Nascent

Brayshaw has equalled his possession count from last week's game in the first quarter and a minute

Looks like his body has caught up with his brain tonight.

Harmes again!! Could even here the screams of 'what was that?'

Harmes??? Strange non effort there in the forward 50

Wonder how much patience Matt Rowell will have at Gold Coast

We can cross off Ed Richards as a potential target. Has re-signed with the doggies for another 2 years. https://www.westernbulldogs.com.au/news/1003359/richards-re-signs

Makes me excited to see Laurie in action next year. The recruiters seemed equally bullish about his skills and footy IQ.

Was outstanding in that department today.

Easy to praise the man after kicking 7 goals but just wanted to acknowledge the improvement in his goal kicking. He has now kicked 46.18 for the year. Outstanding accuracy by any measure but particularly for someone that used to look shaky in front of goal. Also brought up his 100th goal with his second major of the day. Kids a jet.

6. Fritsch 5. Lever 4. Petracca 3. Langdon 2. Salem 1. Jackson

Out: Smith, Sparrow, Melksham In: May, Viney, McDonald We rarely make multiple changes particularly coming off a win, but I think these are clear upgrades from our 22 today. Good game from Smith as well, perhaps Hibberd might feel nervous.

I don't pretend to know the ins and outs of list management, but looking at this list I can make a good estimated guess as to the rationale behind re-signing Smith. Not including rookies, everyone out of contract this year could justifiably be delisted or traded. That's a 10 player turn over which I think is unrealistic in the present covid climate. Then looking at the out of contract list for 2022, nearly all are best 22 with players like Laurie and Rosman surely deserving of more time on our list for development. Melksham the only obvious one at risk of not getting a renewal and McDonald pending his continuation of form. Seems like a simple solution to me of offering one year contracts to depth players. Might sound harsh but that would give us a 'delisting buffer' to protect the core of our list that we want to keep. Lockhart, Bedford, Weideman perhaps Hibberd and one or two others I wouldn't be surprised we signed on for at least next year. We can then delist the remaining players this year, bring in 2-3 draftees plus 1-2 trades or free agents. Think people get caught up in some players thay are re-signed outside of the best 22. When you have a list of 36players + I don't think its unreasonable to suggest clubs will have players on the list that are nothing more than injury fodder with the potential to play a role if injury requires. If they develop on the list and break into the 22, then that's a bonus.

Not sure how we engineer that from both a Salary and draft picks perspective but would love to see him in Melbourne colours.

Everytime I watch a Richmond game I see a dirty Cotchin act, this one was an elbow in the back of a GWS players head after a tackle. Amazing that players like him and Selwood seem to escape criticism for their consistent dirty acts.

Agree re Weideman. They obviously don't trust him for this year. Whether they want him around for next year or not is another question.

North Melbourne and Hawthorn can merge to become the North Tasmanian Hawks. Gold Coast and their hideous jumper can fold and talent divided amongst the remaining clubs (we get dibs on King). Back to a 16 team competition and everyone is happy.

I do have to LOL at the fact the Kangas had another serious dip at Kelly and got rejected yet gain. So much schadenfreude joy from the kangas failed attempt at luring half decent players.

If so the question will be will do we look at Weideman one last time? Felt we were a tall short against West Coast.

Doubt we will debut any more players this close to the finals but could be wrong. I would expect Hibberd to come in with his pace and experience. Hope he has freshened up a bit because he looked way off the boil in his recent games. Perhaps Hibberd can play a lockdown role on opposition defenders like his game against dusty earlier in the year. Should free up Bowey for some more attacking plays and remove intensive defensive responsibilities.

Wouldn't have thought we'd lose too much pace with Bowey. Kid is quick.

Will be his penultimate game for the Crows but I believe he is still weighing up his options for 2022.

Josh Kelly has officially re-signed with the Giants for the next 8 years which has been estimated to be over 1mil per year on average. Would've been the ideal hard running inside/outside midfielder but we were never in the conversation for him at that price tag. Perhaps that will tighten the Giants salary cap somewhat and leave some young guns ripe for a trade.

FB. Bowey May Petty HB. Rivers Lever Salem C. Langdon Oliver Brayshaw HF. Spargo T-Mac ANB F. Fritsch B. Brown Pickett R. Gawn Petracca Harmes I/C Viney Jackson Jordon Hibberd Sub. Sparrow Emerg. Melksham Weideman Jones Chandler The next group. AvB Lockhart Smith Jetta Baker Bedford Injured Hunt? Thought about putting Sparrow into the starting 22 but feel it makes us a bit young with Bowey, Rivers, Jackson, Jordon and Pickett all young and relatively inexperienced. That's nearly a quarter of the squad already. Hibberd is clearly on his final legs but have him as a better contributor to Sparrow at this point and gives us another option off the half back, particularly with Hunt injured (?severity). Barring injury to a key forward, it's too late for another Weideman experiment and he will have to sit on the sidelines. Wouldn't mind seeing Jones in a sub role as well, would be a great sight to have him out on the ground during the finals. Not sure he can run out a full game though. Hopefully I haven't forgotten anyone.

Think he'll be a fan favourite for years to come. Someone with pace that can hit targets consistently is a rare commodity. Will find a home on the half back line but could settle into a wing role quite easily down the track.

Painful last 15 minutes but got the points. Top 4 locked away!!