La Dee-vina Comedia

Imagine if Goodwin continues to use van Rooyen as the second ruck and keeps Grundy as a KPF for the whole game. Just to confuse everyone's expectations and so he can say in his post-match media conference, "I told you so". I don't expect this, of course, and it will be fascinating to see how van Rooyen goes when he can stay forward for the whole game.

I believe we always pick a ruckman as an emergency. Usually the breakdown of the emergencies is one forward, one defender, one midfielder (non-ruckman) and one ruckman. As I see it, Schache is an emergency because he's the next ruckman in line after Gawn and Grundy.

Saturday night. But, yes, agree.

If we do this, can everyone promise not to judge Melksham just on the number of goals and disposals he has?

Due for some luck? The team that has the equal most premierships of any team and who has been rubbish for the whole of this century because of own goals such as draft cap breaching, poor recruitment and even poorer choices of coaches? Give me a break. And give the author of that post a history lesson.

If I didn't know these guys were (now former) footballers, with names like these I would have thought they were protagonists in a US TV crime show with Fischer McAsey being the cop and Castagna part of a New Jersey crime family.

I'll take X-factor over ex-ruckman any day. Mind you, I don't think either description is correct.

Confirmation bias thrives on blindness

I thought it through. I was initially going to say "Except if it's a Collingwood player". But my ego is too great. I'd rather be playing on the MCG than not.

Difficult to know if this a serious post because of the, ahem, reputation of the poster. However, if it is true, I'm interested in the administrative mechanisms. Put simply, does the achilles tendon come from a registered organ donor? If so, imagine the marketing campaign..."Sign up for organ donation and one day a part of you may be playing on the MCG". I am a registered organ donor and if my achilles tendon gets used that way, I'd be most pleased. Even if it's a Collingwood player.

"The only possible reason". Yeah, right.

Crowd numbers might be down on expectations because of the Matilda's QF being played just before our game. We know frrom the TV ratings for Monday's match that more people tuned in for it than watched the AFL Grand Final. It might help to attract people to our game if the MCC announced that they would be showing the Matilda's game on the scoreboard before our game. (I don't know if they have the rights to be able to do that, though.)

If Petracca wins, I hope he end his acceptance speech with "And I'd like to thank Clayton Oliver's hamstring. If it wasn't for that, I couldn't possibly have won."

Andrew Phillips from Essendon (and formerly Carlton and GWS) has announced he's retiring.

The AFL employs the umpires. The umpires vote on the Brownlow. It is clearly wrong for the AFL to be making "predictions" on how many votes players might currently have earned. I know it's only meant to be a bit of fun, but it is clearly inappropriate.

There's a serious lack of AFL nous on the AFL Commission at the moment. It's almost as if the Chairman is over-compensating by getting someone who is not yet retired from the game. I suspect Dangerfield will be an excellent Commissioner...but not yet. He needs to spend some time retired first to get a better perspective. There are plenty of smart, suitable, relatively recently retired AFL footballers who would be better choices at this time.

Thanks for clearing that up. After I posted my query I started to think that perhaps "bants" was a typo for "rants". I wouldn't have been able to concentrate for the rest of the day not knowing whether bants meant banter or rants!

Hasn't he also got professional qualifications as an architect (or something like that)?

When Craig Hutchison took over the running of SEN, Finey lost his on-air position there. After that he did some podcasting with Rohan Connolly using the Footyology site. I'm not sure if he's doing that any more, though.

Apologies in advance, layzie...but for some reason this expression annoys me probably more than any other. After all, what other sort of facts are there? And before anyone answers...I know the expression "alternative facts". But if you think about it, that just proves my point, doesn't it? PS: What are "bants"? Slang for banter?

Not really. If Oliver is back and with Brayshaw and Viney doing so well in the midfield, Petracca can play a lot more time forward. Handy option. Having said that, I still think it's more likely that one of Smith or Grundy will replace Petty as a tall forward.

Didn't we play 7 defenders? May, Lever, Smith as the "talls" and McVee, Bowey, Salem and Rivers as the "smalls". When Petty came off, Smith was moved forward and Hibberd slotted into defence.

Who's on your list? I've got Neitz and...maybe SOS, even though it was only on occasions. (SOS still kicked over 200 goals, though. Good effort for a full back).

6. Brayshaw 5. Viney 4. Gawn 3. Petracca 2. Hunter 1. Neal-Bullen

While I agree, the club might feel that Smith needs to play a full game. With no Casey game this weekend, this is the only option. It wouldn't surprise me at all if Tomlinson is the sub.