, injury free saints have picked upa good forward. Wish him the best.

Bad start by bombers, can they re hire mark neeld and sack him again to turn the season around?

How can they win every contest, if i wasnt so shocked it would be amazing

The only good thing about this is, we can only get better. I have confidence we will settle, even if we lose, i think we will make them work harder then they are.

Stop allowing cox a free run and jump, realize he's their go to for a contest and crumb off and it cuts 4 goals out. Defensive Collingwood have set up like a diamond staying close enough to an opponent but down the line where they can converge and out number. Like west coasts's defensive set up and tigers failed against them too.

The trick is to have 23 men, that way when they look at the bench theres still 4 players.

I thought he had worse games earlier this year. His disposal is either good or a shank. When he first got moved out of position his biggest weakness was his speed. He would let himself get sucked into the contest and end up in the dead zone with a quicker opponent who would tirn and go and if we didnt win it the opposition would use his opponent and hurt us while he was left watching the back of his opponent get further away. They still try to exploit this but his positioning has improved but if we had lever in fritsch would be in that role or stretch would have made it his. Credit to tyson, hes a good footballer, i like what he can bring and what he has brought. I think getting a game on the wing when he has no attributes to play that role is a great effort. Great attitude to accept the new challange. If he loses his spot this week i think he will ask for a trade, i think hes worth more than we would get for him. If he stayed and injury hit one of our mids we could bring tyson in, no other club has a midfielder of the quality of dom running around in the 2's.

Without looking at any predictors or form guides im tipping j.hogan 3 votes to jump out of the blocks early followed by c. Oliver 2 votes then when the media were all over the aa ruckman the umpires will realize they shouldn't be handing out votes because they struggle with the job they have and have no clue how to judge footballers and just vote for the midfielder they see get the ball most so will jump on the media hype and the leader board will finish m.gawn 3 votes c.oliver 2 votes with razor fan boying over a.brayshaw 1 vote after the low five. T.Mac will be referred to as Tomald once more by a channel 7 former player battling early onset dementia caused by concussions (was it bt or frawley? If anyone is affected or family member affected by this terrible disease please dont take offence or personally, it is intended as light hearted) Fooling all channel 7 big wigs he is popular and deserves more air time and we will return to calling him Tomald and he will probably pip j.hogan for 4th with hogans strong start holding onto 5th.

Hunt has a battle on his hands, he lost his burst and speed this year, the injuries must have been affecting him but with out his closing speed defending his weaknesses showed up and on the counter he was just as bad as smith with disposal and his go to was bomb down as far as he could, most of the time to a group of opposition defenders. He needs to get his body right and work on these. He has time to improve and will be a weapon if he does.

Tyson is a better footballer and more influential than our bottom six. Its just he isnt in the top few for his position which means he's playing a different role. Now he's spot in the 22 is under threat because other players might be more skilled for that role. If he drops out this week and we lose he might ask for a trade, if we win through and he isn't in the gf 22, it would be pretty hard to take being a player of doms quality.

Tyson is a average mid, played in his preferred position, injury free and consistent games hes an above average inside mid. He's not a bull like viney oliver and brayshaw, he's an extractor who scans for the best option and hits it most of the time. This can cause him to get caught some times or dispose under pressure. If he were playing inside he wouldnt be in our bottom 5, but others have pushed him to the wing where despite not being suited and never playing that role he still manages to be serviceable. Unfortunately for Dom, if we have smith in it pushes fritsch from defence back up to the wing. Fritsch's value to the team has been greatest on the wing. So smith defensively upgrade on fritsch. Fritsch up grade on tyson. Fritsch could go forward in hannan or spargos spot but its not as much gained across the field.

He didnt dive, he just didnt try and not fall over. Umpires warned a few hawks and oliver himself for retaliating. They had been targeting him and umpires were watching for the next one to put a stop to it. He went down easy but most players have gone down easier in their career, its just people will grade him harder since the west coast incident. He might not care what people think but he should be making sure he does nothing to get the media whirl wind going again. Because the umpires are easily influenced and if he's got the rep of a flopper, they'll let that influence decisions.

Ahh wow thats amazing! Again thankyou guys so much it really made it a great day having us all with him, at the end of the game his eyes went watery when he was saying thanks for everyone coming but if you asked him it was dust. And his eyes still wouldn't be like that, there was probably dust in our eyes and it made it look like that. If there's something i can do for you two or something i can get you to say thankyou it still wouldnt be enough. I tell you what, next year ill guarentee a premiership (confidence) attendance and let you two fight it out for the honor. But i cant reward violence so ill think of something else... Thank your brother for me if he misses this.

Who has Tomald when Mcgovern goes forward? Last time when Mcgovern was in defence melksham played as a defensive forward on him. A defensive forward that ripped them apart offensively. Smith seemed to be finding the time to dispose better before his injury but i wouldn't expect him to find that time first game back in a prelim. If he's serviceable by foot takes the easier option then the gain would be defensively Smith over Fritsch who is ok but gain more from him on a wing and you dont lose his disposal you just move it to where he gets more chances to use it. So that would be tyson an unlucky out, who has improved his disposal but is not a natural wing and is doing well with a role that doesnt suit. The other choices i think would be spargo who was good last week and even his quiet games he still has good important moments. Or Hannan who can either bag 3 or 4 or only get 1 or and with his low possessions is vulnerable. But remember his last game in perth? Got us firing early. Fritsch would have to go forward who is better than spargo/hannan but not as good as his good games on the wing. so the team gain wouldnt be as great as it is for unlucky tyson.

Hey guys i know everyones after a barcode for the gf, i didnt get the grand final guarantee instead bought my daughter a membership too. But i can live with that, that was my choice, i'm hoping that i can get my dad there, he had been a member for decades, priority 1, and only missed the 2000 finals series with his first bout of cancer (I know timing). He got struck down again last year for a third time and it didnt look good, they even gave him a month time line, but the tough son of [censored] is still here, numerous times i invited him to some games this year but he always had an excuse, or said it was to bigger day, it wasn't until our first final that the proud sod told me he couldn't afford his membership this year and after burying mum he just gave up a bit i think. Fellow demonlanders @ding got him there vs the cats which was just amazing and @faultydet also lent me his and our whole family got to go and enjoy it with him. Thankyou guys so much, thats a memory that will stick with us forever. He wouldn't accept a ticket last week because we all couldn't go, but a grand finals a bit different I would love to go with him, but from where I'm sitting i just need to get him there. If i knew he didn't have the money or wasn't buying his membership i would have pulled money together and bought it for him. We didnt even know he was struggling financially, he only expected to last a couple if months and set up his funeral costs and paid off what he could on his property which he wanted kept until the grand kids were 25 to give them something to build from. If anyone has one I'm more then happy to pay the grand final guarantee amount, hell even if you want me to pay a bit extra its worth it. it would feel like i could make up for not picking up what was actually happening and sorting it out at the start of the year. Thanks for taking the time, I'm not usually one for airing personal things on the internet so thankyou to the two posters i mentioned and if anyone isn't using one please keep me in mind. Ill be doing everything i can to get him there.

So adding a tall defender for a tall forward line isn't a need? Lycett and Vardy will rotate through ruck and forward and will be too tall for hibberd, but might enjoy the freedom running off but the net gain wouldnt be worth it. Nev would make a mockery of needing tall defenders and embarrass the afl and we'll get a fine for bringing the game into disrepute when he continually beats two ruck forwards. Leaves lewis or salem. Who ever we play (including smith) will get massacred one on one, so we need smith in for his intercepting. Between hibberd, smith frost(who is ahead of o'mac for quality intercepts meow) and o'mac hopefully we can limit the influence of the 3rd big tall. Im thinking back trying to remember the last big forward line, it would be adelaide playing 3 talls, and vince took lynch and i think vince on vardy would as good as lewis on vardy.

Or Harmes can stop him and hurt him the other way. Viney to mitchell same as ablett, not so much a hard tag just beat him. shiel is the one that got off the leash last time with the focus going to mitchell. Matchup for bruest? Could see smith being an in this week if anyone pulls up sore or us extremely unlucky.

When lining up to get into the G, Roosy walked through to a massive cheer from everyone, he couldnt help himself he stopped and took it all in with a bit of a smirk on his face.

Just got to melb, grab something to eat, what time would be safe to get to the game and get in with a bit of time to spare? Is there any pre game stuff?