binman

9 hours ago, Dee in a Kilt said:

Last Sunday's devastating loss delivers us an opportunity, as does any bad event.

I've supported the Dees since the early 90's when my 6 year old son helped fly the huge cheer squad flags at a time when the squad comprising two men and a dog (today's cheer squad is brilliant!) My family has hosted draftees and a current player is godfather to one of my grandkids. But I've also had decades in executive roles in Australia, USA, Japan, China and now the UK (currently back in Melbourne during the European holiday period).

@binman's post this morning in the training session thread cut through the noise: We members ARE the club and we have power we are not using. The 57,000 of us MFC members feels like Dr Seus's "Horton Hears a Who!" Like Who-ville citizens, we members struggle to be heard.

Here's what I propose

Demonland becomes the voice. Not another venting forum, but a structured process to deliver member expectations to incoming President Steven Smith and CEO Paul Guerra by August 31st. As Smith and Guarra don't start until September, Demonalnd feedback can inform their onboarding process.

Critical areas for member agreement

First, Demonland agree on the critical areas to be addressed, for example:

• Communications strategy with members

• Transparency standards and accountability

• Complete governance review - obviously including the footy department

• Securing MFC's permanent member home

• Our message to AFL leadership (umpiring professionalism)

The Process

Constructive discussion only - enforced by moderators. I have deep empathy for member pain. Let's channel member frustration into positive action through Demonland as a unified voice.

Upon agreement on critical areas to address, then these topics become a separate Demonland thread. When broad agreement is reached on each thread, we then insert it into the official communication we send.

Andy has veto and edit powers, informed by Binman and George.

We do all this with respect to the Board and CEO.

A final point is that the word "ruthless" has been used of late. In my mind, the only time we have been ruthless was when Peter Jackson rebuilt the club.

And that ruthlessness delivered us the 2021 flag.

Since, members have spent the last 2 years as passive observers of governance failures with significant infighting at Board and CEO, resulting in Goodwin riding a two-legged horse.

Current circumstances hands us a blank slate and leaders who need to listen.

Can we channel our anger into constructive feedback the oldest AFL club deserves?

What do you think?

I think a stripped down version is feasible, one that doesn't involve moderation per se (just a commitment for posters contributing to a thread to focus on constructive criticism and positive ideas not raging at the club).

The reason I say that is consensus would be all but impossible given the disperate views and the risk would be it wouldn't actually be representative.

And the moderation would simply be too time consuming amd complex

I'm thinking something less focused on creating a platform so to speak, more on a space to contribute ideas on specific topics/areas that the club could tap into.

In that sense there is an opportunity for the club to get free of charge the sort of direct feedback and input from consumers big organisations spend huge sums on in the form of focus groups, research, surveys etc etc.

Would the MFC be interested in such feedback (and I don't mean the sort they have been copping)?

They would be absolutely crazy not to.

If done well the info they would get back woyld be miles better than the joke member surveys they do every year that likely cost a 150k or more.

Business doesn't seek input from consumers for [censored] and giggles. The drive for such processes is usually profit, to sell more products, the bottom line.

No different for AFL clubs that increasingly rely on membership sales to survive, let alone thrive.

It would be plain stupid to ignore FREE well considered feedback, input and ideas from passionate supporters of the club, the majority of whom are paid up members - in business speak the key stakeholders.

The trick might be to have some communication with the club to let them know the feedback exists and what its intended purpose is.

I suggest we start with one topic area, see if we can self moderate, see if we do in fact come up with some agreed good ideas and consensus and go from there.

Because it's a hobby horse of mine, is an area where there is actually pretty good consensus already (ie that it's poor) and is not that loaded, I reckon we could start with a thread on how the club could improve communication (all aspects - ie engagement, social media, crisis management, injury reporting, website, content etc etc)

When I'm at a computer tommorow I'll happy to start a thread to get the ball rolling if there is support for it.

6 minutes ago, Chook said:

I'm a supporter. It's not my responsibility to run the club. It's not even my responsibility to financially support the club. They play well, I buy in. That's where the relationship ends.

'They play well I buy in'.

The corrally is they play poorly you don't buy in.

Sounds more like the classic fair weather theatre going fan than supporter to me.

25 minutes ago, WheeloRatings said:

Apologies, I completely forgot to come back to add that on Monday. Potentially related to how the game ended!

Here are the team pressure numbers and I'll post the players soon.

	Melb	St K
Q1	198	170
Q2	158	187
Q3	209	184
Q4	162	165
Total	182	177

Thanks wheelo.

Strange pattern-

• almost 200 in the first (200 being considered elite, 180 AFL average)

• only 158 in the second- massive drop off

• Come out after half time firing -209 in the third would be one of our highest rated quarters all season i reckon.

• Back down to 162 in the last

6 minutes ago, At the break of Gawn said:

What I have trouble understanding is that someone like Goodwin knows exactly what it's like to coach the fittest team in the AFL as he saw it first hand in 2021. He clearly knows for this season that we're nowhere near the fittest team so why isn't he demanding more from his S&C team?

I can understand how some coaches like Brad Scott might have no idea what it's like to coach the fittest team, but Goodwin does, so why isn't he asking for better results?

What makes you think he isn't?

On 28/07/2025 at 13:26, WheeloRatings said:

I have access to the quarter-by-quarter stats, but they're not readily accessible. Here are the stats for the last quarter (first table) and the first three quarters combined (second table).

Quarter 4

	Melbourne	St Kilda
Disposals	67	95
Contested Possessions	26	32
Post-Clearance Contested Possessions	19	20
Uncontested Possessions	39	62
Clearances	6	9
Centre Clearances	1	6
Inside 50s	7	18
Marks Inside 50	2	9

Quarters 1-3

	Melbourne	St Kilda
Disposals	251	260
Contested Possessions	98	92
Post-Clearance Contested Possessions	57	49
Uncontested Possessions	157	166
Clearances	34	32
Centre Clearances	12	5
Inside 50s	45	25
Marks Inside 50	13	5

Have you got the pressure ratings for the Saints game @WheeloRatings ?

3 hours ago, Deeko2 said:

Great post binman.

I have a little theory on Burgo as well in that he somehow keeps the players up and going for a longer by communicating with them more and reminding them how much more they can really give.

I think I can recall footage of the 21GF where he was with the playing group (maybe on the bench) just telling them that they're all good and heaps more to give.

There is obviously physical restraints to all players fitness levels but there has to be some percentage of mental blocks at times preventing the extra 10-15% which can see teams improve incredibly.

Looking at the Crows this year and I see some resemblance to us in late 21. Players giving there all for longer and longer.

Yep.

A mantra of burgess, one I heard the players repeat so often it was clear they believed it, was they were the fittest, strongest teames, could not be outworked and even if they thought they had hit the wall they could find something extra.

I have a related theory. Key to burgess' philosophy, particularly that psych aspect of it, was his teams train harder than they play and train thru niggles.

Griffith worked under Burgess and I believe has a very similar philosophy.

I wonder if there's a shelf life to that approach.

Senior players would have had that hard core approach drilled into them for the last six years. That's a long time to be under the kosch.

Perhaps a new approach is needed.

4 hours ago, Go Ds said:

Hmm, I would've still been scratching my head but assuming you're right about Misson I stand corrected. Obviously not everything a player does at home will be monitored. But I'm surprised with all the ways a player's ability and performance can be measured that much escapes a fitness coach.

With all due respect I think you've still misunderstood my point.

29 minutes ago, Go Ds said:

Anyway we do need to improve fitness. But unless players are deliberately cutting corners or being uncooperative it's incumbent on the coaches to help guide and redirect players towards those goals.

Absolutely, i didn't mean to imply otherwise (though i was actually referring to the High-Performance team not coaches, though they of course have a role in the fitness space too).

I'm 100% not suggesting players are deliberately cutting corners or being uncooperative. What i am suggesting is that perhaps the entire playing list is not 100% dialled in that space and some might be thinking they are giving their all but in reality are not.

That was certainly the feedback from some players when Burgess first arrived - they thought Misson had them dialled up but soon realised they still had levels they could get to.

I'm to elite fitness to what the MFC is to good governance, but from what I've gleaned over the years the gap between optimal, super elite fitness and elite fitness can be very small and it's in those margins that all the difference is made.

That's true for a single elite athlete so one assumes that multiplied across 44 athletes the effect can be significant.

Just now, Ghostwriter said:

Define “a look.” Not sure viewing for hours on end is sneaking a look.

Time is an abstract concept

14 minutes ago, Ghostwriter said:

I’m on it, Binners!!!

I mean i'd probably sneak a look to see what all the fuss was about!

12 hours ago, bing181 said:

Also also FWIW, in my opinion what has happened with the players/team/club over the last few seasons is almost ALL between the ears. Even this year. We can at times play like gods and match it with the very best. And then lose to the very worst, often in the worst kind of way (e.g., inaccuracy in front of goal). We're both miles ahead of the Norths, WCE's and Essendons - and miles behind them.

It's not about technique (the players can at times do exactly what's needed), it's not about coaching (we can at times dominate opposition and counter their strengths). Lack of consistency within and across games is almost always down to what's going on between the ears.

As to why, and what to do about it ... I have no idea. I do wonder though whether winning the flag has become a millstone around this group's neck, that they can neither move on from it nor refind the form that lead to it. The pressure and expectation to succeed saps away at them - e.g. both Goodwin and Salem spoke a while back about "chasing the scoreboard" rather than focusing on what you're supposed to be doing.

There's a lot to unpick.

I agree with much of that Bing

But id add that in my opinion there is little doubt we have not been sufficiently fit.

BUT it doesn't necessarily follow that that's all on the high-performance program. A huge amount of responsibility has to fall on the shoulders of the players.

To get to the comparative fitness advantage we had on the comp in 2021, the sort the Pies and Lions have had in the last 2 years requires all team 101% buy in and fierce desire to push beyond that.

Perhaps it's also between the ears with a critical mass of players thinking they are pushing to their limits but in fact not doing so.

An important impact of not being fit enough is how that intersects with the psychological aspect you are talking about.

Put simply people under fatigue are less likely to make good decisions and more likely to make what appear to be complete brain fades.

2 hours ago, jnrmac said:

Nothing changes.

My point writ large.

Who's fault is that nothing changes.

An analogy is constantly moaning about how hopeless government is when we live in a relatively well-functioning democracy.

We get what we want.

1 hour ago, MrFreeze said:

Id actually like to see the players engage in public self flagellation to ensure the DLers stay happy 🙄

Ironically that could be fund raising opportunity.

I suspect an Only fans page with 44 fit young athletes self-flagellating would be pretty popular.

12 minutes ago, DeeZone said:

I don’t blame you Ghostwriter the negativity and mean spiritedness is bordering on this time last year. “The coach needs to be sacked, we need a clean out of players, where’s the resilience, etc, etc, etc. imagine how West Coast, Richmond and North Melbourne must be copping it. Personally I would like to see a bit more resilience and team first actions from some of our supporters, we are doing a rebuild on the fly and there will be ups and downs, it must have been terrible at Marvel on Sunday for our poor Dee Army and supporters watching the doomsday clock winding down then the 6-6-6 nightmare, we really missed May and Levers leadership in the last quarter. The look on our coaches faces said it all. Glad that you turned up Ghostwriter shows that kind of resilience and team first spirit that I mentioned earlier. Bravo.👍😁

The negativity on DL fir the last 18 months has been relentless.

But is peaking right now on the back of the disaster that unfolded in the last 30 mins of last week's game.

I was there, sitting directly above the Dee Army, (whose support was awesome from go to whoa). So I got the full immersive angst experience.

Don't get me wrong it was certainly something to behold.

But at the risk of being howled down, whilst I understand ans share the anger and frustration fans feel, frankly I find many of the attacks on our club pathetic.

What amazes me is that people attack the club like they are not part of it.

Supporters of the dees, regardless of whether they are a paid up member or not, ARE the club.

Boards, coaches, players, CEOs etc come and go. Supporters don't. Supporters support.

We are the club.

I love the dees, and have done since I started supporting them I'm 1972.

I have seen my fair share of woeful performances, including full seasons when we struggled to win a game.

Perhaps is just me, but I've never once felt the urge to mindlessly attack the club and spew vitriol towards it. Criticise sure, blind negativity and anger never.

The one constant in the 50 plus years I've supported the dees is for almost all that time we have been a rabble off field.

Successful organisations, whether in business, community or sport, have one thing in common - strong governance.

Calls for the coaches sacking all you like, bag the the players until you are blue in the place, but we won't see sustained success until we sort our chronic, half century long governance problems.

The great irony is, unlike how players and coaches perform or our trading decisions etc etc, supporters actually CAN do something about improving our governance.

We are a member based organisation and we have power.

In my book, if we choose not to use that power (and I don't mean by refusing to buy a membership or attend games - which of course doesn't help) angst should be directed at us not the usual scapegoats.

Part of the problem not part of the solution.

Peter Lawrence copped a bit of stick for activelly trying to do something about improving our governance.

I for one look at PL's efforts to improve our governance last year thru a different lens now given we end yey another season in turmoil with the shadow President and new CEO on holidays in Europe and not returning to seasons end (even if we wanted to make major changes to the FD how can we).

I'll put my hand up and admit that i have shown little interst in actually trying to ccontribute to efforts to improve our governance. I'll start thinking about how i can change that - for a start I'll go to our AGM for only the third time.

3 hours ago, Kev said:

This was posted about last weeks recovery session (training, 22nd july) by ghost who walks.

"This morning the players had an indoor training session which was all about tackling. They were told to lay hard tackles and make them stick, also how to ‘shrug off’ tackles. It was long and intense and at the end they were told to now go about doing the exact same thing during play.

Tomorrow, the indoor session will be all about handballing."

It suggest there is flexibility to the workload in recover sessions.

Not being facetious kev, but do you think that rather than contradicting Bing's point it actually reinforces it?

I mean, it sounds like we significantly changed our recovery program, presumably to increase the likelihood we would coming out firing given our woeful starts goody referenced in the post blues presser.

We do in fact come out firing and are all over the Saints.

Before falling in a compete heap, and stopping to a walk in the last quarter.

It's hardly a stretch to suggest that such a dramatic change to the recovery program potentially contributed to us being more fatigued in the last q than we have been in recent weeks, and otherwisemight have been (and if so fatigue would def contribute to some of the brain fades we saw).

2 hours ago, Whispering_Jack said:

You should have started the podcast and then abruptly cut it of three quarters of the way through.

Or alternatively be OK for three quarters of the show before falling in a complete heap for the last quarter....

('tell me Andy, do you think we should take the opportunity to change our allegiance to the Tassie Devils - I mean Demons to Devils is not such a big idealogical or conceptual leap, and there's a certain synergy in swapping support from the oldest football club in the world to the newest')

Would have preferred a letter from our 'new' CEO along the lines off:

I understand the anger of fans and also challenge faced by our hard working and passionate President in addressing that anger.

I don't want to leave Brad to deal with the angst of fans alone and I understand the importance of strong governance at this time.

Accordingly, i have brought my start date forward and rather than commencing in September, which in hindsight was an error on my part, will now start my tenure tommorow.

6 minutes ago, The heart beats true said:

I’ll be there! What’s the point of not going? I’ve already paid for my Trident membership, and I’m interested to watch from level 2 at Marvel.

I was disappointed today, hugely, but is it more disappointing than the second semi in ‘23, or the Prelim in ‘87? If I can survive those I can survive anything.

I'll be there.

I'll leave my bells at home but.

Cold. Wet. Train replacements there and back.

So pleased I made the effort to go.

3 hours ago, At Least I Saw a Flag said:

What could possibly go wrong?

I see that Sportsbet have us as slight favourites. We've won 1 of our last 5 games, Saints have lost all 5. Clash of the Titans.

Any given Sunday.

23 minutes ago, Ethan Tremblay said:

Blowing a 35-point lead.

Nek Minnit

This season has proved a disaster for the AFL - and even more so for the broadcasters.

Five rounds still to go and there's only one team outside the 8 who realistically can make finals, the dogs (by the by has a team ever not made the finals with a percentage north of 125%?)

Meaning we have five weeks with any number of rubbish games, including tonight.

And tonight's game highlights another related worry for the AFL and broadcasters - the gap in performance levels of the top 9 teams and the bottom 9 teams.

The dogs are 9th on 40 points, and the bombers are 14th on 20 points.

In most seasons, at this stage of the season 9th would of course be favourites in the betting against the 14th team.

I know the bombers have been decimated by injury but even so the fact they are 11.50 to win this match is absolutely nuts.

The dogs are 1.04 to win. I'm pretty sure winx never even started that short.

On 21/07/2025 at 20:50, Dr. Gonzo said:

At first I rolled my eyes - I was never a huge fan of Joe, way too goofy for my liking.

But if he didn't cost much (picks wise), despite being a year retired and one of the more unreliable players even at his best he would still be better than what we have now. If it meant JVR could stay forward while Daniher pinch hits in the ruck and he takes the oppositions best defender while playing forward leaving JVR, Fritsch, Melksham (?) space to work it would be worth a stab.

We don't need a superstar KPF, we need a solid, big body that can take a mark and play backup to Gawn. If Daniher could be got for basically nothing then it's worth a shot, not like our list is bursting at the seams. There's about a quarter of the list we could cut tomorrow to free up a spot and no-one would notice.

Where I've landed pretty much.

The key is daniher would take the oppos best, and likely biggest, defender, giving JVR a bit of a chop out.

55 minutes ago, Brownie said:

I saw that one yesterday. Disgraceful.

The ump said to Jackson, you took a step. The kick was reversed and the pies had a shot on goal.

I then watched players taking multiple steps off their line for the rest of the game before play on would be called.

Players aren't standing the mark always anymore and players with the ball move a number of metres off their line before play on is called.

There's no consistency in how the rules are applied.

Insane.

As was this 50m and gifted goal to the pies after a Freo player gestured towards the screen.

No abuse no arguing, just a gesture, 50m. Yet players are back to arguing with umps all the time.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/724315990200691?mibextid=9drbnH&s=yWDuG2&fs=e

And it was another dodgy free kick paid in front of the goals for the pies to start with.

Compare and contrast with Xerri furiously pointing at the scoreboard and mouthing off when he dropped maxy off the ball and a completely reasonable free was paid.

Last night was the classic case of the scenario where two things can both be right.

We were woeful for much of the night.

And the umpiring was appalling and had a material impact on the game.