Demon Dynasty

Yep they just showed the drop away vs what was projected by Pert just after the flag and put up his quote saying we were aiming to become a big club with 75k members and big crowds etc

All good points. The defence and lack of pressure hasn't been there (consistently to AFL averages) since about Rnd 8 2024. That last para i'm not totally convinced. The playing group in general (not always and some players not as proficient as others at executing of course. Exceptions to the rule, out of form / not match fit or capable etc) plays as it is trained. I see that as a 50/50 shared task. And if they can't execute after being given plenty of opportunity to do so, it's the coach/es job to find alternatives that can.

There is some truth with the stubborn side for sure. Great example is Noughton. Imagine the reaction here to him getting constantly selected by Simon.

According to Chris from Camberwell.... there will be no CEO appointed until Smith is appointed as President. Which i think he said won't happen till end of this year... Take it to the bank

My favourite candidate (gut feel), if he were to ever consider coaching which he apparently isn't, is Hodge. Yes i realise he hasn't done the apprentice of say Mitchel but of all the players to have recently left the game i feel he is as switched on and knowledgeable as anyone. He is also tough as old boots both as a player and in his view of what's required to compete and win at this level.

The last time i thought the same and we were this bad was 2012. It took 9 more years for a flag. You might wanna consider a cryogenic option TD

No haha. But ended up becoming a teacher & eventually a principal himself

I took that as Buckley inferring that if players are ignoring / burning outside receivers / runners with an extra handball or two, and instead just banging it in there, that they might be doing because they were under instruction. And if my memory is correct, that's when Lewis jumped in and mentioned that under Yze they were def instructed to look to get it to outside runners / receivers (if free) by hand.

They were highlighting 666 center work and exit / clearance from stoppage. Buckley did say this but also wasn't in agreement with it being the most effective. He and Lewis saw it as more of the same old from us. A continuation of long bombs deep into 50, while ignoring / burning your exits on the spread in better positions either out the front or lateral. By hitting up those players with an extra HB or two you would be changing angles / lanes and giving space / time to those who have spread away from stoppage, allowing them to be (potentially) more effective at hitting up free or leading players inside 50 or around the arch. Or potentially a shot at goal if doing that (linking) when exiting out the front. Similar to bang bang bang bang or what we saw with Clarry in the third quarter on Saturday night. Which unfortunately he missed. Forwards also then have more ability to work their craft. Timing leads, running their patterns, working off their player into space to present etc. By ignoring / burning those exits out of stoppage and just bombing it in long so often, you are making it super easy for defenders to just stay back shoulder or run with the forward toward the ball drop and spoil with others peeling off to assist at times and / or gather the resulting crumb and then sling shot out. The others (Reiwoldt, Lewis and Johno Brown) all agreed and said we are too easy to defend playing that way. They also couldn't believe that this is still happening and hadn't been corrected under Simon to date after being a problem for so long now. Speculating that this could be instructional from the coaches (to elimnate / bypass and just bomb). If watching be prepared for a visit to Advance Hair (yeah yeah) afterwards.

I'm thinking you might know my brother DR....him and a few mates did that to one of their not so nice high school teachers back in the day 😄

Or.... maybe there is a fracture within the playing group between those that aren't happy with their current lot under Simon. Let's call that side 'the Christians' (no inference to Salo intended).... And the loyalists who are rusted on... 'The Blighs' In addition to that, let's say the past culture at Demonland under some previous coach/es was player driven. And it was mostly eradicated in the Roos years and Simon flew in on his coat tails and managed to keep things on track to break the drought. However, for whatever reason, getting too close to too many players or just plain complacency from a few leaders or a coach or two, we've reverted again to the tail wagging the dog?? I friggen hope it isn't the latter or we are about to head into many more years of inobscurity and being irrelevant once more.

Getting all cheech and chongged for the remainder of the games this season is not a bad idea Sold! Pink / purple lighting, some shag pile throw cushions on the benches and burning of incense in the rooms pre-game. Cryogeniclly frozen flower petals stored in readiness for our next sing song after a win.

Sorry Andy but this new update has MFCSS feels 🤮

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Can't speak for everyone but Smith would bring a serious level of professionalism and business / legal kudos. Great network of high level contacts as well. Hopefully get things moving on the Caulfield front. That's if he has the desire and passion to commit. The time factor shouldn't be an issue given his consultancy commitments from what i understand.

Great summary SW. You won't meet a better people manager and a great bloke to boot. He'll chat with any supporter / member anytime anywhere and treat them like they're as important as any other person in the club. Very humble guy but always looking for the edge over oppo and lookimg to get the best and expecting it from every player on the list. And there's no way he'd be allowing the forward crud we've seen in the last 2.5 seasons to continue on unsolved imv and just keep crashing & bashing on in hope. Big yes from me.

Team & Player Ratings to Rnd 5, 2025 vs H&A Season 2024 * Played less than two full matches < Subbed out at least once or more > Subbed in at least once or more Stats courtesy of footwire.com & wheeloratings.com

It feels like we're in a bit of a closed loop now DZ. Spiraling out of control and unfortunately not in a good way. The coach can't see the problem for the trees and appears to have backed the bulk of the premiership group and one very young and struggling potential KPF to get the job done, whatever that is, and just work harder on aspects of the game he feels we are deficient in. There are no doubt many factors that have lead us to where we are now. Much of it in my opinion is by design. Not that anyone, including Simon or others within the FD, are wanting to ever see this sort of failure. Of course not. But we have arrived at this point through the various decisions, directions, recruiting, training methods etc. Add to this our inability to address the obvious. Ie; that our forward line woes were and continue to be the elephant in the room and that this major under-performing aspect lead to much of our woes over a fairly extensive period. This failure we are seeing did not happen overnight ie; just this season. The writing was on the wall even in some matches in 2023 and of course, plenty of others in 2024. There was enough time for the forward conundrum to be addressed and corrected in the last two plus seasons imo. Aside from one year in 2021 when we managed to get BB, Kozzy & LJ all firing, it has since been the weak link in what used to be a super solid defence and a very strong mid field. Unfortunately all good things, in this case our defence and mid-field, eventually also come to an end. Did we make enough hay while the sun shined!?? It's my personal view that we are now witnessing the fallout of what an across the board demise of all lines in the FD looks like on field. And as you would imagine, it ain't pretty! Can Simon and the players correct this in the next few weeks and make a respectable fist of 2025? If Simon was more of a "thinking outside the square" & ruthless coach i think there would be hope. But from what we have seen / heard so far from Simon , it would appear that he will just keep going back to the same well in the hope that a miracle water will magically appear and somehow turn us back in to the 2021 beast that was. Stranger things have happened in footy but i wouldn't want to wager much on it happening.

We've had a poor starting record for many years now

Good luck with all that gents!

With Kozzy out the door at season's end guys, the old question arises a la LJ in 2022 whose body was on the field but heart & mind wasn't... Should we be getting games into the likes of Brown (he's ready now) and Culley (if he hits some serious form / fitness at Casey at some point) from here on in instead?

Lingers - His 2nd highest Rated game at the MFC. Brilliant gut running never-say-die performance. More of this pls!! Max - On track for a much better season than 24 but needs a chop out from someone who is in form up forward. Can't afford to play a part-time ruck in JVR who is not contributing elsewhere at all. Goodwin can't seem to see the forest through the stubborn trees. When a player is this out-of-form you are doing no one any favours by digging your heals in and backing him no matter what until the worm turns. The only winner is the oppo who benefit from nothing dangerous happening up forward until his form does turn. Let him find his mojo at Casey FCS and don't be so pig headed pls Simon. Clazz - Offensively getting back to somewhere near his best but poor defensively on the two way as are Tracc & Vines who is nowhere near his very best across the board. Vines needs to be managed for Brown Dog imho. Riv - 31% CBA this week. Keep Riv in the middle for these sort of minutes or more from here. Whatever it takes Simon, just get his minutes up. We look better with him on the move through the middle, aside from his disposal (not alone). Kozz will hopefully find some form here also as the weeks pass. Salem - Improved on last week imo. Tracc - A long way from his best but It is coming (slowly). You can feel it. Keep the faith fellow minions. Ideally might need to be managed for a week to freshen up but not enough troops at Casey yet. Maybe Culley in three to four weeks? Apologies to Bowsa - Great efforts and plays the intercept / link role well. However he lets himself & the team down with ball in hand too often for mine. Needs to lower vision and look for options inside and stop panic kicking up the line to players who are well covered or double teamed so often. Go lateral or backwards if needed. T-Mac looks to do this whenever possible without the blind down the line kicks so often. A few too many turnovers to get in the votes.

Round 5, 2025 Adelaide Oval - Demons vs Bombers Although a reasonable improvement on last week's Team Rating of 50.6 vs the Cats, this match was our second worst team performance to date (statistically speaking) in season 2025. The Bombers had 18 players with less than 100 games vs our 9. The resulting performance (or lack thereof) indicating we appear to be a mile away from AFL levels / standards at this point with no sign that we are arresting this year's capitulation. The Bombers now the third side we have played who have posted a Mega 70+ Team Rating this season, along with North in Rnd 2 & the Cats last week. Langdon easily our best rated player, finishing a close 2nd just behind Draper on the night. His 2nd best Rating since joining the Demons in 2020. His Best was Round 8, 2022 vs the Saints where he posted a 6.10 His output on the night included... 22 effective disposals at 88% efficiency (AFL average approx 74%), 2 marks i50, 2 one percenters, 3 clearances, 5 rebounds, 6 inside 50s, 1 tackle, 6 score involvements, 7 intercepts, only 1 turnover, 474 meters gained and a goal. Our next best... Big Max and Clarry. The main offenders who stunk it up in this match were... Windsor -51% vs his 2024 Rating (foot issue impacting, did he also tweak it again on the night at one point?) Viney -49% Sparrow -48% Spargo -41% (vs his 2023 Rating) Van Rooyen -31% Tracc -26% Melky -23% & T-Mac -17% (to be fair his first off week so far this season). Six of the eight worst results coming from seasoned campaigners. No chance you are winning on the back of that many posting those sort of results. Turnover Kings.... 7 a piece by Tracc, Viney & Pickett. Spargo and Gawn 5 each and 4 each from Windsor, Langford, Bowey and Rivers. Clarry lead the tackling front with 9. The next best, Chandler with 6. No respite this week as we face the team that first cracked us open post the flag in Rnd 11, 2022. Freo's form appears to be a mile ahead of ours and probably near the top of the tree, at least in terms of precise ball use and forward conversion. They're also super effective by hand with the most meters gained (on average) with each handball, whereas we appear to go the old fashioned ring around the rosie. Inviting more and more pressure, resulting in our inevitable turnovers, which are prevalent, even when under not much pressure at all. I would like to think we can clean this up somewhat (along with other skills and multiple aspects of our game) on the training track but we've had 4 weeks to do so to date with no progress at all. If anything we appear to be treading water. Demons < Subbed out TOG % > Subbed in TOG % Bombers Combined Player Ratings

Apparently there is Love Brownie. Lot's of sweet wonderful luurve...