Wells 11

I’m disappointed in this , I thought you would understand the significance of the monarchy in our colonial history ..and the genocide of our indiginous. We stand and listen to welcome to country to recognise we are one country. Ironically we give a minutes silence to the monarch of another country. We are responsible for our past , our willingness to understand what that is demonstrates that.

they’re borrowing our IP

was thinking the same thing! goals like that or no getting goals like that can be so critical.

Hope so as personally I think he’s going to be a real gun.

Love the info GNF. no certainties of course but good to know we’re at least knocking in some doors.

His upside is crazy. We’ve all seen glimpses and he’s still 20, and carrying an injury,l. I have no doubt LJ at 25 plus will be an out and out star of the comp… and we will prob learn to hate him. But in the short term We’re in a plum window. He’s not critical to us fr the next 3 years. After that it will be what it is anyway. We won a flag with him and ( despite that I might also have to hate him in time ) I will always love the guy fr that. He was part of our bang bang bang story . A truly ecstatic experience. He’s looked after the club in the way he’s leaving too and seems like a genuinely good fella. Wish u well luke. Now let’s get THE best deal done w this we can.

This is absolutely the critical question from 22. All the red time goals we started giving up also point to fitness. 5 of these v lions. Nothing is a bigger concern to me than this. we went from a team that steam rolled others in the3rd and 4th in 21 to one that would dependably be steam rolled ourselves in 22 . This more than game plan, more than selection, more than straight kicking I reckon is absolutely something the club needs to understand. and then address., Some say our fitness guy trained them too hard and ran them into the ground. If that’s so then he needs to know that. Some that Burgess not being there meant we were too soft and he didn’t go hard enough. Others are saying that there was prob 6-7 of our top players limping through the season with injuries that no doubt restricted training also. I prob concur with this one. But whatever it is the club absolutely needs clear sight on this or 23 is gonna end the self same way as 22.

I’d love to see Clarry win a brownlow to just shut these dribblers up and bring him in the respect he more than deserves.

Well thats just a terribly unfair fixture ;-) . .....I did like your point there though.

It’s a bit too easy to overlook after the way we grabbed top spot and our our flag last year . But we finished this season in 2nd position. SECOND. I’ve been following the dees fr over 50 years and only once have I seen us finish higher .. 2021. So despite what I strongly suspect was an injury related fade at the end of this year, the boys did us proud. They came bk in 22 fit and hungry and gave us 10-0 zero complacency. Petty has AA stamped all over him. Kozzi was always a huge talent .. and he’s now getting better at showing more of it more often . 6 goal match winner in Alice. JVR, Howes, Bedford, Turner all look exciting (and maybe a cpl of others) and are looking to push there way in. Jackson fr a healthy Grundy and another 1st rounder is a win.. at least in the short term. Our window is short term so I’m ok w it. 2023 will come and we will be one of a few sides smack bang in our window. It’s painful right now but these are good days to be a demon

Credit where credit is due hey. They’ve revolutionised the way the game is played this year and their corridor at all costs is genuinely exciting to watch. Kinda hurts to see the pies being good again, but they are. Re your comment though about them having an “ inferior” list. After watching them tonight I’m just not sure they actually do. They have a lot of hard running, elite ball users that we don’t have and they play to that strength. They also have some kind of eveness in their inside grunt and outside speed we don’t possess as well.

He really is turning into something special isn’t he. Thought he was just about our best last night.

yep .. and we’ll said. I think this is also why teams started over running us. I guess the question has to be asked did we really need to keep playing all of them? Trac worked out ok, as did Clarry but the rest you mentioned, and add Salem and Rivers, just didn’t. Perhaps that’s just the footy gods having their say.

Yep. Salem prob shouldn’t have played after he got injured at the start of the year should he. We kept waiting fr the him we know to appear. It didn’t. Bottom line was that a half fit salem was in no way better than Bowie… but we’ve been looking at that fr months and been unwilling to see it . He just can’t play injured. some can some can’t. He showed us he can’t. Rivers is also carrying an injury and is utterly and embarrassingly bereft of confidence. I’m a real fan of his but that’s got to be about the worst game he’s played fr us. Genuine liability. I do expect those two to bounce bk though …they’re just too good not to. Hopefully they sort their injuries out over summer… or we’re stuffed., Hunt is prob just in our bottom 4. I don’t think we can point the bone at him.

yep. some real shockers weren’t there. Topped off with that ridiculous call against lever. How many questionable frikn free kick goals did we get hit with in the finals. Just So many dodgy ones went against us. We just couldn’t take a trick.

yes but worse. It was like watching a slow motion replay replay of the SAME crash we watched in almost every loss we’ve had. Surest way to beat the dees is to be 5 goals down near the end of the 2nd.

Lever sums it up at the very end… distracted, disappointed and gives way 50. Kozzi continues to give free kicks away w late hits plus another 50 tonight. That’s Not what great players in great sides do. In general and across the board they were mentally off and the reasons fr that needs finding. Injuries? fitness? game plan? yze / jackson distracted? 23 feels like an enternity away.

Petty was our best player imo. spargo gave us nothing

I was genuinely shocked at just how far off it Rivers, Sparrow, Jackson and Spargo looked tonight. all 4 have taken massive steps backwards this year. Rivers has become a liability down back ( gave away 2 goals by panicking ) and Sparrow a liability with his disposals. pickett. ( as much as I love him) gives away another 50 and 2 x down the ground frees fr late contact. where’s his head at? Jackson drops a critical mark and has almost zero impact. Hard to stomach the way we’ve been over run late and out coached. Season has to be seen as a failure now.

I have a sense this game will go to the wire.

seems to sum up the mood here and in me too DJ. I’m open to being surprised but have that familiar MFCSS cloud around me.

Personally I think there’s more of a risk in playing him. Obviously to the player himself as he WILL be targeted. But more to the point the risk of keeping up the facade that everything is fine. We’re in a sudden death final and arguably our best player is down… it’s now or never. I’d be bringing in an in form Dunstan and, as part of that, try to get the whole team to share the load and lift a notch. This isn’t business as usual anymore and now everyone has to do more. Murphy, the doggies captain at the time, went down on the eve of the finals and they won the flag. The whole team responded to that and we need the same ..not playing an injured trac who can barely run and can’t kick straight .

we left 3 very gettable goals lying around that we should have kicked. so it looks worse that it was.

He did. And a few of the boys looked flat didn’t they.

boys looked tired.