Pates

You'd struggle to find a better first 50 games from any player to pull on the red and blue let alone the competition. The kid will be a genuine superstar.

I haven't been able to watch the game apart from the highlights on the website, but from what I've seen and read we destroyed them in every area except the scoreboard and eventually that caught up to them as well. This could and should have been a 100+ victory but ultimately we just needed to get back on the winning side of things and I'm sure we'll take the positives of our around the grounds dominance to the MCG v Doggies. I'm a firm believer that we need Garlett in the team, he is a spark that creates magic. I understand why he was dropped and kept out for so long but in the back half of the year I feel we need him to be able to not only make the 8 but make it count. Goal kicking sucked, but the last time we were in the NT we couldn't miss so those days happen. It didn't cost us the win, but it cost us valuable percentage. What maybe the coaches need to do is address how to stop the yips from spreading. One piece of footage I have seen in Lewis's elbow. That has to be the final straw, he is meant to be a LEADER, and he pulls that crap regularly. Drop him. The club is working hard to create a culture and it shouldn't include that kind of utter stupidity.

Sounds pretty standard although Goodwin being really angry does suggest the players should come out breathing fire this week. Mat the end of the day talk is cheap. His comment about Richmond is a good one. There’s still so much footy left in the season and it’s on the club to turn it around.

If he doesn't start improving he could be the next big name to be dropped.

The Dogs still have some very good players who can punish when they’re up and about. They’ve done us a favour with the cats plus the cats shot themselves in the foot (about time someone else did that), but it’s a good warning shot for not only a few weeks when we face them but this week with the saints. Underestimate ANYONE in this competition at you’re own peril.

Garlett being out of favour is definitely one of the more puzzling and difficult ones to fathom. He was up in AA contention last year and just hasn’t been able to force his way back in since being dropped. He is up and down but so is every small forward. I understand though the bigger issue is what he does when he doesn’t have the ball. I really hope he can force his way back in, I miss seeing him electrify us with his magic.

I think I’m in the group that feels Vince might be dropped, has been declining this year and it might be time. Also could be a little bit of an example to younger guys to show their position isn’t safe. A lot will depend TMac’s fitness and how he feels. He was saying 50/50 earlier in the week which doesn’t exactly build up the confidence in him rucking as well as playing key forward. If he plays I feel like he will play closer to goal which means someone else will have to take second ruck duties. Pederson or Weiderman. I’m picturing the final bench being: Harmes, Tyson, Spargo, Peds/Weids

Underestimate the saints at our own peril, we have no rights to be cocky or sure of ourselves. Let’s go into this game all guns blazing. Petracca needs a big one, he’s in danger of becoming another in the long line of “talented but....” at Melbourne. We all know what he can do, he knows what he can do. Hopefully this is the week he can step up.

We are smashing them everywhere except for the scoreboard. Hinckley will be telling the Port players they are lucky to not be 10 goals behind. We’ve missed easy chances and our forward entries have been a disgrace. TMac and Hogan must be scratching their heads wondering what the midfield are thinking. I see one of two things happening. 1) we keep dominating the clearances and continue getting multiple inside 50s whereby we will actually get out sh_t together and win in a canter. Or 2) they work us out and we kick ourselves for not taking our opportunities when we had them.

I go further back then Neeld, back to Bailey, and even further to Daniher. Don't get me wrong I loved the Rev when he was our coach and we had some great times under him but we haven't produce ANY out and out stars of the competition in decades. This is despite several very high draft picks. Our current crop looms as the best chance we have to do that. But mostly I put that down to our club being unable to take players from being decent possibly A-graders to anything more. Most got to a certain point and then plateaued to just being very good. Trenners I put more into the unlucky category, if he'd had a clean run and managed to get a chance under the current coaching panel with no injury issues he would be a gun. Watts has application problems, always has, but he was terribly managed in his first year trotted out with Ron Barrassi and put up on a pedestal before he kicked a ball for us, the years following that were just as bad. Toumpas was woefully managed where he was coming back from a serious injury (hip surgery unless I'm mistaken) and thrown in there before he had proven himself just because he was a high draft pick. Of course these are only my opinions but there are so many others we have failed to develop in the last decade (or more).

The article's last line is pretty spot on, as much as Toump and Watts had application issues we failed all three of them (and others) with our pathetic inability to develop our high draft picks. It's bad luck for them that they joined us when we were the very definition of a rabble.

I was sad about his departure and I was also disappointed the way that it happened with him seemingly wanting to stay but us making our minds up. But at the same time I also saw that he represented everything that was wrong with our club in that horrible period. We wasn’t going to be the difference for us, and while the pick we got was pretty measly Fritch hadn’t been a very worthy pick up and has more miles left in him. I wish him well, except if he plays against us then I wish him the worst game ever!

What do you rate our performance out of 10 to this point? Why? 6.5, I see us as the downhill skiers of the competition so far the year. Beat the teams below us easily but seem crumble under pressure. Very much like Port last year. That said when things click we look like a very good footy team. Which player has impressed you the most? Tom McDonald, to come back from his foot injury and have an immediate impact has been incredible and heartening to watch. He did his job yesterday, one of a very few. Which draftee has made the biggest impact? Spargo for me, he’s got a great energy about him and really suits our style. What has been our best win to date? V Adelaide, hard to go past beating last year’s Grand Finalists by 90 points. Which player(s) needs to improve in the second half of the year? Petracca has been really disappointing this year, he just seems to be going at half pace and going to the wrong spots. We need him to have a big second half of the year. What has been our most disappointing performance? Queens Birthday for me. Hawthorn was bad but QB we must have been setting ourselves for it, finals like atmosphere and we got found out as pretenders. Particularly to give up so many goals in the first quarter showed we were overawed by the occasion. Where do you see us finishing? Give a win/loss and finishing position 6th 14W 8L we’ve got about 5 “should win” games and the others are 50/50 or tougher. I feel we can/will get 6 wins from the back end of the season, but the loss yesterday needs to be handled by the playing group well. They can’t dwell on it but they have to learn from it. We are still well placed to have a good year.

It’s a cliche but matches are won and lost in the centre and we were simply smashed in all areas in that regard. We didn’t have one midfielder that “won”, anytime we won the ball at ground level they were all over us preventing any kind of fluid movement. Then when they won the ground level ball they had much more speed and spread with us not doing enough to put pressure on. The defence was completely under siege and there really wasn’t anything they could do. Lever wouldn’t have made a huge difference IMO. I don’t understand the hate against Lewis, I thought he was one of a few players trying to create something from defence and did his best against the swarm of inside 50s. Tim Smith was ok but he was filling big shoes under difficult conditions. OMac got destroyed but again not much he could do. If we’re looking for a big statement dropping Petracca should be first on the list. I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking he is one of the key ingredients to us taking the next step but he has been very average this year and today he was barely sighted. Apart from Adelaide we haven’t beaten anyone of note (though maybe should’ve got the win v Cats), we are the downhill skiers of the competition right now so the bye must be seen as an opportunity for some soul searching because of we make finals we’ll currently just be making up the numbers. And complete credit to Collingwood, they were clean, they were hungry, and right now they want to win more than we do.

I watched it from London, I could see from the first quarter this wasn’t our day. We have serious question marks over our ability to compete when the heat is on. Our ball winners failed to do enough early (or throughout the game), they wanted the game more, they tackled harder and didn’t let up. Credit to them they are much improved and genuine finals contenders (not going to put them in the premiership conversation yet). Bye comes now, we’re back to the pack a bit and we have a big game against Port after the bye, we have a good record against them but they’ll be chock full of confidence. The run comes to an end. Time to reload for the rest of the year.

Got to improve our field kicking, there was a moment in that quarter with about 10min to go where we had won a rare push in the back, we were I think 5-6 points down heading inside 50. I don’t know who it was but he kicked it to an unopposed Pies player. They rebounded and we didn’t touch it before they scored a goal. Completely lost our momentum. I was really hoping we’d be even at half time, we had good chances to but fair go the pies have been wasteful. Our mids need to lift, this sort of game is the sort of pressure cooker that finals footy is going to be played under and the Pies midfield is handling better than us. Gawns getting beaten but not badly, though anytime he seems to be winning the umPIES pluck our a free against him. Need more from Petracca, Jones, Brayshaw, and Hogan. Premiership quarter coming up, need to drag ourselves back in it.

I’m happy with the changes, Lever hurts but it’s an opportunity for Smith to show what he’s got. Pederson has been working his butt off in the VFL so this is good reward for consistent form. The Pies fans have every reason to feel confident but they should be very wary of the 2018 Demons. We should have every reason to be out for revenge after last year’s final round debarcle. I’m predicting a tight finish for whoever wins, under 12 points. I’m confident without being bullish, I think the pies are a much improved and much for confident unit this year with things clicking. I can see them finishing as high as 5th. That said on our best day vs their best day we win.

Incredible that Port can score one goal for the second half with a lead of 24pts at half time and win the game. The second half was Sevens worst nightmare. Anyway this result has made the QB game even bigger now, second spot up for grabs we have to take this opportunity. Going into the bye in second spot would massively set up the second half of the year. Not that we should need it but extra motivation for us. Also side note, this also shows how reliant the tigers are on Dusty. Hopefully this is the start of their charmed injury run coming to an end. EDIT Seven’s worst nightmare advertising wise.

Probably done by the same person that didn’t list Gawn in the top 5 Ruckmen in the competition. Clearly an oversight, he’s taken one game to find his feet an he’s off and running again. Co-captain and out and out gun, he’s top 5 of that list for sure. Interesting thing I read from that article is Gus is out of contract, given he’s having an awesome season since returning to the seniors we’d want his signature sorted.

I don’t hate him and I appreciate the gesture but you’d be naive to think if you think he did it purely out of the goodness of his heart. There has long been the discussion of equalising the draw when it comes to prime time slots and by “gifting us” the QB match every year we’ve stayed silent but now that we’re more attractive and SHOULD get more prime time exposure he doesn’t want us to keep the fixture. As I said, if Collingwood forfeited say two prime time slots in return I’ll be happy with that. But until that inequity is addressed there is no reason why we should give this up.

My position on this is very simple, this is an equaliser for Collingwood getting preferential treatment when it comes to fixturing for Friday/Saturday nights. I am more than happy to share the home team’s year to year but Collingwood then FORFEITS at least two to three Friday/Saturday nights which then go directly to us. They want to talk about equal sharing well they have been given an armchair ride by the AFL for exposure to prime time slots which is one of the key factors to being attractive to sponsors. So those should be our minimum terms.

I don’t mind this idea, maybe train him with the defenders in Jakes role this week and see how he looks. Tell Tommy and Jessie to not hold back as well. There have been plenty of examples of swinging natural forwards to defence having positive impacts on their career. The question is will doing it on a big blockbuster stage be too much for Weids Another thought is move OMac into Jakes role and bring Frost in as the KPD. Oscar has been taking a lot more marks this year and reads the game better than Frost. I’m not as knowledgeable about the Casey folk so there could well be better options, either way the coaching staff have been doing an excellent job over the last 6 weeks so hopefully it can continue.

We’ve had a good run with injuries so I was waiting for the penny to drop but this one hurts. Not just because he was our “big recruit” but because he was starting to play some bloody good footy for us. Good luck Jake, reload for a big 2019.

I started watching from midway through the third quarter and pretty quickly I could see we’re on top and going to win. That said the game was played at a frenetic pace and it was down to who used the ball better when they had ball in hand. I haven’t seen Lever’s injury but god I hope it’s not a serious ACL. Doesn’t sound good though, whatever the injury I wish him the best with his recovery. Congrats to Jonesy on his 250th, he’s a stalwart and a champion. He deserves every bit of success we’re having.

Really looking forward to seeing another epic encounter on Friday night with the highly competitive Blues. ? The AFL did this to themselves and deserve every bit of criticism they’re getting.