Pates

Our midfield can match/beat theirs, our backline can definitely beat their forward line, it’s down to two things for me: Firstly will our midfield and forward line actually work together to put the ball inside 50 in the way the both lines are expecting it? What will our attitude be? This is our first game in front of home fans for 18 months, if that isn’t enough motivation for our players to want to play, tackle, run etc then I don’t know what could possibly be. My concerns are that for one we have gone in with two old warriors (Jones and Jetta) that won’t be able to keep up with their respective opponents and provide enough. I also am just so worried that our players are going to come out sluggish and not ready for a fight (we have seen it before).

I feel like people get obsessed with the “oh he’s great now we should have kept him”. Dunn is a great example of a player who had run his race with us but a change of location gave his career new life. Delisting Oscar was the right decision, it didn’t mean he was useless or unworthy of being an AFL player it just meant for us he wasn’t going to fill our needs and make us better. We all should chill and forget about trying to compare him with Daw, they’re different players.

I believe the regular comment by a few of the Oscar haters was “not AFL standard”. Sometimes it takes a change of club to reinvigorate players. Good luck to him (though I hope he barely gets a kick against us!).

One part of that statement is telling, we’re the 6th oldest and 6th most experienced. It’s time those we considered “kids” not long ago stepped up to being men and put their talent to use.

I think those three will be ok, Oliver was very sharp vs the tigers and as far as I know his missing of the doggies game was management. May’s done a large body of work over the summer and only copped a knock. His concussion symptoms were very minor so he’ll be fine (he’s definitely allowed to play???). Gus is potentially underdone so I’d see him playing parts in the half forward line but is a gun and will come into the game. Having the Box Hill game was important. Melk and Petty shouldn’t play. Salem has been managed but did a decent amount over the summer, so of that list Hibbo (also played v Box Hill) and Kozzie are the only two that I’m massively worried about. Koz needs to be kept simple, pressure, pressure, and more pressure. Sounded like Hibbo did a lot of normal Hibbo things vs Box Hill so hopefully so minutes under his belt will help.

Listening to the podcast I’d say Hibberd and Gus are almost a lock assuming no setbacks. Salem should be available it’s just a question of whether we’d like some match fitness into him first. Melksham shouldn’t come straight in even if fit, he had a poor 2020 and is coming behind with fitness. I know Gus and Gawn like to joke around but Majak as a round one bolter is a possibility (personally I’d be looking for a couple of strong performances first). Questions about where goals will come, for me I think we will need a spread of players on the board. We know Petracca’s more than capable, Fritsch can kick a few, and I’m praying to the footy gods that they give TMac the confidence to get back to his old self. 7+ goals from those three, Jackson and Gawn can bob up for a snag or two, and then we just need contributions from others around the ground. Here’s the important thing that I think somewhere along the lines they’ve forgotten: they need to back themselves. That goal by Oliver vs Tigers in the practice match is the exact thing I want to see, confidence to own the situation and nail the goal. It’s what made Petracca the player he was last season (hopefully into the future).

Really glad we’ve got him, he doesn’t strike me as someone who would put up with the usual soft efforts that our team seems to consistently put up. I’d be wanting him him on the bench talking directly to the players with Goodwin up in the box working with Yze on tactics.

I’m 50/50 on it, I think a month ago I was more confident but as it get nearer and knowing the importance of a strong start to the season I’m getting worried. The concerning part for me is I see very few signs of actually addressing the issues that have plagued us for the last couple of seasons. I want to see us return to the manic pressure we had in 2018, if we do that we will win more games than we lose.

Totally agree, I feel like one of the issues is we’ve confused his role. Play him out of the square, look for the lead not just plonk it on his head. I don’t think our coaches do the players any favours sometimes, play him as our FF.

Presumably it would come from the pool of emergencies that weren’t going to play for the 2nds anyway. They usually carry over at least one player who just sits in the stands, that guy can sit on the pine and warm up with everyone else. I had thought of late that the AFL were basically taking away the responsibility of the player and saying if there are even the slightest of symptoms then they come under concussion rules. So if that’s the case then why is that any different to a player pulling a hammy? I can understand the theory and I think it’s an ok idea, I can just see it being exploited if a player pulls a hamstring then why don’t they just say, “oh and I’m also feeling really dizzy”.

If anger gets us to a premiership I could give a crap whether we’re on the light or dark side! ?

I try to take what’s said with a pinch of salt at this time of year, the players need to sell the club a bit. But I really sometimes wish they’d just shut up and get on with showing it on the field. I’d frankly be angry if they weren’t angry with how they did last season. Forget limping into 8th, they should be aiming for top 4 and anything less is disappointing. If not then what the hell are they doing with themselves.

So just for fun I thought I'd watch the Hawthorn final again because it's great fun to watch but I also wanted to see how we played and see how "soft" we were back then. I tell ya what, we were anything but soft, and this is only a couple of years ago with MANY of the key players that night still playing. When we tackled, we tackled HARD. We went at EVERY contest with courage and ferocity. We may not have been clean but when we weren't the players heads didn't slump they got on with it and went for the second effort (great example of that was in the middle Weids spilled a mark and followed up with a big tackle). Another really interesting thing about it was Spargo was very important, his tackles stuck really well, and he worked hard to get into dangerous positions. I wouldn't say our forward line was functioning incredible that night but we spread well to create space and goals either over the back or within 25-30m of goal, there was a clear connection of where the forward were expecting the kicks were going to be. We got some luck with the Hawks being more with their efficiency going forward whether that was kicks for goal or the final kick inside 50 but we had periods where we did the same. The bottom line is that effort is rewarded, and I honestly feel like the effort hasn't been there in the last 12-18 months (on the field). Get that back and we play finals.

If ever there was proof of how we're rated within the footy world this is it. These are the guys that play each other and we are not feared or rated at all. I hope the players use it to drive them further. EDIT: in 2017 not one captain rated the Tigers to make the finals, so while it's an interesting indicator it's obviously not gospel.

So far Lever is probably only a pass for his time with us. A lot of that is because of his injury issues and he had periods last season he was showing his worth, but we need him to get back to being a damaging interception marker. Having someone take a grab in defence and be able to rebound is absolutely massive in the modern game. May is a gun, early days this year but I think he’s annoyed he got overlooked for AA last season and his gunning for it big time. If those two have big seasons we look good down back, we just need someone to really step in to own the small defender position (I love Jetta but he shouldn’t play many games this year).

Something that during and after games (particularly losses) consistently is the attitude of the players. I can handle losing if I look at the players and think, “they genuinely had a dip, leaving everything out there” I don’t feel like I’ve seen that enough in the last two seasons. Attitude is nothing to do with how well you kick, handball, mark, and ruck-tap. It’s all down to putting your body into contests, working harder than your direct opponent, being in two on one situations and breaking even, supporting your players with shepherds, tapping the ball on instead of trying to mark it etc. These are team acts that rarely get a clear statistic but they inspire teammates, they’re also things that coaches can tell players to do but it’s down to them out on the field.

I wouldn’t say he’s wrong about our culture, in 2018 it had appeared we had managed to change that with us playing tough uncompromising footy that actually made teams fear playing us. Now I feel like our brand is a fake tough, in that we have bash and crash players but when it comes to laying tackles and doing the one-percenters it just doesn’t seem to happen. Time and time again we’ve watched Melbourne teams coast through seasons of mediocrity. I agree that it has to be player driven but it can’t just be Max. Max is a great leader at pushing training standards and excelling at your choosing position, but he can’t be expected to create a new culture. The whole team needs to be want to buy in, work for each other, sometimes be willing to take a supportive role if your teammate is on fire that day. As for not dropping people of importance; Jones, TMac, Fritsch, Jetta are just to name a few that have been dropped. Melksham and AvB (most agree) somehow continued to get a pass last year.

Very close to my exact thoughts. All well and good to have a target, when that target failed I just can’t work out why they didn’t then turn their attention to Phillips who surely would’ve been keener to play for a club more likely to be competing for finals this year rather than a club going through a rebuild. He would’ve slotted in perfectly and certainly better than any of the options we have tried so far. That said we’ve made our bed so now to lie in it. I’m not sure if he’s got the fitness for it but would Petty be an option? The more likely option would be to send Petty to cover Tomlinson and give Tommo another crack. Baker doesn’t seem up to it, BUT if the club believes he’s a serious option then play him for 3-4 games and tell him to own the responsibility. No use in giving him one game to sink or swim. TMac is not a winger, play him in the forward line. It’s where he needs to be.

I was JUST about to say this. With AvB showing very little in the pre-season I would love to see Viney line up on the half forward flank as a pressure forward designated to nullify the opposition run out of defence. He is actually a decent mark as well and I vaguely remember Gawn nominating him as his guy to kick after the siren. With our heavy mix of “bull” midfielders I really hope the FD is looking at multiple ways to use them.

Good luck to him, sounds like he earned it.

Welcome to the Dees, good luck to him.

Good luck to Majak, interesting that Goody said “we’re going to take our time with you”. Indicates to me that we aren’t expecting him to be in the side any time soon.

It’s interesting that he still played in the VFL practice match (kicking one of our few goals as well). I hope the club does look at ways to keep him in our system to keep an eye on his development. This doesn’t have to be the end of the journey for Kobe and the Dees.

Bold move putting captain and one of the competition’s best ruckmen at FF. I’m not actually against it for a couple of reasons. Firstly it seems that even with him there seems to be this ability of the oppositions on ballers to rove to his taps, which given the quality actually gives them a comfortable ride. I would like to see Jackson given closer to 35%-40% ruck duties and challenge him to impact the second contest as well as the ruck taps. Gawn as a forward option could be a headache for the defenders given his longer reach, but please let’s not just assume he can beat all and do the no-look long bomb.

I haven’t seen the game but if this is the case I’m at a loss as to what our strategists are paid for. It’s been such an obvious issue for us since 2019, why not have a bit of creativity about it to try to HURT the opposition? Seems our aim is to get it out of the 50 for a stoppage or pluck a contested mark. Sides figured this out in early 2019 ?.