Pates

If we’re talking about next match, Spargo did way more to earn a game before AvB. As for next year, not too sure. I’d have Jones in front of Spargo for the most part but Spargo is bringing more pressure than Jones. Spargo has age on his side.

That tells you all you need to know about how broken the system is, a clearly worse tackle gets a lesser sentence than Spargo’s just because his head touches the ground. And for that matter the Saints player was fine. Ludicrously bad system.

I think the mix is two big forwards (Weid & Jacko/Brown/TMac) , two mid sized (Fritta & Melksham), two small/pressure forwards (Pickett, Spargo, ANB, Bedford, AvB). Melksham was really good in the first quarter but when missing pretty badly after that sort of came back with a couple of important touches in the last quarter.

Wow blues goalless in the second half against their bitter rivals. They’re done, now watch the Carltank come out.

And for me what is controversial (but maybe off topic) is that because of the repeated cheap shots by Lynch off the ball we have this Toby Greene situation where for that elbow he SHOULD be suspended but if consistency follows then he’ll get a fine. I’m far more ok with an in game extremely close decision remaining umpires call than that sort of non-football act continuing to go unpunished (of course until they decide to punish a Melbourne player). FWIW these were not the incidents they brought goal reviews in for, they wanted to fix the glaring mistakes like Hawkins in the Grand Final.

That’s kind of how I’m looking at it, it’s all down to mentality. Wanting the Pies to win is about protecting our place from the chasers, wanting the blues to win is about us backing ourselves to win more games and overtake the pies.

Unfortunately the lists may be compacted next year year and we can’t carry a bloke to 300. I’m not saying that totally rules out the possibility but when making the call it’ll be on the merit of his place in the side. Take out his absolutely disgusting blunder I think he played ok and that turnover definitely hurt his pride. But of course it hurt the team even more and could have been extremely costly. That said he played better than AvB (who I would be dropping first).

Bring in someone to cover him then because he did very little this week and at some stage will require a rest. Dare I say it ANB could be in the frame.

The AFL review system is much like the others around the world, to go against the on field decision it must be clear as day. It wasn’t, he should’ve been paid the mark anyway, so all good. Every team has been on the wrong end of the umpires call, this time we were on the right side. If Saints fans are sooking then that makes it sweeter.

The way he plays sometimes is almost like a rugby union player who picks up the knowing that he has to ride a tackle. Sometimes his bull like me tail it’s can be good but other times I’d actually like to see him use that strength to be creative.

“Considering how sh*t we played, it’s funny we were still the better team and lost. Thank god we’re not Melbourne supporters and have to watch that sh*t every week” Winners are grinners! I wasn’t unhappy with how we played, turnovers were the main issue that I didn’t like but this game was probably more removed from what we usually see. It was actually nice to see us hold a structure for most of the night.

That’s pretty much what I would go with it think. 3 changes and all three who played didn’t do enough, Fritsch kicked his goals and sounded good, I think it could be between Nev and Lockhart, Harmes for Jones and give Harmes the midfield minutes Jonesy has been getting.

Yeah Richo (I think) wasn’t happy about the reversal either. Very soft from the umpire but really well done from Brown. Those are acts that the selection committee must look at and say, “he gets another go”. He didn’t do a lot tonight but I think he did enough to get a crack at Sydney this week.

I personally had been liking Tomlinson in defence ahead of Oscar. I’d be dropping Oscar, moving Tommo back, and looking at someone else to take the wing role. Possible Baker who Egan singled out in his post match interview for the practice match for his consistency. I thought AvB was poor again tonight, he just isn’t providing any impact. I wouldn’t say no to him coming out for Harmes. With a short break would it be better to give Hibberd a bit of time to get his ankle right and maybe bring in Nev given the smaller forward line? Lockhart surely must be in the frame as well. Finally who comes out for Fritta? First thought is Hannan, did very little but did some good things at the end. It’s a win so ideally you don’t want many more than 3-4 changes. Does Jones survive the chop? That turnover at the end of the second quarter turned the game on its head.

That’s fine you don’t rate him, but how did you rate his coaching tonight out of interest. Or did we just win because May and Trac are guns, and the Saints stuffed it?

Or a free kick! As you say we got that decision go our way.

My point is that May is able to get those marks because the set up allowed him to. I get annoyed at people happy to say “Goodwin completely outcoached” when we lose but when we win it’s down to the players. I wasn’t happy with Goody’s coaching last week, but this week they worked on the structure and executed it well.

Oh no 100% not knocking him, he was huge tonight. If he’s kicking 4 goals then I’m not expecting him to get huge midfield numbers but of course it means other players (Gus, Brayshaw, Clarry) need to step up.

So last week Demonland was happy to sink the boots into Goody and co for the loss against the doggies, so by the same token there needs to be big props given to him for the way we suffocated the Saints ball use. You could see at the end they tried to create to the overlap using Hill but our defence still held firm. I would go so far to say this was one of his best coaching performances, certainly on a defensive front. For the players, May was clear BOG. Brad Johnson said for fox footy then that he doesn’t have that game then we do t win and that is spot on. Langdon has been the pick up of the year for us, he was very prolific and mostly quite good. Petracca’s midfield numbers were low but jeez his goals were huge, if it were at a ground with the goal line camera would his goal stand? Not sure. Defensively we did well, but I think by the numbers we might look at this as a game we got away with a bit. We got our early lead and kept the game tight after that. I really thought that last minute of the second quarter was going to bite us. But this is a massive win. Against a team that we traditionally seem to lose to, a team higher on the ladder, and an 8 point game.

A real arm wrestle here, both teams are setting up well defensively (credit to Goody for that). This is going to be down to who takes their chances. Petracca’s goals have been huge but if we’re getting more from him as a forward/mid then Brayshaw and Clarry need to step up. Clarry in particular. Gus seemed to be getting more of it that quarter but not damaging enough. Haven't seen Enough of Pickett and Spargo, they need to provide more forward pressure. Hannan has been poor. Oscar, I’ve been a defender of his but I don’t think I can cop him anymore. Interestingly that last centre bounce we clearly got the tap but Clarry and Gus got in each other’s way. Is that bad communication or set up?

Bulls*** he could’ve put two hands up but chose to go the one hander and ducked his head. Clarry went with zero conviction, like much of what he has done today.

Listening to Jordie Lewis on fox footy they were talking about the important Saints ball winners and he said, “Melbourne don’t have a tagger if an opposition player gets off the leash” I just thought, “actually we do but he has been played in the wrong position and dropped for form”. Harmes as a tagger IS A WEAPON. But we have botched his development and turned him into a useless half back player.

That squibbed mark early on in the second quarter was costly, put two hands up and take the contact if it comes. Jones’s late kick was disgusting but that kick was a beauty and should’ve set us up for a shot on goal.

We were actually holding firm quite well against their pressure but those last two goals, I don’t know how Goodwin didn’t do a Clarkson and punch his first through the wall. Jones’s turnover could prove to be a massive turning point in the game and that centre clearance from the restart was troubling. Just two tackles for the quarter (and I’m pretty sure one happened in the first 5 seconds of the quarter) that is really worrying. The really annoying thing is our structure was actually holding up well and we weren’t giving them easy entries, even the first of the last three goals came through a bit of luck of the bounce and an unlucky free kick against Viney. But from that moment Jones released that god awful kick all our hard work had been undone. On the other side we controlled the ball well and had some golden chances going inside 50 but botched the final kick. Our third quarters haven’t been good and the Saints will be going in with their tails up.

Opposition fans seeing what we’ve been seeing all year Harmes played out of position. I really would’ve liked to see Goodwin switch him up with midfield/forward minutes before dropping him.