Lucifers Hero

Our competitor fans are back in the doldrums when facing the mighty dees! Bigfooty: "We need to beat them in clearance" and "Lewis Young to ruck number 1" are mutually exclusive. Start the transitioning process by getting rid of the players who won’t be (or shouldn’t be) on the list next year. Pitt for TDK a no brainer. The rest is the ol' deckchairs on the Titanic. Pittonet is a must, I don't mind JSOS around the ground but should be a huge no at the centre bounce. Harry should ruck in the F50 instead of sitting 2m off the contest as if he's going to rove it. Infuriating. Needs to watch some Jeremy Cameron footage. If the ball doesn't get to him he finds it himself. Harry has been far too one dimensional lately. Melbourne will be on the rebound, after their loss to the Pies too & a top 4 place in jeopardy, can’t see Demons dropping this one , the game could get nasty, quickly . Keep the fingers crossed we don’t lose Cripps. I'm tipping by the end of this game percentage won't be anything to worry about compared to the doggies, they'll be well ahead. Dees will slaughter us. Slowly emotionally checking out for the year. The highs were exhilarating and the lows demoralising. I feel exhausted. Still love em. Struggling from above the shoulder Feel we are going to get torched by their smalls on transition. Melbourne: Oliver, Viney, Petracca, Brayshaw, Gawn, Jackson. Us: no Hewett, Kennedy, and possibly Cripps... Strange as it seems giving Cripps a week rest(susp) and going all or nothing v the pies appeals to me We will get smashed out of the middle. Going to take something incredible to be otherwise. This could very well be a 15 goal loss. Melbourne will absolutely spank us. Backs to the wall, undermanned, season on the line, MCG, big crowd, ton of support. These are the games that define clubs. We pull this off & it’s up there with the great Carlton wins. Keep the faith, people their form is as poor as ours but they have most of their cattle. not without a shot but could hardly expect us to do too well given the last couple of weeks. more likely we're the team melbourne springboard into the finals from. Poor form? Beat Freo by plenty at Optus and just lost to red hot Pies. Please can we have some of this “poor form”.. exactly, if they are in poor form then what the hell are we in ? Dunno if it’s mentioned already, but we could put all our eggs in the Pies game. Identify and rest those players this week who would most benefit from the extra recovery (and basically concede this week’s game), and have one last final crack against the Pies. Im the eternal optimist but sadly the season is done. Our 1 wood of clearance and contested ball is seriously compromised without Cripps, Hewitt, and Kennedy. I just don't think it can be recovered from here. I'd give some serious consideration to dropping Harry this week. Omitted. Send him to the ressies and tell him to start taking some actual marks. We aren't going to risk one of our biggest commodities in some suburban cow paddock when its all on the line the next week. Imagine the backlash if he got injured. Seems a bit too bold for Carlton though (fans included). We’d rather go down as a slow sinking ship. In our desperation to see some success, we seem willing to tolerate far less than 100% from our stars, while placing the blame elsewhere by swapping around our ‘bottom 6’. It’s a really bad practice imv. Our form compared to when we played them in the preseason is completely different. We look a totally different side. Think they might really get a hold of us Think we got to the bye, then started looking at the fixture & projecting wins, when all we were doing early in the year was taking each game on its merits. Gunna be tough, but we can win this Almost hoping Cripps gets 1 week, then fingers crossed v the pies we get back a fresh Cripps, Hewett, Kennedy & Zack Williams Melbourne are 4 wins and 6 losses in their last 10 games just like us but I agree after yesterdays performance it feels a world apart in terms of where both sides are at.

Thanks for asking. Am a bit busy for the next little while. But I'll do the weekly 'What they are saying at ..." thread and maintain the 'Contracts' thread as changes happen.

^^^ 'Officialy off' sounds like a twist of what Richardson said (paraphrasing): "there will be no announcement until after our season is over. The club said to Jackson to forget about the contract and just give us the best football you have over the next few months." I took it as a way for the club to take pressure off him. More click bait.

I don't think it was a media con at all. But the above posts sound like a few here believe it was. What intel would we be giving away? If anything the comments by our leaders this week should have prepared Freo for what we actually did last night?

I could list a few reasons but then we go down that 'rabbit hole' again so I won't. My post was about the idea the club set out to con the media. For what?

A nice 3% boost to 131.6% while shaving 5% off Freo to 114.9%. My conviction about a top 2 finish wobbled a little last week after the Bulldogs loss last week. Now firmly back on the finishing top 2 and a series of Home Finals!

Of course I am aware but all the fist pumping makes it look like it is. Anyway, by all accounts Freo was also 'fully loaded' so what happened to them last night?

So now we have this grand conspiracy where key club leaders (Richardson, Goodwin, Petracca, Brayshaw) are conning the media? For what end? Implied in this thread it is to not fess up that we are loading? Really, I would have thought saying nothing or a few straight bat words around training loads etc would be a lot less embarrassing than admitting to complacency, arrogance, lack of ruthlessness, lack of buy-in. The media are generally idiots and after click bait. Why on earth would our club waste time to con them? Not to mention to spend time getting our leaders to all sing from the same song book! I don't for a minute believe everything that comes out from the club. But to think this weeks meeting and club commentary is just a charade to fool the stupid media is insulting to the club.

LOL. So Freo hasn't been loading when all along it has been claimed that the top 4-5 teams this year had the time for loading? And people found a correlation of their loading program and their mid year loses. So what happened to Freo's loading program? It isn't just loading...

In his interview yesterday Richardson said if we make the GF the team will be different to last year. I guess that means changes before then to settle the team and to gain cohesion. I listened to some of the post game interviews: Petracca said they were prepared for the Oliver tag and Oliver sacrificed his game by positioning himself in a way that gave Viney more space. We saw the result!. Viney made the most of his attacking role while Oliver was effectively the defensive mid. Usually, if Oliver is tagged we unleash Petracca. A clever change of roles to unleash Viney instead. Unlikely teams would have prepare for that. Gus said they had planned for him to go into the midfield a while back but needed to wait until a spot was available (paraphrasing). He added it was coincidence it was this week post contract, against his brother. While I don't believe everything that is said by players and other club staff I have no reason to doubt Gus. I guess Harmes being out and expecting Oliver to be tagged, opened up the space for Gus in the midfield. Freo looked lost in the midfield. Aish's tagging role worked well but he didn't have much impact. The others looked confused with our ability (Viney and Gus) to find so much space to attack. We 'surprised' them with Oliver going defensive and they didn't know what to do. At this time of year the teams that have been top 4-5 all year will be level pegging on fitness and readied to finish the season strongly so not a lot to differentiate them. It is contest and ruthlessness that set us apart last night and will continue to do so. And it is the 'surprises' and tactics that coaches bring to the game that will help make a difference. I reckon we have a few more surprises up our sleeve.

Hunt to do a surprise shut down role on Andy Brayshaw? Andy has struggled with a tag not that it happens that often. A shock tactic!

Presumably all emergencies do the captain's run? I didn't mean for him to have a holiday, more to see his family while still doing training, attend games etc.

An alternative view of JVR as an emergency is as a way to get home and see his family.

Clubs and Managers need to stop leaking this stuff to the media. All trade moves should be banned in the media by the AFL until that club's season is over. Two months to go and our team needs to put up with speculation about losing much loved teammates. We have enough distractions right now we, Kozzie and the players don't need another.

If Logue goes to May, May will be ready. If they tag Oliver, Petracca will have a field day. And vice versa. They will need new tactics in this game. They might pinch a few things from the Sydney and Geelong games but I will be surprised if they come up with anything new that our coaches haven't seen this year. They are very tall for a boggy ground which might help us. Jackson for BOG, in our win!

In the last game Petracca was parked forward because he was very ill, May played for 15 minutes and Petty injured early and restricted for the rest of the game. Our backline was all over the shop trying to plug gaps. TMc also out of the side. Despite that we had them at half time with the scores 6.8 to 2.7. Longmuir saw our team was weakened at both ends of the ground and exploited it: He tagged Oliver. When an opp coaches tags him or Petracca the other has a field day. But they were both restricted. Freo started dominating the middle. Our defence was also weakened all over the ground, we semi panicked and kicked straight to their tall defenders giving our small fwds no chance. It will be a very different game tonight. Dees to win by 3-4 goals.

But they wait until after Freo trains on it to replace the turf. So replaced at Freo's request, maybe?

I hope they asked both teams first. But I doubt it. This smacks of helping Freo overcome a weakness in their game ie they don't handle wet conditions. And increases the risk of injuries!

Thank you. I'm glad someone else recognises and articulates the 'biggest problems' affecting our performance. I have been harping on about those issues since the Freo loss. By 'the talk coming out of the club' I assume you mean things like the gist of this post? To that I can add Richardson's comments yesterday about learning form and being ready for Freo. And he clearly stated that while we owned part of the losses to Freo, Syd and Coll they were also due to those clubs trying new tactics against us which were successful. We can add Geelong to that list. Opp coaches have barely rated a mention in loading discussions let alone given due credit.

We may see a new re energised Jackson this week! 🙃

At the 2.30min mark Richardson talks about our mid season slump. He mentions 'owning part of it' but is also open that part of it was Freo, Sydney and Coll succeed with a bunch of different things.

I like that Richardson said that, effectively putting a protective ring around him. The comment that there won't be an answer until the season is over, suggests to the media: stop asking. Hopefully, everyone at the club follows that cue. The circus is not Jackson's doing. Hopefully, others (his manager, freo people etc) now also 'go to ground' so to speak. He added that in chats with Jackson the club has said to him don't worry about the contract just play the best you can for the rest of the season, giving him some breathing space. I'm sue all on here would be happy for this to die down until our season is done and for now just let the kid play (and help us win another premiership).

If there is any doubt that Gus is not a gold digger with an inflated ego: "...But industry sources said Brayshaw, who has been more satisfied playing at half-back than wing, could have earned easily above $800,000 over the same six-year term had he chosen to play for the Bombers, Fremantle or another club and had accepted much less than was on offer..." "Brayshaw said he had taken a careful and considered look at the options before him, before deciding on staying with the Dees, with a number of factors at play, including the culture being built at the club, the list, and the long-term re-signing of key teammates". "Melbourne has everything that I really needed to tick this one off. I love my teammates, I love the coaches, I think we’ve got a great list where we can compete for finals and premierships and this is the place where I believe I can become the best player I can be,” brayshaw-staying-with-demons

No need to read the whole thread as the latest table is always duplicated at the top of page 1 of the thread to save people wading through. The quick answer to your question is look for the against the names.

Let me introduce you to this thread: