binman

So many rubbish games, including most of the Gather round games (not helped by the weather of course, but still). For neutrals, i can only think of two great games this season - for the drama, our comeback win against the blues (but not a great game skill wise) and the Cats hawks Easter Monday game. I might be missing some, but geez that's a pretty poor return for box office games after 5 rounds and OR.

Finally, a semi decent round of footy. Nine games, most competitive. How the AFL could have cocked this season's fixturing up so woefully is beyond me.

And we lost Salem early too. Two down can't help with the total number of clicks the team has to run.

Good call. You're spot on, we could use the burst of energy XT will bring - straight swap for Salo you'd think; high half back kicking inside 50. I fear we'll struggle big time defensively against the Lions - hardly a big call their talent and skill level. Much will depend on our intensity and capacity to press up on their kickers and receivers and pur them under pressur. Any hint of last weeks 'fatigue' and they'll cut us up.

That's awesome- on two levels. One, who doesn't love it when a new draftee debuts? Two, it's clear from comments made by King that XT had some things to work on, and I suspect attitude was one such thing. If King is picking him I assume XT has worked on those things to King's satisfaction. XT's leg speed won't hurt either.

Thanks, that's an interesting consideration - I hadn't clicked we only had a five day break into the Tiger's game. I think playing both Heath and Max against tge lions would decrease our chances of beating them. I'd suggest if they pick Heath to maximise how fresh Maxy is for the Tiger's game they are prioritising the Tiger's game. Which wouldn't surprise me as it is our biggest game of the home and away season and Guerra has already shown he wants to maximise such opportunities from a promotional perspective. If they are thinking that I'd rather they rest Maxy and play Heath as the number one ruck - but can't really see them doing so.

The issue is not his form, the issue is that he cannot cover the ground at speed or do the end to end running for the whole match that Kings' game plan demands. You might argue that nor did Melksham and he was still selected. Which would be a good point - i was amazed he was selected against the Suns, and proven wrong. But the chickens came home to roost against the Bombers when he might as well not have played. Every player has to run north of 10kms a game, and mostly at a good clip too, to do the sort of offensive and defensive running the game plan demands. With Salem out early in the game, and Melk slow to begin, and then injured we basically played two down for the match. Add Tmac's lack of leg speed. and we were behind the 8 ball all match in terms of being able to defend (hence our struggles in stopping them chip the ball around - a strategy obviously designed to exploit our lack of run) or create overlap on offence (hence our woeful score from the back half). Heath might play with Max at some stage this season, but i would suggest probably not until the back third of the season. My guess is as soon as Luker is 100% good to go he comes in and plays as a key forward and chop out ruck.

Snap

Yes, at least for the short term. You do know Max is likely to retire at some point don't you? And that our succession planning involves Heath becoming the number one ruck?

I'll give you lever, but Sparrow was our 5th highest rated player Player Ratings Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Match TOG Ball Win. Ball Use Max Gawn 6.3 5.3 0.9 8.8 21.3 85% 12.4 7.2 Harry Sharp 5.1 4.7 6.0 0.6 16.4 73% 4.8 10.0 Kysaiah Pickett 3.5 4.5 8.4 −3.0 13.4 81% 6.1 9.0 Harvey Langford 1.0 2.4 2.4 5.7 11.4 70% 3.1 6.8 Tom Sparrow 1.5 6.8 2.0 1.0 11.3 67% 4.5 3.3

The first line here picket rather undercuts your call to bring Jeffo in. I mean a scratch match, a shorttned one at that, between two VFL teams sits somewhere between preseason match play drills and intrac club sim for relevance to senior selection. That said, I think you'll be proved right.

If fit, and assuming there's not other isssues, surely he will. We need some of his physical grunt. To be honest, when thinking about who would come in I forgot about Riv, in large part because I assumed he was injured. But he played the Casey scratch match, so hopefully he's OK play on Sunday. Id go with Out: Melksham, Salem (assuming he is inured), and Tmac In: Kentfield (plays forward and second ruck, Petts goes back), Jeffo, Rivers (if fit- AMW if not)

Equity Post Clearance - the only quarter where our pressure was at an acceptable level was the second. Not surprisingly that was the only quarter we had a positive Post Clearance differential (+12). And the only quarter we outscored them. Interestingly, we actually stil lost cp that quarter (and were down ball winning equity too) - shows that in that quarter with AFL level intensity we got great scoreboard impact from our possession won Post Clearance. The second quarter was also by far our best quarter for ball use equity points (+9.7 - next best +3.6). Our pressure fell away in the second half, there's went way up in the ladt (+22) and our points from ball use collapesed (-13.4 and -13.9). There's obviously a risk of confusing correlation and causation but I think its reasonable to argue that our ball use is largely dependant on our pressure, contest and intensity - with ball winning equity points being a good measure of these aspects of our game.

Thanks @WheeloRatings The quarter by quarter stats are fascinating. Rather than just looking at contested possessions and Clearancs as the measure I'm increasingly looking at a combo of cp and ball winning equity points to get a sense of how good our contest work was. And I don't even bother looking at disposal or kicking efficiency as a measure of our skill level. I just look at ball use Equity points. Both tell a tale in this match, particularly when you look at the quarter by quarter trends - particularly ball use, which collapsed relative to them from half time. That said I was wondering if it's possible to include clangers in your weekly data - our clangers were off the charts yesterday and I reckon clangers are a good measure of where our kicking, intensity and even fatigue us at.

And clever - she's leveraged her position of strength very cannily. My day looks very different tommorow, and will involve full clean of her car, gardening and my most dreaded of chores - cleaning the #$%$#$% windows inside and out (for weeks afterwards sunlight mocks me highlighted all the smudges I've somehow missed). By the by, in the as live Masters Jason Day made birdie at 9 to go 5 under and equal second.

I'm not suggesting Goody behind the Swans change to their game plan to but it's interesting their hyper attacking style and long forward handball (#1 for metres gained by hand) coincides with goody joining them as director of coaching and performance. That's where the buck stops. Always

Great day of sports watching Masters as live now thru to 1pm game time. Get my bets on the ponies. Races kick off 11:45 am Game 1:10pm Races replays during the breaks, more after the game finished Post game, 3 group ones in Sydney, includng the excitement machine Pride of Jenni enjoying the trailing wind - can they catch her (I hope not). And Australia's best horse, the u defeated Autumn Glow gunning for her 12th straight win in the Queen Elizabeth, which this year is stronger than last year's Cox Plate. Then watch the replay of our victory over the bombers. Gold.

....with four of our recent first round draft picks - Langford, XL, Kolt and Latrelle - going bananas.

It's awesome isn't it - it's by one of Australia's great musicians, ans hige dees fan, David Bridie (Not Drowning Waving, My Friend the Chocolate Cake, terrific solo stuff). It's a recording of a live performance from many years ago on, I think ABC's spicks and specks Note: well answer that question again on the show, just coz

Thanks Layzie, much appreciated. I rhink we'll be right - we're actually going to use Andy's zencaster account, and then he can access directly overseas - an elegant solution. And he's taken some equipment with him to record the intros and edit properly, which is amazing. I can only assume he has a very understanding family!

By the by, that track is is from one of my top 5 Australian albums The Lost Dub Tapes, released in 2004 by the mysterious Secret Masters. Brilliant album. Brilliantly produced. And sounds absolutely brilliant.

10 goals up at half time Lose by 17 goals.

G'day loyal Demonland Podcast listeners. As you know Andy is away and will miss three games in total - last week and the bombers and lions games. The process for recording the show, which normally goes out live, is a bit complex and above George and my pay grade - Andy records and mixes the show with a combo of recording software and analog mixing desk, with George and i joining via video link. The plan was for me to do the Suns (tick), Bombers and Lions games solo whilst Andy is away, with me recording a basic sound file, which i send to Andy who adds the intro and outro and then uploads to the various platforms (which by the by @Demonland is above and beyond given you are on holidays - much respect). However @george_on_the_outer and have decided to harden up and find a way to record the next two Demonland pods together. I mean how hard can it be? Why am i telling you this? Because George and i are going to record the show Sunday morning, which means there'll be bugger all time post game to put questions in this thread, so we thought we'd open it up now for anyone who wants to ask a question for the dees v bombers pod ahead of the game (about the game or more general). We have some questions already that were posted after i recorded last weeks show, which are relevant for this game too, so i'll kick off this thread with those questions: @GS_1905 asks: Haven't jumped into the podcast thread for a while so apologies if this has been asked already but im just a little worried about the development of our young brigade: Windsor, XL, Langford and Tholstrup in particular. Now i know these kids are 2/3 year players and we must temper expectations. But aside from becoming (obviously) solid footballers, are any of these kids likely to be future stars of the comp? If so, who is most likely to break into the top 20 afl players in the future? @buck_nekkid asks: What does our best forward line look like? Based on facts? Based on best guess? By the end of the year? Smaller group used in the centre bounce setup - are we getting to our ‘pure mids’, and the choice who went through was specific (tactical?) to GCS. For example Kolt had zero attendances - so no tags this week. @Bowserpower asks: What are the main differences with our forward line this year? @binman asks: George have you adjusted your thinking/expectations post our magnificent wins against a benchmark team in the Suns, and starting the season 3-1? George, speaking of our magnificent wins against the Suns, how pumped were you? Highlights from that game ?

Too early in the season. Wont be able to open Demonland come our bye - which by the by is bizarrely not till round 16!