1 minute ago, picket fence said:

ANB missed targets and unmissable goals

Yes, forgot about him. He was probably equal worst. His turning back into trouble, or handballing to a team mate in a worse position was appalling. Not sure why he has stepped back so far from his effectiveness from last year.

What to do with Lever, Jackson, Sparrow and BBB? Their touch has gone, their confidence has gone, their intensity is totally shot.

Very harsh on Hunt. He kept Papley to no impact, and his one goal was from a free kick that was soft ( but it was a free kick).

Both Browns, Sparrow, were the worst of us tonight. Sparrow's decision making was just awful, a standout among a heap of poor decisions. ANB, Jackson, Harmes and Tomlinson were almost as bad.

6. Gawn

5. Brayshaw

4. Viney

3. Jordon

2. Oliver

1. Fritsch 

4 minutes ago, Alex Flood said:

Our efforts at contested footy, our decision making & our delivery inside 50 have all been appalling for a while now.

 

Better to have these issues now then at the end of the season though.

Yep, these three things are glaring and poor at the moment. 

We have some things to figure out, and quickly.

Decision making with ball in hand. There has to be SOME awareness of the game around you. 

How to handball

Spread from stoppage.

When to play on from a mark/free kick and when not to.

Numerous times players in vicinity of the play standing watching.

Our forward set up.

We only lost by 12 points, but the general play was excruciating to watch as mistake after mistake.

Fritsch has been all class, then that.

Followed by a brain fade from Petty

Our decision making with ball in hand = horror show. 

And still no movement inside 50.

Really good quarter of contested footy from both teams. Hard to watch but it was trench warfare. Not sure why the hits after a mark or free kick are not being seen or paid by umpires but there have been many of them.

Fritsch and Kozzie looking likely. Jordon, Brayshaw, Petty, Langdon and Viney keeping us in the game.

Jackson has done little, so make him man up on Paddy McCartin.

OK, I got up, had a cold drink, vented my frustration, and now ready for the 2nd half.

Our midfield looks hesitant and faulty, our forward 50 looks clunky and dysfunctional. Swans have goals from Reid who is getting free kicks for nothing, and another goal from a kick out of a pack which lands in the lap of another forward. And yet we are 2 points down. 

I think we might actually be OK.

1 minute ago, Webber said:

Meanwhile our forward entries are frankly an embarrassment in their predictability. 
 

This is what stands out in our forward 50 so far. No run, no flair, no imagination. Bomb it to the pocket, hope a tall can get near it to bring it to ground, and then a fight at ground level (which the Swans are thrashing us at). 

Well done Fritsch, but our work around the packs is poor. Sydney are reading our stoppage work and ripping it away.

How can our handball to target be off the charts brilliant in the 1st quarter, then absolutely sub-VFL standard in the 2nd quarter? And our stoppages decision making is out of control poor!

Kennedy and Buddy out - huge loss for the Swans.

Swans are brilliantly coached so Lever will not be free to intercept all day, and the stoppages will probably be 50/50.

We are close to our best 22, but Salem will be very rusty.

Having Gawn, Oliver, Viney, Petracca, Langdon and Brayshaw across the middle gives us grunt and class that the Swans can't match.

Close most of the day, real dog fight. Dees will have a 10 minute patch where they kick 5 straight, and we win by 20 points. 

Doggies looking a rabble so far. Little system, poor skills, low energy. It is early in the match so anything can happen, but what happened to their highly celebrated midfield? 

You know that endless commentary that begins "we now know how to beat (insert team name here).

Against the Dees, it is short kicking through our zone, but make sure you hit yoour targets.

Cue the mind-numbing ad nauseum repetition of to beat Carlton, beat them at clearance."

Both teams played well, Collingwood's pressure won it for them. Blues almost stole it when they won the clearances again in the last 10 minutes or so.

Cox can be so annoying, but boy he is having a crack today. Has competed fiercely all day and even clunked a few. Pity he can only do it 2 games out of 5. 

I too am "barracking for" the Pies. (I think I need a shower).

Cox is chucking himself at everything and actually making a impact. Weitering off makes the game a 50/50 now, he is as important to the Blues as May is to us. Pies tackling pressure is messing with Blues a ground level.

14 hours ago, praha said:

Today was as much about our holes across the ground and how poorly we played, as it was about how utterly awesome Freo were. They were scary good. Looked very Melbourne circa 2021 finals series. They're legit and are still very much a threat. People wrote them off after the last two weeks. Credit where it was due.

My main concern today was just the overall disconnect in general play. Hospital handpasses casually to players directly under pressure. Poor aerial contest. Outmarked across the ground. Constant space between Melbourne and Freo players. They pulled off every trick they tried. We had nothing up our sleeve. 

We were a shadow of our best. But Freo were just awesome.

Yep, and I included these same things in an earlier post.

The amount of poor handpasses to players under pressure, or hospital passes that our player had to stop and wait beneath really surprised me. This was one of our biggest faults after 2018, but it only raises its head on certain occasions.

Aerially we were murdered. It appears Freo came in with a tactic to outdo us in the air. With May subbed out and then Petty running on one leg, it became a stronger point of difference. Lever was way off his normal aerial game, and his kicking and handballing was a total indecisive mess.

And don't get me started on the amount of free Freo players around stoppages. We got annihilated around the packs in the 2nd half, but didn't change our gameplan - if only for a few minutes to stem the flow - to play one on one until the momentum slowed. 

4 minutes ago, dazzledavey36 said:

Not surprised one bit with the amount of premiership players missing. This loss has been brewing.

We got absolutely obliterated in every aspect of today's game. There is no sugar coating this performance. 12 goals to 1 in the 2nd half is a concern moving forward.

Where to start.. midfield was smashed today. Oliver tried hard but Jordon was the pick for me. Viney has no right foot and just sells teammates into trouble. Also wtf was up with Petracca?

Forward line is a mess and have barely fired a shot this year. Our connection inside 50 is horrible and needs to be sorted asap as we start playing some hard games in the next few weeks.

On a few individual performance.

Weideman: Yeah nah he's crud. Here I was thinking he'll be hungry tonight and play like he's got a point to prove but nope, he's just crap player in general. Pack him up and just leave him at Casey. I'd rather get games into JVR or play Mitch Bren just to add a different element to our forward line.

Luke Jackson: Going to be extremely harsh here but [censored] it. He's simply having an ordinary player. He's not a good tap ruckman at all and it's like Watching Mark Jamar all over again because he's first instinct is to always handball the [censored] pill. At one stage in the 3rd he won the ball in the centre and had clear space in front of him only to then turn back and handball it back Into congestion for a Freo turnover which resulted in goal. Watched him get easily pushed aside in a rucking contest against David Mundy which was embarrassing to see. If he wants to chase serious coin and head back home then no problems. Get a 1st rounder and use it on a gun midfielder or a forward.

Melksham: Got gifted straight to 200 games. Now see ya mate. Stoked that's the last time we'll ever see him in a Melbourne jumper. 

Rivers: Has become a liability down back. Poorly skilled and his awareness and game sense is just not there. Either head back to Casey or rest him if his not 100%. Salem will take his spot thankfully when ready to go.

Petracca: His form is a concern. He hasn't fired a shot for a few weeks now and it's affecting the team as well as our midfield set up. Honestly not sure what's up with him but if he was sick today then playing on isn't courageous mate, it's stupid. Rest him if we have too because we need him fit.

All in all a disappointing game, but it's been brewing for a while now. Some of our top line players are out of form and it's showing now. Change needs to happen pretty quick because we have some big games coming up over the next few weeks.

 

There is  a part of me that doesn't like what you have posted, and wants to reply with an equally angry defence, but unfortunately in most respects you are spot on. A bit harsh on Jackson but his form has been less than ordinary.

But its one game, and some time soon we will have our best 22 - 25 in place and our system forward of centre worked out. 

7 minutes ago, DubDee said:

Our Key fwds were so poor for all 4 quarters. I watched Weed closely as I’ve always backed him. Freo didn’t even have a man within 10m of him. They knew he would do nothing. Brown was just as bad. At least contest guys!!

I also am a Weid fan, and love what he can bring but to be honest, his game tonight was indefensible. Just so physically weak and lacked effort. I don't remember him actually leading more than once when he took  that great mark. Actually for many of the contests he might as well have not been there. TMac back in hopefully - if not - I would prefer  JVR to be given a go. 

And BBB looked way out of sorts. Again, physically weak and unable to handle the physical hustle-and-bustle of the Freo defenders. But he has a LOT of credits in the bank so one bad game is no means for being dropped. 

It will be very interesting to see who comes in and out. We have a lot of sore, tired players (Gawn, Petty, May, Petracca and others) and we also had a heap of our very reliable players playing poorly. But you can't drop half your team. 

Surely Dunstan, Melksham and Weid go straight to Casey and used only if desperate. Rivers needs a break, he has been average at best this year and defensively our weakest link.

Thinking that Hibbered, Salem, May, Langdon, Harmes, TMac and Smith are all out shows how

Marking the ball is one of the skills of playing footy. We were FLOGGED in the air.

I would love to see the handball efficiency stats. Our handball skills and decision making were atrocious tonight.

Weid, Brown, Melksham, Dunstan, Bowey,  Petracca & Rivers had absolute howlers. Bowey consistently made poor decisions which was strange to see.

Special mention to Lever. His playing on followed by decision making caused multiple turnovers or sent straight to the opposition.

And if I saw the Freo man  free at the back of the pack get a free handball one more time... aaaahhhggg!!!

Having ranted all that (I had to get it off my chest), I see our best 22 producing much better than that.

6. Viney

... daylight...

5. Jordon

4. Brayshaw

3. Oliver

2. Kozzie

1. Gawn (for effort more than output)

2 minutes ago, bing181 said:

Now the early-season hysteria is behind us, could Richmond be the Dees' biggest threat?

https://www.espn.com.au/afl/story/_/id/33980233/afl-rohan-connolly-early-season-hysteria-us-richmond-tigers-melbourne-demons-biggest-threat

 

Seriously, every week the narrative changes due to a single game. There are 4 or 5 teams that have shown they can challenge us, it is simply that none of them have sustained it thus far.