binman

A normal smirh intervention should have been an option. I'm confident

I think kozzie covers the need for a very good small forward but agree that we could do with a really good mid sized forward (though not instead of a big) Melksam and Hannan are not cutting the mustard and the best teams all have dangerous mid sized goals kicking options. thoih i guess you could argue Fritter is playing thta role for us. The jury is well and truly out for me on baker. Before this last game i was also of the view that he was not going to make it, but he gave me some cause of optimism with his best game for the club (good timing too). Fingers crossed. In any case he is contracted for next year i think.

Our priorities in order, in my opinion: Elite kicks Elite kicks Elite kicks Key forward (assuming tmac doesn't overcome his physical limitations- which by the by if he doesn't no other club will want him) Outside runner (a bit here depends on baker's ceiling) Above average small defender (a bit here depends on lockhart's ceiling) - 90% of opposition goals are scored by smalls and medium forwards and mids Saad ticks four of those boxes. Though of course if he played for us we would learn that, like may and Lewis , despite being an elite kick he would still turn it over plenty of times. But unlike say lever he would also hit his share of high risk kicks from the back half that create critical scoring chains.

That's quite funny. Coq au vin was all the rage in 70s in the suburban Melbourne of my childhood. The ultimate in hawt cuisine. Seems like that's where you might be stuck - 12 teams all in Vic, man on man, kick the bloody ball and the only zones the new fangled travel cards used to to get the train and buses to far flung, exoctic places like Windy Hill, Waverly and Morrabin. Maybe your next name change could be Three Cheese Fondue or Chicken Chow Mein

Two things annoyed me about how they called that incident. Three actually. The first is Cameron ling was talking. I simply cannot stand him. Clueless ans seems to be incredibly dismissive of the dees. The second was that not one of those clowns disagreed with Langdon's deliberate earlier in the game, which was more marginal in so far as he kicked it under pressure 40 odd metres, forward. And ling said yep, obvious 50. But argued the greene wasn't! Third. Richo is wrong. I think. My understanding was the rule was to be interpreted as it was incumbent on the player to keep it in play, in order to keep the game moving and reduce stoppages. The only out is if it is miscued and/or a teamate is really close (not in 'the vicinity' you peanut ling). So the rule was, contrary to richos stupid comment, brought in for that exact sceario - ie a players whose skills they dribble over pretending to accidently handball it out of bounds

A really interesting dynamic is that the only realistic chance of making finals is if dogs lose. If they beat the saints both will end up on 36 points. But the giants would need to win by 9 goals odd goals to make up the percentage gap with them. And would then still need us to lose. So to be a chance they still need us and the dogs to lose. But crucially for us they need make 3.3% on the dogs as well. So they have to win by four odd gials to have a shot. Good for us as they play Friday night and us sat arvo and have to attack the saints and go for it to be a chance. No putting the cue in the rack if they are a couple up wirh 5 to go. A good game to bet over the total match point line.

That reads like a Timothy Leary haiku

Totally agree. The last one was infuriating given where the match was at. They didn't even have a replay of it. And to make things worse, soon after they were showing goody talking to fritsch on the bench in the little break for no reason. The other thing that did my head in is all rhe talking and conversation between darcy when the ball is in motion. Call the bloody game!

Total thug. Unacceptable in this day and age. Pathetic he has not copped more criticism, though unsurprising given footy media is dominated by ex footballers who are almost meat heads - meat heads who instinctively say no case to answer for every hit. But there is some justice. In game decided by 5 points Mumford gifted us a goal when the ball was clear of our 50 and IIRC another he gave away on the wing ended with a goal being kicked (i think)

Fair point

Agree. A big redeeming quality

This reflects a shift in the AFL towards slow ball movement. As any regular demonland poster probably knows, because i bang on about it all the time, the standard of commentary for both fox and 7 (7 is way worse) drives me nuts because it so bad and lacks any real insight. But one commentator who i've actually thought recently is not too bad is Bartel. He made an interesting pit tin the Dogs game in the last quarter when he said that teams now often slow the ball movement down and chip it around. Said they call it defending with ball in hand. The logic is that it allows them time to set up their defensive zone behind the ball to protect against a turnover when they do attack (which helter skelter, fast play on footy doesn't - as occurred at least twice to us in the giants game). The dogs slowed the game right down in the last as the hawks were pushing, but with a four goal lead the risk reward ratio for a fast play was out of wack - ie attack risked giving up another goals to the hawks, whereas slowing it down and setting up their defensive zone reduced the risk of a goal on the counter AND kept the the ball out of the Hawks hands. Smart, albeit boring, footy. hunt's run and gun style i ill suited to this trend and his terrible field kicking means he is liability because the chip and hold approach breaks down with turnovers (often in dangerous spots). All of which means the forward line is the only spot he can play.

Baker played really well in the Giants game, though dropped off a bit in the second half. It really reinforced to me the importance of having a second winger with pace who carry the ball forward and gets metres gained. And of course it goes without saying we need more above average kicks and Smith is an excellent kick who gets great depth with his kicks. Has the skill to put the ball to a forwards advantage so they would love that (almost every player used to have this skills, few seem to anymore). I don't really know how Smth is going but from the bits of him ive seen this year still looks in reasonable form. Would cost us little and i'd bbe keen.

No. Buts that's where goody will play him.

I don't reckon he does want to be at the dees

I heard it to. And came to a different conclusion. Which was that he has fully considered leaving. Explains a bit i reckon

The weather for carrara next Saturday: Saturday 19 September Forecast Icon Min 13 °C Max 24 °C Precis Possible rainfall: 0 to 4 mm Chance of any rain: 40% Gold Coast area Partly cloudy. Medium (40%) chance of showers. Winds easterly 15 to 20 km/h turning northeasterly 25 to 35 km/h during the morning. The next routine forecast will be issued at 4:50 am AEST Sunday.

I'll go the other way. I have praised him often previously but he was poor for 3 quarters. Redeemed himself somewhat in the last quarter - mainly by not screwing up and somehow stopping Cameron mark in the goals square. But i'm happy to concede the Smith experiment needs to end (at least as a defender - i'd love him to go crazy up forward). And going the other way i thought Tomlinson was good in defence tonight.

Well we have different KPIs for decent game titan - in my opinion two possession game for a player who played 90% is the very definition of a poor game. Come on - two possessions, and not single mark for a player who has license to get up and down the ground. You can't seriously suggest that is not a poor game? He was as bad against Freo and again poor tonight. In the last 3 games he has a grand total of of 16 possessions and four marks, none contested. But the issue i have is not those numbers - it can be hard for a forward to get possessions (though the odd mark would be nice). The issue i have is that the last 3 games have all been season defining, must win games. Reputations are made, or not as the case may be i such games. And Weed has been miles off an acceptable level of pressure in all 3 games, tonight included. As an example he did not lay a single tackle in any of the last 3 games. That is not on.

Dr Ds football knowledge - do not rate

Not sure about that. The goal he kicked he was involved deep in defence and got the first handball in the scoring chain about 20 from their goal. Ran the length of the ground to kick it form the goal line after the tap from Hunt. That is some serious running

Weed had two possessions against the swans and you don't think he played poorly?

Who is a chance to come back in next week. Bad week for Weed to play his third shocker in a row

Disagree with both of these comments bing. It was a simply ridiculous decision to drop him for preuss. The fact that was wet just amplified the stupidity of that decision. Not just becuase preuss is not a forward and is slow as wet week but alps becuase Pruess barely left inside 50 and brown gets on his bike and provides options and cover. That decision was big factor in our inability to stop them crossing and not being able to stop their chains of uncontested possessions. mind melting decision.

This. This is the real test of where we are at as a club. Forget the draw, the hub the travel. Forget everything. How much do we want it. GWS can lose and make finals still. This is an elimination final for us. It is members thank you round. Dess fans have tipped in money for that jumper. Time to stand up dees. Go redlegs