Pates

While yes the cats are reliant on quite a few ageing players, I think they’ve brought some good young players in this season that are showing some serious zip. I personally think at their best this season they look more dangerous.

I actually thought his ruck craft was the best I’ve ever seen, he genuinely looked like he was doing better than breaking even. Now that obviously also looks better when you have a psychopathic Viney smashing through and winning clearances but I thought he battled hard all game and as you said did team first acts. I really hope we don’t rush Gawn in; firstly this is a great opportunity for Weid to gain some confidence with a body of work. I also think this is a fantastic time for us to trial some plan B scenarios should the big fella be unavailable at the pointy end. And finally, the poor guy has been carrying such a heavy load of responsibility particularly during our slump, he needs time. I was disappointed Weid didn’t get the goals from his chances, but if he works hard and persists with what he did on Thursday the opportunities will come.

This side isn’t the case, Alice Springs is actually mild and no humidity. I don’t mind us having one game in Alice every year, we’ve played there enough now that we are more familiar with the ground than any club in the AFL. My only annoyance is playing Port Adelaide there means we will likely not have the crowd support. Would much rather we play one of the likes of GC, GWS or even a Victorian side. As for not needing the cash, we sadly kinda still do. Our crowd numbers haven’t been great, we aren’t completely out of the woods. It’s also actually good that we are connecting to First Nations communities.

I usually try to avoid father/son comparisons but jeez that would be epic to see Jack vs Todd in his prime. The universe would probably implode such would be the impact of them coming up against each other! Jack took the dropping of the captaincy like an absolute champ and now that he has it back (if only temporarily) he has gone to beast mode x10.

I’ve never really known AFL teams or players to game this, in fact if anything players resist getting onto the stretcher when they should to seem more macho. Total contrast to soccer, particularly European and international games, where they blatantly and disgracefully use it to slow momentum and waste time. I will never forget an Aussie match against Iraq where they used the stretcher what felt like every 5 minutes. The ref did nothing. Really glad AFL isn’t like that.

Petracca looked good on Thursday night but I would be interested to know if there’s anything being done about his kicking for goal. His goal drought extended this week and there’s no doubt he’s getting enough looks at the big sticks to say he should be doing better. That one on 3 quarter time in particular he should be nailing every time. In fairness to him he’s not alone, Nibbler and Oliver both missed very straight forward chances in the third. I’m not expecting our team to do what we did in the Grand Final (hell that was one out of the blocks), but it is frustrating seeing very getable chances going to waste. EDIT throw BBB into the group wasting opportunities.

Understand what you’re trying to get at @Harrisonrules and I think there was a bit of that when we got to 10-0. There was talk of “who’s going to beat us” and even dumber chatter from media people (didn’t see any on here) of us going undefeated. When we lost those three in a row there was definitely this feeling of us being back to the pack and the aura surrounding us being this really hunted prey seemed to disappear, suddenly we were a wounded animal. As the reigning premiers we will always be the hunted, every team will be itching to get us as a scalp. But I do also think that since our 3 losses there has been a wake up call, and on Thursday night we were playing like a team with something to prove.

I like what I’m hearing from van Rooyen, how good is it that we’re not desperate to throw someone in and instead allow him to develop at a natural pace. Will only make him hungrier to force his way into the team. Casey look like an absolute force this season. Quick question on AMW, I was excited by us picking him up, where will he potentially fit into the team in the future? Absolutely no reason to rush him though. EDIT would love to see Chandler back in the team if later in the season, even if it’s a rotation to release some tired legs. He was really stiff to be suspended for 2 weeks but it looks like he’s taken it in his stride.

That’s the beauty and the beast of a difficult run home, it’s not only a chance to get form on good teams but a chance to take further ground on them. On the same token, losing to them had the same affect in the reverse. I feel like we need to have a similar mindset to last season and put aside the fact the we’re the hunted. We tick things off, fist thing we win 2-3 more we play finals for sure.

100% agree with this, there’s been a lot of resistance to this sort of action but at the end of the day it’s not the victim’s team on the night that gets the benefits of a player being out a player, it’s the infringing team that gets the benefits by taking that player out of the game. I’d be very comfortable with a system of a green, yellow, and red card. Green sends the player off for 5 “in play” minutes, yellow is 10, and red is out of the game. I could also see a system where the umpire is able to send the player off but there is someone reviewing the decision to decide if it’s too harsh or not harsh enough or even missed completely. That way if the umpires misses something the player can still be put out of the game for a period. I know it’s a movement that makes it look more like soccer and hockey, but it’s completely wrong that Geelong got to benefit from a dangerous and really thuggish act.

I know he played out the game but could there be a concern for Petracca? He didn’t look great in the immediate aftermath of the collision. I would be trying to avoid rushing Gawn back in as much as possible, he was massive for the finals and lead up last season. I also thought Weid worked really hard and earned his place in the team for next week.

West Coast looked A LOT better against Geelong, I’m not saying their going to be winning on the regular but like a large portion of bottom teams they aren’t as they seem. They’ve had COVID rip through their club (poor management and attitudes perhaps) as well as a number of injuries to compound it. They have a lot of premiership players in their team, so when things get going they are capable of playing decent footy. Love seeing the bombers lose!

Interesting, watching the telly it looked and sounded like we had a far higher spread of support.

Yep, BOG for me without a doubt. Oliver was in everything but it was Viney starting it at every contest, he was almost scary in the way he attacked the ball.

Glad I'm not the only the only one that thought this! Fritta had three occasions of clear front on contact, one of them the incident which Lyons got hurt. Great courage but not much sympathy for him when he created the situation.

Oh yeah forgot about the bizarre (but massive) goal at the end of the first quarter where the 1st gamer let it float through!

That was the best we’ve played since the Grand Final and far and away the best we’ve played this year. Our back 6 was back to their what made us such a hard team to beat. Lever has had a poor year by his lofty standards but wow he was unstoppable. Absolutely back his AA best. May being back must’ve been a huge help and I really hope he’s learned his lesson because he is massive to us. Viney was a man possessed last night, they even said it post match that he always goes in hard but last night it was finals like the way he went about it. For me BOG. The interesting thing from last night showed that our forward line isn’t our best line, but it just needs to be functional to a point and it needs the midfield to win their battle further up the ground. When that happens Fritta and Co get on the end of opportunities. I thought Bedford looked really lively (his checkside goal was the highlight of the night for me). Nibbler looked more like himself (but really needed nail that one in the third quarter) his forward pressure was exactly what we need, really needs to fix up his finishing. I thought JJ showed great confidence on “his wing”, kicking two goals is fantastic for him. I also have to tip my cap to Harmes for his job on Neale (and then kicking a goal on his as well). This was the well oiled machine we saw last season. Max said it in the rooms afterwards that those losses could be the tonic we needed. I’ll also pat him on the back for the mini slap in the face to the AFL for our “shortest bye ever”. I’m almost surprised it’s not in the AFLPA agreement that the bye week must have a minimum length, 10 days is a joke. Well done to everyone, and well done to the crowd at the ground. I made a decision not to go as I’d had a super busy week and felt it would be too much to go. Thursday night footy sucks, but it was fun to watch last night.

If we lose this week we run the risk of becoming a forgotten premiership winning team. It will be spoken of and remembered fondly by Dees fans, but ultimately it was done in Perth and it won’t mean as much. I can see a very real possibility of us losing this week and finishing outside the 4, I’m not trying to be pessimistic here but three weeks in a row we’ve had good leads that have evaporated to nothing. We’ve had a dysfunctional forward line for most of the year, these are issues that have not shown any signs of being rectified. On current form you have to tip the Lions for this week and it’s on the coaching staff and players to dig themselves out of this funk. We can do it, I felt similarly late last season and the GWS loss ended up being the tonic the team needed.

There are very few guarantees in footy, todays hero can become tomorrow’s forgotten man in a blink on an eye. He has shown great potential and you’re absolutely right in the GF he was a big part of taking the game away from the dogs. But real value comes when he takes a position and makes it his own. I’d also be very cautious about taking big money and a long contract because that immediately puts him under the pump. Still reckon taking a 3 year extension is his best course of action, but clearly I’m very biased!

Weid has actually filled the second ruck role decently in the past, it’s not his preferred position but I feel like as a forward he almost tries to avoid contact, whereas as a ruckman he knows he has no choice and it seems to settle his issues about the physicality of it. At the end of the day where we are at now is “decent” is the best we can get, we have injuries, last year we got a good run. We clearly have a very good best 22 but now we test the depth of the club, as well as the character of the players. Oliver, Trac, Viney etc will have to work a lot harder to win the clearances now and frankly I feel like they have been getting way too used to the armchair ride they’d had from Gawn.

Agreed, I would bring JvR in before holding onto M Brown in the team. He’s had some solid games over his time with us but his time is up.

If he wants the big money then this period with Gawn out is his perfect opportunity to show his worth to us or to another club should that be his preference. I still feel like he’s staying short term but then I was gullible enough to take Scully at his word that he wanted to be a one club player so I don’t have great form here. If a trade were to pop up I would definitely go hard at us getting Brayshaw, they see him as one of their young players to build their team around so let’s see how much they really want LJ. Get big bro Gus in his ear telling him how good the Dees have been to him and that the folks will be happy having him home in Melbourne. Ultimately the sum of this isn’t just on his footballing abilities, it’s also the fact that he is a part of our future planning. We got him because we knew that Gawn was coming to the twilight of his career, so we would need compensation not just for the now but for the future.

I wondered this myself after the Pies loss, the question is is his loss of form due to the rest of the team playing poorly or is his form drop separate to the larger team? There are many players where when the top falls they can’t contribute in the same way (ANB, Spargo, Sparrow come to mind here). I hope Bowey is separate to that, he looks a long term prospect but when you look at someone like Brayshaw who still gives everything to get us over the line when the rest of the team isn’t performing, that’s the sort of player I want Bowser to become.

That’s exactly it, he may well have given a better go the Mitch Brown but he wasn’t playing well and didn’t deserve to be picked.

Haha did that once, it was a good day out and we’ll do it again, but it’s not her thing. Definitely not a fan of night matches either.