Demon Dynasty

As long as the door was closed and children not in ear shot

Yes thought his effort was excellent and managed a few taps to advantage. Held his own. Tough gig to play a KF plus chop out ruck role.

Melky said last week the HP crew had tweaked the program to better match the 6 day / 9-10 day breaks & interstate travel. He felt it was working well even though it wasn't a major change up. He mentioned other factors re in-season training also. Bowser said the same afterwards when i quizzed him about it. Happy as Larry.

Agreed. Also Maysie & Rivers need to recognise their short kick limitations and feed off to these guys with handball where possible and let them pull the trigger. Hec even BB is better at short passes when he drifts down back on occasions. With Bowser playing a bit more time forward of center you are also getting his crumbing / ground ball skills. Speaking of which, good to see Kozzy finally getting some mojo back here. Woe also adding a bit of class with his lovely running goal.

... "Whole lotta Rosie"

And his commitment at the loose ball on the member's flank to hold the ball up. Showed great courage. Not many disposals but very clean. 2 matches for two wins. What a debut from the young sun of a gun.

Clarry has also brought that since he started. Max also in many matches. Tracc's also jumped in here since Clarry went out. He's learned to play brutal no holds footy most quarters most weeks, imposing himself at and around the contest. The Jones boy before that with Viney & Max.

Certainly not this lander 👇🏼

I'll comment shortly.... just trying to find a new pair of jeans

Gus's efforts immense in this 2nd half

Nice wok from Max. Kozzy to Tracc.... Tracc to Kozzy!!

FCS SUB SPARGO FOR SMITH!!!!!!!!

Howes in for Hunter??

Should be straight in for Spargo from now. Let's hope we don't wait till the last 15 min

100% our biggest weakness tonight. He has never hit form at any stage since the concussion. Coming back to bite the selectors on the bum. A pitty Clazz aint ready. Straight swap

They're looking to go through Lever's man whenever they can. The pressure has to come from up the field to curb them doing this to the favoured side of his opponent or so often

Presently feels like 9 degrees ....top of 14 and overcast all day with ye olde Melbourne eddy circling (again). Cant get toast & Vegemite in bed let alone an Aperol from me lil storm cloud. Really appreciate you not rubbin it in!! THANKS Ollie! 😝

Dunstan was VG in patches but generally 'ok' for three quarters. Last quarter was very sloppy and dropped away. Defensively he probably doesn't get to the level that might see him picked (at least in this particular Casey game...not talking generally here). He might still be recovering from his knee issue somewhat which might be limiting his ability to cover ground (speculation). He still managed 24 disposals with some VG distribution by hand, a few of which resulted in a goal. One worth noting in particular was at the 8 minute mark (approx) of the second. A magnificent forward HB in congestion where he hit up Chandler 8 to 10 meters over the top who then spotted up Schache for an easy joe-the-goose goal. Having said that, he then turned the ball over a couple of times in the last with poor handballs, a dropped mark from a hospital short pass from a kick in which eventually resulted in a turnover goal and was generally not at the level of his fiirst three quarters (which were ok). Some may interpret this as a poor result (not my interpretation) vs an ok game (my assessment on the day). Chandler worked his behind off all game. Got first use on a few occasions in and under with extractions that resulted in at least two clearances and three scoring chaines. Namely the two goals to Edwards and the one to Schache above. I guess a stats guy would classify those as 2 clearances & 3 score involvements? Also had 19 disposals and 4 tackles but failed to hit the scoreboard again for the 5th game running if you include AFL results. In total scoring only 7 behinds in 5 matches. The last time he kicked a goal was Rnd 11 vs the Power with 1.1 I would argue he was outpointed in a 'genuine small forward' sense (ie; crumbing, opportunistic goal kicking and pressure (tackling) by Moniz. While Moniz had less disposals (11), and was quieter in a general sense than his outstanding performance the week before (and quieter than Chandler in a general play sense), he still managed to lay 7 tackles and kick 2 snap goals.

Pretty sure they said at least 3 weeks to fully recover. He would be right on the edge of that probably. One week too early me thinks plus they usually like to give Hibb a run at Casey before coming in.

Yes but they can still put significant training time into him playing as a forward in the interim until the next Casey game. That actually might be more beneficial as he'll have about two weeks of that and then get to put it into practice at Casey.

Could be MF. Might have intended something like this all along

I wasn't aware we were blooding him as a mostly forward. The CBA numbers don't support this with Max still taking the bulk of them vs Grundy. Max is also running at 39% accuracy at goals vs Grundy 63% so far this season. Why would you want your least accurate Ruckman, and by a long margin, up forward? While Max does take double the number of marks inside 50 each match it's still less than 1 per match (on average) @ 0.8 vs Grundy 0.4 Neither are setting the world on fire in this regards either. I would argue the premise of looking to turn one of them (or both !!??) into a serious TF option is a flawed concept in itself. Most teams only ever see the main rucks drift or push forward to stretch the oppos ruck and offer an 'occasional' extra option up forward. They certainly don't try to turn them into a genuine (regular with serious minutes) forward target if that's what you're suggesting we are attempting to do with Max. And if we have attempted this (from one or both) the results so far would suggest we shouldn't be.

Makes sense post the knee issue. I don't feel it's the right strategy if Max was fully fit and not in that space though. I'd want my best ruck to be at his very best and dominating. Even if it was just say two more seasons, for an improved chance at one more cup vs just plodding along for longevity sake with the help of another 'ok' ruck and probably missing out. Hope to be proven wrong, but the extra ruck means you have given up a place for a potential very good KF, inside or outside mid. When all is said & done i just don't feel the pay off will be worth that sacrifice after we look back and review this decision after another season or two. For whatever reason, post injury and/or other, at the moment Max looks like a shadow of his former self. That's not to say he isn't playing some pretty good footy at times. It's more his body language on the field and in general. The happy-go-lucky confident Max (on the field) that played with a bit of fire in the belly and freedom appears to be missing somewhat for mine this season.

I'm in no way wishing ill on Grundy but i agree with the premise. IF Max can run out a game at about 80% we will be a much better team with the extra mid and/or KF imv.

It was also pretty dewy. On his day Max is also the better tap ruckman imho. I could be wrong but in first halfs we seem to play Max for a fair chunk of time at CBs. We often get on top or are well in touch at this point in many games. We then revert to opening the 3rd quarter with mostly Grundy doing the CBAs. The oppo then start to get on top, winning a few more clearances and often scoring. This sees them get a sniff/incentive and start to take back the momentum. The momentum that we often had in the first half. This momentum then becomes hard to shut down and guess what, we then revert back to Max at CBs (half way through the third or so) in an attempt to stop the rot. That's no longer as easy as it may have once been though as we have an aging Maxy coming off a knee recovery plus no Clarry of late . The second half then becomes a bit of a struggle street with the likes of Max, Viney & Tracc trying to wrestle the lost momentum back our way again. Ok so maybe Max doesn't have the capability of playing three quarters in a row at full tilt anymore to put a game beyond doubt but i'd still prefer to see him at least open the CBAs straight after the half time break in order to keep the momentum going our way, prior to bringing Grundy in for the chop out later in the third. The other option is to do the above but drop Grundy for Schache and see how he goes playing as a KF for the first 2.5 quarters (or so) before giving Max a chop out in the ruck for the last quarter and a half.