Jaded No More

He isn’t in his prime anymore and he isn’t our best and only midfielder anymore. That doesn’t mean we discard him like yesterday’s trash. There is a lot to be said for showing loyalty to those who have shown it to you. It’s not just about his position in the team, it’s about team unity and loyalty and harmony. Disrespecting Jones says to the entire team “sure, be loyal and stick by us in bad times, but when the time comes we will throw you to the curb”.

If he came cheap I would. He is a match winner and a massive upgrade on Garlett. If his head is right he could go another couple of years, as I believe he doesn’t have significant history of injuries.

He got 2 didn’t he? No way he would move clubs for 1 year deal. His concussions are no worse than what Gus was facing. With proper management he can overcome it.

I hate when he hits our players and breaks their jaw. What a d@&k!

I think Melbourne supporters don’t ring talk back radio because they are busy working and having a life, not collecting dole or scamming cigarettes at train stations. They don’t feel the need to waste their time talking to other idiots on the radio, as if they will miraculously fix our problems. Our supporters are the most resilient and loyal there are. We have the highest supporter to member conversation rate. We aren’t the problem.

Why? He’s contracted so unless he retires I can’t see why he wouldn’t.

If you don’t laugh you cry. I rather forfeit the remaining games than watch more players go down injured. It’s not worth it at this point.

The year that keeps on delivering. Have we gone one solitary week without someone sustaining a serious injury?

I’d be disgusted if we are low balling our captain and a champion who has stood by this rabble of a club for all these years. I think one year is fair, but FFS the last thing we need right now is media noise about our own captain being unhappy with his contract offer. Get it sorted fast. This [censored] would never happen under Jackson. To think how much money we have payed absolute garbage players over the years... no wonder Jones is annoyed. Deserves a hell of a lot better. This season truly can’t end soon enough.

Glorious outcome. Hopefully puts GC out of contention for a PP. Between Day signing and this performance, they have another 40 odd years to reach diabolical Melbourne type levels and hence gain a PP

Beating Essendon would also be a nice little sweetener. My Essendon supporting friend is currently losing his [censored] in our footy chat. He called his club weak and pathetic. What a softy! ?

I don’t disagree and I particularly think it’s important for our backline as we know who our starting 6 are and they need to start getting to know one another. Their cohesion is key to us climbing up the ladder again. However the reality is we have 4 weeks left. 4 weeks in which we need to make decisions on players staring at delistings. We need to decide who we should try and offload and is surplus to our needs. We also need to decide what to do about our badly underachieving midfield. If he wasn’t in AA contention I would give Gawn the rest of the year off for a well deserved rest. I’d throw Preuss to the wolves so he knows what he needs to do in pre season if he wants to ever be good enough to tie Gawn’s shoelaces, let alone compete alongside him. I would get Gus to go rediscover himself and start playing defensively. I’d give Viney an extra 4 weeks to rest up his broken body and send him to leadership training. I would play Salem on a wing. I would play JHK where he plays at Casey, as an inside mid, and see if he can cut it with the big boys. I would try Oscar up forward to see if he has a chance of saving his career from total meltdown. Winning or losing is irrelevant. It would be nice to win sure, but it would be nicer to use the next 4 weeks to make tough list decisions that need to be made.

Yep and we only have one game left we can potentially win which is the Swans game. Pies and Tigers will rip us a new one and North in Tassie with an interim coach trying to get a permanent job won’t be easy either.

If anyone is not fit and is playing right now, increasing their risk of further injury or delaying an end of season operation, then we are stupider than I imagined.

Ok so in that case we can agree that our awful skills across the board have nothing to do with injuries, and just simply putrid footballers?

If the club gets a pass for injuries this year from you, then surely Lever who is 3 games in from a 12 months knee reco gets the same luxury?

If May doesn’t get up for the game we will surely let the Tigers kick 25+ goals. Lynch and Reiwoldt against Frost, Oscar and a barely fit Lever. May god have mercy on us all.

To be fair the margin flattered us. Their goal kicking was all over the shop and we gifted them 14 goals. I mean if that’s not putrid I don’t know what is. What frustrates me is I thought we played really well last week against a quality opposition that I expected will eventually win out (and we had players down on the bench). To back it up with this stinker of a performance against a club who, lets be honest, are just as crap, is depressing. How many more years will that spud Bruce tear us a new one? I swear he is only an AFL listed player off the back of his games against us. He is a modern day Kent Kingsley.

I hope like hell the optimists are right and next year with a fit list everything will be bloody hunky dory again. God I hope you guys are right. What the hell do we do if last year was the aberration and 2019 is normal programming resuming?!

Brayshaw is a shell of his former self. If injured he must be put out to rest for the reminder of the season. If not, he needs time in the VFL to regain skills/confidence. Not sure who the hell you bring in instead. If Melksham gets thru half a game in the VFL I would be tempted to throw him at FF next week. But probably risky and silly.

So injuries are why Brayshaw and Harmes have gone backwards at the rate of knots and refuse to play defensive footy? It’s why we can’t hit a target? It’s why we run around like headless chicken handballing to teammates feet? It’s why players miss from 20m out directly in front of goal? I agree that the backline has really suffered this year and so we’ve been easier to score against. You can also argue the same about picking a target going forward, although if McDonald was injured all year why did they play him? But like I said above, the basic skill errors and lack of two way running and effort can’t be all put back on the injuries.

Ask for your 2 minutes back.

Also stressing the supporters who are a loss away from losing their [censored] minds. The thing that hurts the most is we’ve had record membership and exposure on free to air tv this year and we’ve totally and utterly blown it.

Lucky bastard. I have 2 more games then I’m off overseas. Opposite time zone means no footy! Nobody can deny injuries and lack of fitness have ruined our season. And to be honest if we finished 9th-12th you’d say ok we’ve been so unlucky what a shocking year. But come on, injuries alone cannot be blamed for a 4 win season. Our midfield has been intact all year. Yes they have been down on fitness due to post season surgeries, but as a whole we’ve had a good run with midfield injuries. The backline has suffered and so has our forwardline. It is absolutely the reason for some of our performance, but you can’t keep hiding behind injuries when we are staring at a bottom 2 finish. Our skills, our game plan, our lack of defensive running, it is all deplorable. I repeat injuries have ruined our season. But even injuries as bad as ours don’t simply cause a team to go from 4th to 17th.

It sums up why he shouldn’t keep getting games and yet...