Little Richard

Not sure what they were thinking, selecting so many talls for what will probably be a heavily rain affected match. Hoping it backfires spectacularly, I reckon we'll come away with the points. Midfield battle will be fascinating and looking forward to Viney asserting himself and Oliver using the ball smarter this week.

This whole situation is so frustrating. We finally get access to an academy pick and a great prospect in Mac and we're going to have him whisked away, thanks to a rule change. Fantastic.

Always manages to make his commentary and writing about himself in some way. Surprised he's elected to write about Fritsch too when there are so many snipers in the game. Mumford is one that comes to mind, he's a genuine rat who always plays the man and gets away with it every time.

Many fantastic memes out of that one ?

I think it's certainly that. The hack kicks and the way he ignores a first (and often open) option and ducks back into traffic are just so, so agonising. Viney was exactly the same.

Oliver's decision making is regressing at a rate of knots and it's so painful to watch.

Oliver, Petracca and Viney had no issues finding the ball. But jeez I don’t think I’ve ever seen as many dumb or ineffective disposals. What’s going on?

I will know, didn't even realise it was on. Pumped to watch Andrew but I'll be holding back until he's officially on our list. Not that hopeful TBH.

It's mostly just the same trash, over and over. Leppitsch was great last night and I love listening to Daisy's insights - I just hope she doesn't become corrupted, trying to fit into the mould of the simpletons who are still living in the 'good old days'.

Still buzzing, that was absolutely the statement we needed to make. Doesn't matter so much if we drop a few games to the lower teams, because we clean up against the ones that count. Even better that it could have been a ten goal belting, really.

BBB has to stay in the side, our structure held up so much better.

Harry Petty, take a bow!

Huge opportunity to make a resounding statement tonight. Super pumped!

I can't see us dropping Jackson as he offers so much as a second ruck. True that he's not exactly an imposing forward target yet but thanks to his insane movement, he is still dangerous when the ball hits the ground and kicks most of his goals out the back. Brown has to come in and I think Melksham for Pickett this week. Brown stays deep, McDonald roams around half forward where he does his best work and Melksham adds some more polished delivery inside 50, which we are sorely lacking.

Something Nathan Jones said a few years ago still resonates with me. He was talking about how many of the younger players at the club still didn't understand momentum shifts during games and how to go about combating or capitalising those. The likes of Vince and Lewis were a breath of fresh air with their experience and obviously coming from more successful and professional clubs. We've come a long way in dealing with momentum shifts during games. Now however, we're having to deal with momentum shifts in the season as a whole. We haven't been in a position like this and therefore, the players and probably coaching staff have to work out the best way to wrestle back some momentum going into the pointy end of the season. We're definitely not pretenders in terms of list quality and coaching nous, but we absolutely need to get this right or we will fizzle out. Mark Williams is going to be instrumental IMO.

Today I’m not as disappointed with the loss, but fuming at the way we played. Dropping back to second or even third over the next couple of weeks is better IMO, takes the heat off a playing group that is renowned for its mental fragility. However, I am worried that we don’t have the experience or knowledge to allow us to peak at the right time, ie the eve of finals.

We're very lucky that our backline is so, so good.

Pathetic really.

I love Oliver but his brain fades have been horrific today, turnovers galore.

Have I somehow time travelled back to 2019? What is this trash?

Trent Rivers is paying 51/1... huge odds. He's flying so far under the radar it's not funny.

Yeah our trading has been quite good, was just focusing on the drafting there.

It's truly amazing how far we've come with our drafting. We all know about the nightmares of the 2000's but the early 2010's weren't any better. For example, 2011 we drafted 7 players across the national and rookie draft and those 7 players combined for a total of... 47 senior games. Amazing. The upswing really began in 2013 when we picked up Salem, Hunt and Harmes in the same draft, though even 2015 is iffy, with Oliver the only one excelling. Jury still well and truly out on Weideman obviously. 2016 was a fail with none of the players we drafted still listed while from 2017, as you've noted, we started really nailing our picks. Good resource re our drafting history here: https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/td-melbourne-demons?year=2017

The 2019 class plus Jordon in 2018 is the kind of drafting we can build a dynasty on. These kids are unreal!

I have more faith in us winning the flag than England winning the Euros!