La Dee-vina Comedia

I suspect Melksham and Hibberd left, at least in part, because of the supplements issue. I was trying to point out that others leaving suggests that there might also be other factors in play leading to players - including possibly Ryder, Melksham and Hibberd - leaving Essendon. Or, to put it another way, assuming Ryder, Melksham and Hibberd left solely because of the supplements issue might leave other problems at Essendon buried from view.

I'm convinced that one day Langdon will be in the injury report with "self-bitten tongue"

I have always said that the results of pre-season games are meaningful only if you win.

While I like your thinking, I just wonder whether such an approach would make umpiring more complicated and controversial. Your approach makes adjudicating highly subjective. What one umpire (or viewer) thinks is innocuous or incidental another might think is worthy of penalising. One of the problems with umpiring now is the degree of subjective assessment required, most obviously seen with the "insufficient intent" rule. If we add more subjectivity into the process, I think matters will get worse, not better.

Conversely, Brodie Grundy has dropped right off (even before he was injured).

In addition, because they didn't make finals in 2021, Carlton had had a longer prep time to ready for this match.

Or, he may have wanted to leave Essendon anyway and used the supplements program as an excuse. I say this because Essendon seem to have a habit of players wishing to leave (Fantasia, Daniher, Saad, etc) and none of them are because of the supplements program. In other words, I think there may be an ongoing underlying player satisfaction problem at Essendon.

And then the ultimate...it's all because we sacked Norm Smith.

Was it a broad question about the best ruckman including tap work, marking, goal kicking and around the ground play or was it more about ruck craft at bounces and throw-ins?

While I like the idea of "teams" of umps that practise together, how would this work with interstate-based umpires? I see this leading to accusations of umpire bias if we end up with "teams" of WA umpires or Qld umpires, etc.

I often wonder when players do media whether they even know how another player's injury is tracking. It can be obvious when the player is on crutches or in hospital, of course, but I suspect Lever actually has no idea how close Viney is to playing.

Oliver leads in The Age, too, with Petracca second and A Brayshaw (but the other one) in third.

Thanks for doing the work. I wonder whether the umpire paid a free kick for a breach of part (f) above? I can't see anything else that seems relevant in this list.

Hey DeeSpencer, I generally appreciate your explanations and analysis. But can you explain your last point? I don't understand what you're saying here about the "Back 5" and "kings of the back 3".

Is a "dangerous tackle" a category of free kick or just something that we all seem to think exists? If so, is that what was paid? And if it was what was paid, should it have been?

No, but if you put yourself on the MCC waiting list today, you'll only have to wait about 20 years.

The discussion seems to be about a "day" start at 2.30pm, a twilight start at 4.15pm (or thereabouts) or a night start at 7.30pm-ish. Would a 3.20pm start be an option? Not a traditional grand final start time and not quite twilight, either. But it would be consistent with the start time for a lot of day games.

What happens when an aerobic beast like Langdon breaks his ribs? (Note: I'm not saying they are broken as we appear to be still waiting for confirmation). Does he get back to full fitness more quickly than most because of his base before the injury? Or does he lose that particular strength overnight because he can't do the exercise necessary to maintain his aerobic fitness?

6. Oliver 5. Jordon 4. Lever 3. Sparrow 2. Petracca 1. McDonald

Jake Bowey tops the list of players who never played in a loss with 17. Next highest is 9. In addition, should we win next week, he will equal the 18 games that Albert Lauder from Collingwood played before his first loss. So, something extra to play for over the next two weeks - the chance to equal Lauder against Freo and then to go on to break that record the week after.

As a matter of interest, which other players have had songs written about them? (Excluding Greg Champion/Coodabeen Champions songs).

One thing I've learned from Demonland is that there is no consistent view from supporters as to preferred timeslots. Some prefer night, others daytime or twilight. Some prefer Thursdays, others don't. And so it goes on. I think the AFL has realised that they can't satisfy the supporters. So they go out of their way to satisfy Channel 7 instead.

I'm OK with Melksham playing. There could be many reasons for this selection but perhaps he got the nod over Dunstan and Bedford due to a concern that we're not really kicking large scores, even though we're winning. Melksham provides a better forward target and a better forward distributor than either Bedford or Dunstan. The latter two provide better on ball work and probably better defensive pressure, but perhaps we use Neal-Bullen more on ball this week to compensate for that part of Harmes's game that will be missing.

Peak viewing time on TV is between 6pm and 8pm. When more people are watching, the TV stations can charge more for advertising. When advertising revenue is higher, broadcasters pay more for TV rights. And if more is paid for TV rights, clubs get a bigger financial distribution from the AFL. That was the essence of Eddie's argument on Footy Classified. He just had trouble articulating it because Caro kept interrupting.

Thread title needs a change.