The heart beats true

I have no idea where this question is going.

Demonland logic = We play well - the opposition are terrible. The opposition play well - we are terrible.

Our draw is harder. Considerably. Our game plan is the benchmark, so sides have done a LOT of work on us. I saw Justin Longmuir at the ground tonight. The players are trying their guts out, and giving their all. We had a month less fitness at the end of last year than 2021, and we’ve had a lack of cohesion with injuries - which we didn’t have last year. Honestly I think a lot is working against us. This is the time to double down and support us more. The footy gods are angry at us, but if we can get right and come good when it matters it will be the most incredible victory. Get around us. The boys deserve that.

We don’t have a second key forward ready to go. Weid was only in because Brown was out. JVR needs more time. To be fair to Weid he worked insanely hard tonight. He ran from wing to wing at top speed about 30 times. That’s part of the reason JVR isn’t being picked. He obviously doesn’t have the fitness just yet.

Evidently around here you only get evaluated by the last 5 minutes of football you’ve played.

You understand modern footy fine - you just don’t understand people who like to blame one our greatest ever players for trying his absolute guts out.

This is the difference in the season. Our draw is killing us.

Rubbish. Absolute and utter garbage. We are so far from lazy it makes my blood boil. Take a look at our draw. We keep coming up against sides with less rest and more favourable conditions. I was at the ground tonight. The players tried their absolute guts out. It’s not about want, or skill. We are exhausted, with a full day less break plus interstate travel and missing 2 of our most important structural players. The Dogs played out of their skin - but Ugle-Hagen may never kick 5 goals again in his life. He had a day out where he could do no wrong. Fair play to him but it’s not a reliable game plan. Our team is trying so incredibly hard and fronting up against a lot - and the footy gods are not smiling on us at all. You need a bit of luck, and instead we keep getting injuries and a lack of cohesion. I can’t cope with people putting down our players any more. It’s pathetic. These boys won us a flag and are doing everything in their power to go again, and a lot is going against them. Frankly they’ve been incredible.

I just saw Justin Longmuir on level 3 here at the stadium. I gave him a filthy look from all of us.

Ummm. Haven’t lost a game. It appears Plan A is serving us quite well.

The Bulldogs massive weakness is structurally in defence - so of course our 2 best tall forwards are out. Honestly our draw this year has been so hard. It doesn’t get taken into consideration enough. We are up against it every week. I’m really proud of what we’ve achieved to date.

Really! That’s mind blowing. Thanks.

Has this been reported anywhere? Not questioning what you’re saying, just intrigued as it’ll make a joke of the draft rules.

Eagles have to use their first draft pick this year under the AFL rules - so if they wanted LJ they’d have to get AFL approval. It’s not impossible, but I can’t see HQ loving it.

All but locked in is very different to having a contract. That’s actually my point. New opportunities will present themselves. And I don’t get your second point? I never said people weren’t talking, but everyone talks - that’s why LinkedIn exists. I was suggesting that how players feel now and by the end of September are very different things - and that’d we’d do ok out of it because we are well run.

What a bunch of nonsense. Unless they’ve changed the rules and I wasn’t aware, but do they now have a June trade period for us to bring in a key forward? No one has absolutely any idea who is actually on the market. Was Steven May coming to us 6 months out? Ben Brown? Lever? There are players out there who want different things. They might not even know they want them yet. Let’s just have some faith that our club is run by professionals, and that from the outside looking in as a player you’d be pretty keen to play for the reigning premiers. We will do ok. We turned a terrible 2019 into Jackson and the bloke who single handedly won us the game last week. The last 5 years of player management at our club says we win a lot more than we lose.

I like Toby, but he’s behind Koz and Spargo and they are both young.

Can you imagine all the complaining about the ‘high pitch’?

It’s an interesting one. I thought our forward line looked quite different last week. Melksham held space differently and we looked to get them out the back more often. I think it’ll be good to get a proper look at it at Marvel. No disrespect to Alice but it was a very difficult game to figure out structurally due to the low camera angles. Love seeing Oliver and Petty back. We aren’t far off our best side - still just trying to figure out our forward game.

This is classic Demonland. Someone revived a thread that’s 4 YEARS OLD, and now it’s splintered into 3 extra pages of people screaming No, a side argument about when forgiveness should and shouldn’t be given, and a thread within a thread about an 80’s alternative band. Bless you all.

I thought Clarry was a thumb, or do he injure his finger in fury at Goodwin when he told him he wasn’t playing against Port?

Larkey is the one at North that best suits our game style. We need a big mature body that can offer us a get out of jail kick down the line option, and can bring the ball to ground for Koz and the smalls. We missed a trick with Levi Casboult in hindsight. He’s been terrific for the Suns, and would have filled TMac’s boots perfectly.

The Saints are done. Ryder is their best player and is now out for 6 weeks. They just can’t get it together.

Our club is run by very astute people. There’s no way they are going to let that happen. They will speak to Luke and tell him if he wants to go home they will absolutely do the right thing by him, as long as he makes it clear he’ll do the same and sign a one year contract if his club of choice doesn’t offer his value. All of a sudden the onus is on the club that wants him to not act like terrible people, and to appropriately value him. If they don’t do that they have far more to lose than to gain. A lot can happen in a year. Just ask Tom Papley.

I mean, how spoilt can you be? It’s hard to remember in the tension of the game - but we have 3 of the greatest Melbourne players ever in our current centre square. Also, just to make you feel ok about the future, the 2 blokes leading the competition as it’s best players both have 7 years left as Demons.