Demon Dynasty

Not necessarily dimmy. I would think it's a foot race when it's kicked or handballed out wide to a fellow player or to his advantage into open space under pressure. Or forward into space to your player's favoured side / or even over his head on the sling/shot break off HB for a joe-the-goose attempt. The Saints will look to exploit this advantage as the game opens up at some point. Aside from Rivers, i think Goody has gone for defensive / contested capability, height and experience over foot speed, skills and finish. The tipping point for me (taking us from sluggish to turtle like vs the speedy Saints) is Jones. I would consider him coming in for AVB but that's about it. I don't see what purpose / role he plays in this side other than AVB's (vs the Saints) and we certainly can't afford to play both. I would have kept Harmes in to play a part time mid / mostly forward role instead of Jones and played him back into his 2019 top 3 form. Goody has potentially ruined a solid career (at the MFC anyway) here which is a real travesty and one of the poorest pieces of player management i've seen since he tried Fritta down back last season. The majority of our mid field will have to play out of their skins to win this one as well as most forwards. Two or three players go missing from both of those groups and the Saints will exercise our Demons comfortably. Might have to win with the last kick of the night from "that's ruck craft big boy" Maxy!

Pickett-on- the -Fence2?

Aside from Rivers.... so much for the "bringing in some pace/speed" call. Lost two players with a bit of toe for one. Saints will be licking their chops here and while we are always a chance, they 'should' win this one with relative ease me thinks.

other than a direct replacement for AVB, and imo he deserves it given his better form in general, i agree (vs the Saints). Against similarly sluggish sides i think he still is...just, for now.

Agree with the first two LN but Hannan, albeit not setting the world on fire in this regard (actually no one is...with our young rookie Kozzie just leading the way here), isn't so bad as the former sitting in equal 3rd place for average tackles inside 50. The other two running at about half his rate here. We will need to ramp things up as you say and given our lack of pressure in general, the more the merrier. Can't see us beating the big boys very often until that begins to happen along with importing a genuine KF plus some outside run & class / finish to cover the non-langdon wing. Hoping that might become Bennell at some point but i'll believe that when / if it happens.

Seriously! Surely Fritta was just following standard modes of N.T. transport to training!?

Sounds like Pruess, T-Mac and Maxy are likely to be all named then.

Good discussion LH. Following on from this re your last two points above... I believe May is probably the ideal leader to be making such instant / mid quarter change ups as you say, assuming he has that authority. He's in the ideal position to see the game unfolding to the betterment or worse of the team and he would no doubt have a feel for the ease / regularity with which the opp is entering 50. Almost a Hodge type captain down back. Now that doesn't mean he HAS to be named as a deputy capt or capt etc. It just means he is given the licence (and authority) to make change up calls in defensive styles/methods/tweaks (in game only), before the coach is able to address the troops under certain 'qualified' scenarios, probably scoreboard related. And nothing extraordinary, just methods which the entire group are savvy to and fully trained to handle so it's not a major move away from standard trained playing methods. Eg; simply one option from two or three standard methods of team defending for example. Or it might even be attacking as in the last 2 min of a match and coming from behind eg; pushing a defender into the middle etc. Protecting a lead with X number of forwards moved back to stack the defence in the last two min etc. All set plays/structures that are known to the group and if someone isn't quite getting the set play / method and/or structure (eg; a rookie or new to the club) then of course a senior leader steps in and directs player/s accordingly. Now your last para. And this is one of my bug bears with this club. Has been for a while. Ideally you would need to be at ground level to fully know this so i'm just speculating. But with this season's iso games and lack of crowds. There isn't alot of noise about and you can often hear the players voices on the field. Im not saying we are more or less vocal as there's no way of truly measuring. However, i wonder, do we have 'enough' vocal leaders who get up and about 'in game' in an attempt to rally the boys when the opp's on a roll on the scoreboard? Or do we, in the main, tend to have a few too many introverted types that tend to go into their shell a little too much when up against it? Again this is one of the reasons i would love to see May as VC or even joint Capt at some stage. The bloke seems to HATE losing and he loves to direct and/or occasionally dish it out where he feels it's warranted. We need this given the 'general quietness' that seems apparent within this group when under the pump and to rally them before they come out after half time etc, knowing the opp is going to come at us. Try and prep/steel the boys, particularly the younger blokes, mentally and set them for a big 3rd & 4th quarter effort. I reckon this last part is lacking somewhat within our group. I recall watching us re-enter Metricon after half time last week and look, there's probably very little to this but... There were one or two blokes joking a little and having a bit of a giggle about something in the race (i recall Tracc was one of them) just as they were about to run back on and i thought to myself (probably just MFCSS) "wow i hope these blokes don't take the Dogs lightly here or we are on trouble". Probably means nothing but i always like to see game face on well before the start of each quarter. I'm certainly no expert in such matters. Who knows, relaxed might be better and i could be barking up the wrong tree!

I think in a major way (significant change up of style) i would agree LH but i do think a few minor tweaks are possible, depending on the amount of change and the degree of difficulty required. However like any 'way' of playing, the coach would need to show them the how, why along with the manner/techniques... and then they train it. I heard a player or might have been a coach (might have been woosher in the Bomber's draw with GC not sure?) asked a few weeks ago, "do you ever train for that last few minutes scenario coming from behind in a nail biter?" and the response was "Yes we have a drill for it that we act out and train for it at least once during a training session" or something to that effect. It got me thinking if they can train for these scenarios then surely they are capable of training for things like.... > Man on man through the middle and / or front half for X amount of time before reverting back to usual type (eg; rolling zone, diamond zone etc) > Slow play / maintaining possession off and across HB > Lock down / Run with on player X and/or Y (or other) as required by our player A & B until told otherwise Etc. The above separate to say a major positional change up such as May to CHF or something similar if the game is almost gone a la Hooker y'day arvo. While i agree, major changes "in game" would be very difficult to pull off in my mind surely ones that the players know and have been instructed in and trained for can't be impossible? As for on field leadership, i believe your senior leadership and other players / captains can and should be capable of coaching 'method / structure' individually. But imv the coach is the one who decides when/which method of change should be brought in at any particular time. They see more from up high and have a full view of the ground plus more eyes on the entire scene. They also aren't caught up in the heat or role of the moment nor under physical stress / exhaustion which might have an effect on a player's judgement / decision making in game. Among other things, the the coach is there for very good reasons such as these and that's what he gets paid to do and do well imv. Some doing it better than others, including training it onto the playing group till it becomes second nature to most, or at least those that are capable.

This sums us up in a nutshell. Whenever we are favs or slightly better than a 50/50 we usually play like rabbits in the headlights at some point during that match. When the going gets tough too many players go missing instead of stepping up and taking it to another level when challenged (and i'm talking small percentages here, not expecting miracles across the board). Does this mean we should win this week given we will surely be going in as rank underdogs? Unfortunately i reckon we can match speedy skilled teams for about a half as we did last week, winning enough inside contests and clearances to balance the losses on the outside, at least to that point. Once that effort/skill drops away a little (skills usually fairing the worst here) after half time and the game opens up a little with the opp starting to win their fair share of clearances and contested, they're then able to spread and use their better skills on a more regular basis, as well as intercepting more of our awful turnovers, to rip us a new one with multiple unanswered goals. Weight of numbers on the outside overwhelm us once our "inside" intensity, skill levels and ability to run down the opp drops away in the second half (against those clubs who have the speed and skills i mean). It doesn't help that we also don't seem to react to this in the box and try and shut down one or two of the main offenders from the opp. The box also appearing to freeze like a rabbit in the headlights. Ok so maybe we don't have the answers on the day as we just don't have the outside speed / chase down ability to go with the opp. But surely that's by design both at a list level and at the selection table (to various degrees). I can't say i've witnessed us doing much of anything such as... ? Attempting to close down the opp's spread / movement by going man on man for short stints before reverting back to a zone method once/if we get the game back on our terms. And i'm not talking about waiting until the 4th, 5th or 6th goal in a row is kicked either. A good box should be able to recognise we're losing control of the ball / losing control of the match early on into an opp's run on and swing the change ups quickly ; ? Slowing our own ball movement down to bore the opp and let them cool their heels, putting a halt to their run on. ? Down by 5/6 goals or more and time's running out to turn things around? How about throwing some caution to the wind with player positions / roles and giving yourself and the opp a different look / feel. Look at the Bombers match yesterday, swinging Hooker from HB up forward and instructing their blokes to handball on the angle, then kick long to one on ones once they got in the clear. Sure it was only a few minor tweaks but it shows that sometimes a few tweaks (whether it's actually the tweaks themselves having a direct effect and/or the mere psychological effect upstairs, maybe a bit of both) can have a major effect on the outcome of a match, including massive turnarounds on occasions even if history would show your chances of doing so are slim. As per the late John Kennedy's famous cry "Do something, don't just think....DO!"

Might have been handy this week on Hill?

Unless they bring him in for AVB. Not so much for speed of course, more from a form perspective in terms of getting to the right places, getting involved in link up. Chunk can also kick the odd goal occasionally whereas Vanders doesn't. If Bennell had a defensive / intercept side i'd be bringing him straight in for AVB. Might be worth a look for a managed Kozzie? Rivers is a must in for Sparrow so Harmes can go back to his preferred role running with Steele in the middle / and pushing forward for the odd mark/goal & attacking chain work in the forward half which will also help keep the Saints honest. Bringing Harmes into the mid also allows Viney to play more time as a pressure forward which we will need in this match. Something that was sadly missing last week from the smalls inside 50 who were found wanting.

Too funny DD!

Road to Finals / GF - Triple Crown Update (to Rnd 13, 2020) Vs the Bulldogs Meters Gained Differential (looking for + 200 or more) ? -359 ❌ Marks inside 50 Differential (any positive is a win but the higher the better) ? +3 ✔️ Contested Possession Differential (looking for a +10 or greater) ? +2 ❌ Season Averages (the ones that count) Did i say we were finals bound last week!?? Still a bit of work to do! Meters Gained Average Differential (looking for an average of + 200 or more) ? +157 ❌ Down from +204 last week but still holding No.4 spot. Tiger's replacing the Power at No.2 The top five with current ladder positions in parenthesis below. Top five ? 1. Cats 371 (3rd) 2. Tigers 306 (5th) 3. Power 293 (1st) 4. Demons 157 (9th) 5. Bulldogs 148 (8th) Marks inside 50 Average Differential (ideally we need to see a top 6 ranking) ? 3rd ✔️ Holding at 3rd with the same average of +2.5 Top five ? 1. Cats 2. Lions 3. Demons 4. Tigers 5. Power 6. Eagles Contested Possession Average Differential (looking for +10 or more) ? +7.2 ❌ Holding in 3rd place with the average slipping slightly from +7.7 last week. Below the required pass rate but no team has hit the required pass mark yet. The Kangas have slipped out of the top 5 being replaced by the Blues at No.4 & the Power slipping from 4th to 5th. Top five: 1. Cats 2. Pies 3. Demons 4. Blues 4. Power

Weighted Averages up to and including Rnd 13, 2020 Player 2020 Weighted Score 2020 Rank 2019 Weighted Score % Change vs 2019 % Change vs 2019 w/ 20% time adjusted 2019 Rank Change in Rank vs 2019 Clayton Oliver 4.200 1 4.880 -13.93 7.58 1 0 Christian Petracca 3.821 2 2.843 34.40 68.00 9 7 Max Gawn # 3.194 3 3.437 -7.07 16.16 4 1 Jack Viney 3.030 4 3.258 -7.00 16.25 5 1 Christian Salem 2.852 5 3.658 -22.03 -2.54 3 -2 Ed Langdon 2.781 6 - - - - - Steven May 2.721 7 2.618 3.93 29.92 14 7 Angus Brayshaw 2.642 8 3.131 -15.62 5.48 6 -2 Michael Hibberd 2.341 9 2.339 0.09 25.11 19 10 Jake Lever 2.269 10 2.519 -9.92 12.59 16 6 James Harmes 2.208 11 4.039 -45.33 -31.67 2 -9 Tom Sparrow 2.150 12 1.275 68.63 110.78 37 25 Nathan Jones 1.979 13 2.907 -31.92 -14.90 7 -6 Oscar McDonald 1.925 14 1.956 -1.58 23.02 26 12 Adam Tomlinson # 1.894 15 - - - - - Braydon Preuss # 1.875 16 1.643 14.12 42.65 33 17 Harley Bennell 1.850 17 - - - - - Alex N-Bullen 1.783 18 2.120 -15.90 5.13 22 4 Tom McDonald # 1.675 19 2.297 -27.08 -8.85 20 1 Sam Weideman 1.675 19 1.895 -11.61 10.49 27 8 Jay Lockhart 1.650 21 1.819 -9.29 13.39 30 9 Bayley Fritsch 1.640 22 2.809 -41.62 -27.02 10 -12 Mitchell Hannan 1.634 23 1.433 14.03 42.53 36 13 Trent Rivers 1.575 24 - - - - - Luke Jackson # 1.463 25 - - - - - Aaron Vandenburg 1.438 26 - - - - - Charlie Spargo 1.388 27 1.513 -8.26 14.67 35 8 Jake Melksham 1.371 28 2.181 -37.14 -21.42 21 -7 Neville Jetta 1.355 29 2.264 -40.15 -25.19 18 -11 Joel Smith 1.292 30 - - - - - Kysaiah Pickett 1.283 31 - - - - - Toby Bedford * 1.250 32 - - - - - Jayden Hunt 0.908 33 2.092 -56.60 -45.75 23 -10 Mitchell Brown * 0.775 34 - - - - - Average Team Score -Top 22 52.155 59.623 -12.53 9.34 # Hit outs to advantage not captured * One match only, not an average Stats courtesy of footywire.com

Haven't heard that one Dp. I've heard a few such as "rubbish in rubbish out" or "Some individuals use statistics as a drunk man uses lamp-posts — for support rather than for illumination". Sometimes i'm a bit of a boozer!

If only we could find that magic bean SNS. I'm still not sure it lies within the present list.

Would love to see him on board but not sure he would want to return given the past treatment under diamond Joe.

Harmes must be borderline but imv i just think he is being asked to play a role he just doesn't get this late in his career. He's been a run with / part time mid / winger who pushes forward to stretch his opponent and mark/ maybe kick the odd goal in the past. I would reset him this weekend on a shut down (not necessarily heavy lockdown) role on Steele who is presently the Saints most prolific ball winner. This makes complete sense now with Sparrow out imo. Rivers comes in to cover Harmes. The only option i can really see if Fritta is dropped is Bedford and i'm just not sure he will be ready for such a big match. If you are bringing him in for Fritta then i can't see him playing out Fritta's role in the air. On the ground sure. And he probably won't play the entire match out. It's possible but you will need others to drift forward and help out in the air like AVB, Harmes, Tracc and Clarry. As well as on the ground once his tank peaters out probably about 2/3rds of the way through. Maybe let Hannan & AVB share this role early. Once AVB's legs are gone chasing....then bring Bedford in to cover the Saints defensive smalls in the second half with Hannan along with our other two smalls, Kozzy & Spargo. Could even consider dropping AVB for chunk to play that same role in the first half as he appears to be in better form than AVB at the moment (subject to a fitness test of course).

Weighted Average Scores - Rnd 11 through Rnd 13, 2020 There are arguably better Zep songs out there than this.....but none more appropriate for our boy Clarry. Rain, hail or shine, hat's off, this bloke keeps delivering the goods. Ok he's had his dinky handball phase and a few other question marks over his short journey so far. But let's face it, we'd be struggling somewhat in the mid without this bloke's consistency and manic attack on the ball. He's now adding another component to his game on the burst and getting to the outside seemingly with more damaging kicks happening. Let's hope he continues on his merry way and he gets plenty of support from his mates coming in to finals. Gus, Ed and Jake the snake all pushing up as well in this last block of three matches. Yes only one match to go on but not a bad output from the two rookies Trent & LJ at this early stage. Let's hope LJ can make it back firing in time for finals. The team score in this block is off the charts compared to the previous block. Yes there were two easy pickings among these numbers but you don't average 17% higher vs the previous season and approx 25% vs the previous block of three matches (from Rnds 8 to 10) without getting some major lift in form from a significant number of players. We are also tracking the average 2018 team score in this block. While there's no certainty in life and certainly none in footy i would say we are a very good chance, maybe 70% or so, of making finals here. Being the 2nd highest scoring team behind the Cats in the second half of matches this season should help if we can get back on the winner's list this week. Defence looking very solid also. Big game coming up after the disappointment against the Dogs. Player Rnds 11 to 13 Weighted Score Rank 2019 Weighted Score % Change vs 2019 % Change vs 2019 w/ 20% time adjusted 2019 Rank Change in Rank vs 2019 Clayton Oliver (3) 4.875 1 4.880 -0.10 24.87 1 0 Angus Brayshaw (3) 4.033 2 3.131 28.81 61.01 6 4 Ed Langdon (3) 3.592 3 - - - - - Christian Petracca (3) 3.492 4 2.843 22.83 53.53 9 5 Christian Salem (3) 3.450 5 3.658 -5.69 17.89 3 -2 Jake Lever (3) 2.775 6 2.519 10.16 37.70 16 10 Steven May (3) 2.758 7 2.618 5.35 31.68 14 7 Michael Hibberd (3) 2.583 8 2.339 10.43 38.04 19 11 Trent Rivers (1) * 2.550 9 - - - - - Jack Viney (2) 2.275 10 3.258 -30.17 -12.71 5 -5 Luke Jackson (1) * # 2.275 10 - - - - - Adam Tomlinson (3) # 2.250 12 - - - - - Tom Sparrow (2.3) 2.192 13 1.275 71.92 114.90 37 24 James Harmes (3) 2.183 14 4.039 -45.95 -32.44 2 -12 Nathan Jones (2) 2.163 15 2.907 -25.59 -6.99 7 -8 Tom McDonald (3) # 1.917 16 2.297 -16.54 4.32 20 4 Sam Weideman (3) 1.917 16 1.895 1.16 26.45 27 11 Braydon Preuss (2) # 1.875 18 1.643 14.12 42.65 33 15 Charlie Spargo (3) 1.867 19 1.513 23.40 54.25 35 16 Jake Melksham (3) 1.650 20 2.181 -24.35 -5.43 21 1 Mitchell Hannan (2) 1.588 21 1.433 10.82 38.52 36 15 Bayley Fritsch (3) 1.550 22 2.809 -44.82 -31.03 10 -12 Kysaiah Pickett (3) 1.467 23 - - - - - Jay Lockhart (2) 1.325 24 1.819 -27.16 -8.95 30 6 Aaron Vandenburg (3) 1.108 25 - - - - - Average Team Score -Top 22 55.810 59.623 -6.40 17.01 # Hit outs to advantage not captured * Only one match played ie., not an average score Numbers in parentheses = number of games played for this data set Stats courtesy of footywire.com

There is Layzie but it's under Champion Data's copyright so no chance we will ever get stats that drill down to that level. There's a little in the Hun on a Monday such as pressure acts and hit outs to advantage but otherwise nothing publicly available.

Other than some of the newbies to the game that haven't yet been fully retrained eg; the recent addition of Lewis to Fox's special comments team, i'm afraid you are clutching at straws here HBT. The media also have their snouts sniffing and snuffing around the massive AFL swill trough and are doing very nicely skimming the grease off the top of the club's swill. No way they will rock the trough much and i suspect the aim is to avoid too much discussion (review via replay) of anything that is deemed a little or too controversial. You can clearly witness that with the dead silence often greeted after a rare criticism of a controversial umpiring decision on the coverage from those who have been well trained and fully "swill" compliant such as Bruce, BT, Derwayne etc. Even if the replays cleary show something isn't right with a decision or conversely a non-decision, very little is often said to fan any fires of controversy other than the occasional fence sitting "undecided / unlcear" type comments. The present circus is a very sad state of affairs with Gil's tentacles weaving their way throughout the entire system from the HQ, to the clubs themselves and almost everyone involved in the media, with a few minor exceptions / slip ups that slip through camp AFL's retraining / restraining filter.

I would say for as long as we remain part of the AFL circus NSfm. Everyone is on the gravy train. Some getting more of their snout into the trough than others as we are witnessing with theses anomalous tribunal outcomes. I'm pretty sure the AFL have, in a round-a-bout way, put the lessor favoured clubs on notice that it won't be considered 'ideal practice' if we were to rock that train (trough!) too much.

They're not saying that at all DZ. Imv what they ARE saying is... "It may or may not be ok to sling (or apply a dangerous) tackle. However, the outcome / penalty will depend on who you are and which club you play for and WE will decide the outcome arbitrarily and potentially in a discriminatory manner purely at our discretion". END

As we all know, the AFL have their favs both club and player wise. Unfortunately for too long we haven't been one of them and we continually cop the short end of the stick....and seem to accept it more often than not. How does a club that rarely pushes back with appeals or stand up for it's players in glaring examples of injustice such as the ANB one (and there's been others eg ; this from 2010 to an ex R.I.P. https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.theage.com.au/sport/afl/no-charge-after-kennedy-breaks-colin-sylvias-jaw-20100315-q9bw.html ) then expect that its players (in general) will do the opposite and stand up and fight for the jumper? ANB was always going to be outed but to roll over and accept 4 weeks then cop the SHIZENHaus decision without a yelp?