Demon Dynasty

Outside of some of the defenders, who tend to get a few cheapy chip kicks, he is our best by a fair margin Spalding. Kicking efficiency 77.2% Next best is T-Mac @ 71.9% Salem not far behind @ 70.4%

Ha as long as we aren't heading back to the future McQ. Oh wait...what...

Re: Frosty, Stretch and to a lessor extent Jeffy (as he fully knows what's required) let's remember they haven't played any senior footy for over 10 weeks. Will all need a couple of weeks to acclimatise to the pace/pressure and match fitness required to perform effectively at AFL level. Still need to see a solid contribution but not expecting miracles in their first game back after such a long time away. Fingers crossed they can bring something decent over the coming weeks and become solid contributors in a strong finish to the year.

Spargo one side and Jeffy on the other with big bodies of Hulk and T-Mac crashing and contesting. Tasty pickings for the speedy craftwork of an AFL quality crumber and finisher Bz! He ain't bad over the first 10 meters and finding space on the lead either. Only issue here is, is there anyone other than Fritsch capable of hitting? Maybe Stretch & Melk (in horrible form though). FD will no doubt want him to bring the defensive stuff but 2 to 3 goals along with some ground ball clean ups and creative involvements nearer the goal face would probably get him a solid pass!

Barring injury to Tracc, Jones i can't see him returning either KM. The only spot i can see him in is Melk's if he doesn't lift (or out injured).

If only we had that sort of depth Sam!

Not arguing that WJ. Just saying what happened in part of the first quarter of the Cats match that cost us a few goals and quite possibly the match.

A few muddled mis-matches through the mid field early in the first quarter cost us one or two goals (like Hogan on Ablett where Ablett lost Hogan easily and ran into half forward at one point for the easy receive and goal) and the match against the Cats. Maynard eventually went to Ablett for a short period mid way through the first and at least prevented him from causing any major damage while he was on. Admittedly Maynard a big work in progress, especially kicking skills and lacks pace but his work rate / effort is there along with, contested/clearances and tackling. The hip issue obviously a big set back.

What a disaster if that's the case. Murphy doesn't offer us anything we don't already have and is coming into his twilight years. Game has gone past him IMO and rarely gets on the park. No thanks.

No need for a ruck when Max is resting. Just play an extra fleet footed (for us!) mid for the crumbs/contesting/tackling eg., Tracc, Brayshaw or ANB. They don't have Sandi and probably no decent relief ruckman anyway when their main replacement follows Maxy to the bench. Just need to halve the contests and prevent a run on during the down time. Back up ruckman are severely overrated and have little if any impact IMO. Problem solved.

Best balanced team (on paper) all year by a country mile! Better late than never.........Goody has finally woken up to the need for speed in all 3 sectors of the ground! Frost, certainly no Lever once he gets the ball, but easily the next best intercept option (Lever was only just ahead before going down) and speeds us up. Will need backing from the coach to gain confidence early though. Hope he's told him he's in for a block of games (subject to getting the basics right). Whether he works out or not who knows. But the die has to be rolled or season over given the fragility and lack of height (support for O-Mac / Hibb & Lewis) and speed down back IMO. Also needs to tell him to offload to runners lateral or behind more often so we max his intercepts. KISS principle for Frost on the disposals pls! But wait, hold your horses folks!!! In order to have maximum effect and max our winning opportunity IMHO Goody has to ensure we don't play Viney/Jones/Clarry in the starting 3 through the middle (or at worst for lengthy periods) and certainly no shut down roles by any of those 3 if starting or in together. Maybe Harmes / ANB sharing such a role for periods of a game on the absolute gun mid fielders but only IF they get off the hook and momentum needs halting/changing. Goody must BACK and let OUR mid field loose (and the rotations going through there) to join with arguably THE best ruckman in the comp and MAX (yes that's a pun!) our mid field advantage. No lock downs, subject to an ugly run on needing to be shut down as mentioned. As soon as it's halted and we are back in the game or a few goals up again, bang....let em loose! Let the opp chase and try and shut us down once we are in the game or ahead. Catch us if you can MOFOS!!! Easily equal to or the best clearance / first use mid field line up in the AFL when we are not tagging and we are on. Delivery i50 obviously NQR and needing a stack of work. Would be focusing on this aspect from here if i were Goody along with the work rate/two way running from all (which goes without saying after last week). Lastly, don't let the press get sucked so high from here on the bigger grounds! Goody's learned a few hard lessons. Now he just needs to fine tune in between weeks and have the entire team turn up on game day. If they do we will barnstorm our way into the finals! Go Demons!

Thought it was Roos walking in to Demonland just after the siren Saturday

He was incredible SF. Even im sad to see him go and i would usually never say that with our arch enemy.

Rioli announced retirement. So early. Hawks will be in shock.

Chazz that is not this Saturday. Even playing at a similar level to last Sunday (which was horrid) we beat Freo (subject to the Umps tearing us a new one).... Just. Yes they are that bad without Fyfe and Sandi. That's IF we do play at a similar level. It could always get worse i guess so in some ways you are right but we should beat Freo with one hand tied behind our back. I would take no notice of whatever happens this weekend to be honest. And our team is only solid if it works as a team. Stuff that Lewis is not doing in those Videos just has to be ruled out and if he can't bring it i would rather see someone else in that role even if inferior at general play like Frost or Baker? And remember we went with Weids instead of Smith. Smith our best tackler inside 50. I doubt he lets Carlisle run away at will without chasing him down and at least closing the gap. Not saying Smith should play either but i think if we want to improve our pressure i50 (and we have to) then you have to play players who are best at doing so. As Gazza demonstrated we are now the easiest team in the comp to score against once the ball enters our 50. In addition if we are going to continue with so many potatoes through the mid field who can't chase down their direct opponent over short / medium or long runs then don't play such a high press and make sure you have at least two speedsters (who can tackle) behind the press. Also tell them not to get adjacent or goal side of opponents. In the end though we have to find some players with speed (who can also apply manic pressure) in a number of areas across the ground. I personally can't see us playing finals unless we bring this factor into the team in the next 2 to 3 weeks and i'm struggling to see who these players will be at this point.

We are often talking about our kicking skills (generally) and how we would like to see some more accuracy hitting up targets and in general. In some ways i think the dropping away of this skill in the last few weeks and our ability to maintain possession and therefore control the momentum of the game (by foot where you don''t have to play on), has cost us dearly and seen us move away from what we were doing more of and more of successfully in the games we were dominating. Controlling the ball in those matches for extended periods (without turning it over as often) allowed us to halt some of the opp's run ons and maintain and then go on to build on our lead once we caught our breath and reset for the next flurry of attacking break neck play. Obviously pressure from the opponent playing a large part here but possibly the speed (or lack thereof) of many of our potential receivers and their inability to get away from their more speedy opponents (in some cases) also may have played a part. So here's a brief summary of the season so far, broken down into positions so it's a little more relevant. I have not included players who have only played one match so far like Stretch, Maynard & Petty. Note the positions are determined by AFL StatsPro and i don't have time to adjust into more relevant positions in most cases. The two obvious exceptions (for me anyway) were T-Mac where i moved him from a Key Defender to a Key Forward and Spargo from a Mid Fielder to a Forward....

I'm talking about the quality of his finish and decision making in the last quarter overall PD. I'm not saying his whole body of work is ordinary in that period and certainly not a general critic. He wouldn't be the only player to see his efficiency etc drop away in the last. I'm not even sure it is vs other quarters TBH but just going by what i see in matches, particularly Sunday and the last few against Port and the Pies. Just think we might see some better results without some of the extra clangers in the last quarters if we manage his game time with some assistance off the bench.

Easily BOG for us Chook and his best game for the season. Fritschkrieg is certainly all class. I just hope the others start catching a little of his kicking skills and accuracy. Beautiful to watch.

WW if that were the case why play him? Spargo would have been brought in surely. I can't bring myself to watch the replay and didn't notice on the day but someone said he was tagging at one point? Has dropped away badly since the Crows match.

Have noticed Lewis tends to fade pretty badly in the last quarters of a match. Prior to that he's usually in our best 5 players (or thereabouts) most weeks. The writer hasn't watched him closely / often enough and is talking out of his hat. You drop Lewis you may as well have all 6 backmen bend over a barrel and call in the dog squad. The FD needs to manage his game time better IMO and maybe this is where the Vince / Lewis combo could have been handled better. Neither of them are up for 80%+ game time but if they were to share the role a little more off the bench and/or throw Salem in the mix in their role also?

DD he may not have earned it this week but Goody has to take Jeffy under his wing (personally) and try and encourage him to find some form (if he hasn't done so already). He is easily our best pressure small forward inside 50 when he's on as the article below covers. And even this year he is a smidgen behind Tim Smith for tackle averages inside 50 at No.2. And we have neither of them in the team at the moment. He isn't just there for the sneaky ones. Need to get him firing and back ASAP (among many other tweaks) to make finals. He is a key missing link to our run home. Demon is best small forward in the comp: Luff By SEN a year ago Champion Data’s Glenn Luff has used a number of key performance indicators to find the most valuable small forward of the 2017 season thus far, and it is a player that almost no-one would’ve guessed. While talking on SEN’s Pure Footy, Luff has concluded that Jeff Garlett is the most efficient small forward in the AFL at the moment, using measures such as forward half pressure points, groundball gets inside 50, forced turnovers and average goals scored to make his decision. https://www.sen.com.au/news/2017/05/18/demon-is-best-small-forward-in-the-comp-luff/

Petty for Vince was always going to be an experimental change YB. Do you make that change and make an already inexperienced back line so much less experienced? If you are hell bent on it then surely you go for the height factor but give the nod to someone who has a tad more experience in Frost (58 games). Were we sitting pretty in the 8 and weren't coming into Saturday's match with two losses on the trot....would i consider chancing Petty? Maybe. But he would want to have played a break out block of games at VFL level before i would consider. I go back to the Hawks as they've been the most successful club for decades now and they rarely blood new guys into the team unless they've spent significant time below (sometimes a few years before a call up) and busting the door down.

Pretty sure it was a "pure footy" session on SEN via Glen Luff. Was some time ago. Our game analyst, Craig Jennings, would (or should) be all over it Timbo. I'm not sure anything like that would ever be raised though and doubt the Coaches would put any weight on it even if it was (maybe after the event lol). Some are more into the game's stats / history and others probably can't stand it and it gets totally ignored. Then there's some who are probably in between. And i just checked and we did go from 7 players under 50 games vs Port to 8 vs the Saints. The Saints had 6. (Power had 5). That's 2 too many in my book, even against a bottom 4 team with a horrid %. Never give a sucker an even break or in this case, a slight advantage! (especially when you have alternatives available to choose from eg., Frost instead of Petty).

Fair enough DD. I certainly didn't see an AFL worthy performance against Coburg that justified a 200 plus gamer in Vince being dropped for a debutante. Not arguing he didn't put a good VFL level performance block together.

Based on what i saw in his game against Coburg before the call up and about 3 other matches earlier YB. I also thought it was a huge error from Goody at the time bringing in another debutante just after Joel into what was an already very inexperienced team. I think we went from 15 players under 100 games to 16 and under 50 gamers from i think 7 to 8. I recall a champion data guy saying that once you go beyond 7 (maybe 6!?) under 50 gamers the odds of winning in any scenario (unless the opposition matches you) drops considerably against.