Lucifers Hero

If the choice is Alice vs SCG I would take Alice: We get the $800k The flight to Alice is 30 minutes shorter than Brisbane to Alice. Not much of an advantage but not a disadvantage We play Pies 13 10 days later so even if we have to FIFO there is plenty of time to recover. Importantly, give the folks in Alice some enjoyment watching two top of the ladder teams. Edit: change 13 to 10 days.

Good point. Just as well there were no crowds on Friday night. The beauty of a 'block the corridor' order is that the while the opps hear it, they have no dea where our players will be, until it is too late. I was glad Richardson drew attention to it; it gives great insight into what happens on the field that otherwise we would not know about. I wonder how many other 'orders 'our leaders have to ensure players are in the right positions and structured correctly, ahead and behind the ball. I've noticed that Petracca has become more vocal. Melksham seems to play a similar role to Lever at the opposite end. Could be why he gets selected.

On Lever and our stingy (10 goal) defence. Matty Richardson said he could hear Lever often shout "block the corridor! block the corridor!" during the bulldogs game. Lever was suitably hoarse when interviewed after the game. 'Block the Corridor' impressed me for two reasons: Lever has to read the the play upfield and needs to pick the exact moment to order the troops into 'block the corridor' formation. A few seconds wrong either way and the opps get thru. The players need to know and get to their designated spot in the corridor quickly. On both counts the 'block the corridor' strategy worked brilliantly. Great example of on-field leadership and players playing their role, doing no more and no less. Last week Crows won by 'charging' our defence through the corridor. Not sure whether we didn't have 'block the corridor' tactic in our arsenal last week or just forgot how to execute. Either way we learnt heaps from the Crows 'charging the corridor' (also a key part of the Bulldogs plan) and our execution this week was flawless. The team would have been mighty proud of themselves for '10 goal win' v the bulldogs. Rightly so.

May is kicking to the Langdon wing ie our attacking side. Whether the ball is marked or it comes to ground we can set up to take the ball fwd. How often do we see the end to end ball movement with overlap handballs involving Langdon with Salem or Hunt. Gus on the other, defensive, wing is rarely seen in those overlap runs. For mine, as long as that system works May can continue kick ins to the left.

After the Crows game Lever was interviewed and said their aim was to keep the opp to about 60 points (10 goals) and generally we had achieved that. He wasn't at all happy that the Crows kicked 90+ pts. I can't remember his comments but sensed it was like an insult to their professionalism. No surprise the defence came back with a vengeance this week. Yes, Roos would be very proud: stingy defences win premierships. And we are becoming one of the stingiest defences in the game. In other threads folks talk about 'run away' wins. But they come at a cost - more attacking by us gives ops more chances to intercept then attack themselves and score. Any win will do me and I'd rather a stingy defence than a big win where the opps break down or break thru our defences..

@Wells 11and @Lord Nev I've heard her say the 'tanking' saga was as bad as the Ess drug sage. I was angry but it passed. For some reason the 'tanking' hit a nerve with her and it has clouded her judgement about those events. I don't warm to her as a person but on the whole I find her articles well researched and reasonable. She is one of the best non-football calling reporters in the industry.

She gave Richmond (Hardwick and Gale) a serve this week saying the AFL is filthy with them for whitewashing the Bolton saga and complaining about Marvel and umpires. Bolton gets a $20,000 none of which is suspended. She said they are 'at war' with one another. Even said she wouldn't be surprised if they get 2 games at Marvel next year. I personally doubt that. The point is she can be critical of her own club and the AFL. She isn't as one sided as people make out.

At the moment I'm not a fan of moving a player out of his set position. But I think it is a matter of managing the risk. I like that idea of Hunt to the wing, mainly because he has been running along side Langdon all year from the backline so he knows Langdon's positioning and moves and could more easily slot into the role than someone who hasn't played a game for a few weeks and not familiar/practiced in our ball movement from the back half. Brisbane isn't brimming with small forwards so bringing in someone to replace Hunt in the back line is the lower risk option. Less risky than replacing Langdon with someone not in the team. I think Jones is too slow for the wing. Could be a candidate for the Hunt role if he is moved. Other candidates for Hunt role: Lockhart, Sparrow, Bowey if they want to give him a taste of AFL.

Its unfortunate for Brown there is no VFL this week to impress. Not sure he has done enough to force Weideman out. The club is still experimenting with its 3 tall forwards. Brown will get another go just don't think it should be now.

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Seriously? Our jumper is nearly all red and theirs is a mid range blue. This is the start of the Sir Doug Nicholls round - doesn't make sense to not wear it - no clash whatsoever!

Won't we be wearing our indigenous jumper, this week?

Update for Alex Neal Bullen's two year contract extension. Given how well Hibberd is playing he would be good for another 1 year contract. Goodwin is pretty confident Weideman will stay with the club. Well done to the contracting team for signing up so many OOC players early in the season and for bringing forward other contract renewals.

I think we will come out determined tonight. They blew it last week and they knew it. Last week I felt we didn't bring our 'game face' of earlier games when goals were taken in their stride with little fanfare/celebration and quickly ready for the next play. Handballs were targetted and purposeful. Last week I saw the 'hollywood hand ball' come back. Early goals received more than their usual backslapping/laughing. They celebrated hard after Clarry's last goal thinking the game was won so forgot to defend a very good lead. Tonight I want to see that steely 'game face' again. The one which says: we are here to be serious.

The media didn't name the Bulldogs 'staff member' who was at an exposure site. Appropriate that the same respect be shown to our club.

Gettable? Depends what happens when Dylan Shiel returns. Parish has excelled since Shiel was injured. Had he not been injured and Parish given a chance to play in his best position, I would say he was definitely gettable. Now, I doubt they will let him go. He has quickly become a well rounded midfielder, kicking goals. Shiel is 28, still young but probably not there for their next tilt at a flag (may that be decades away) so Ess may trade him out while he has good currency and continue their rebuild from the draft. If Shiel goes back to his midfield position and Parish is relegated back to a flank he could be gettable. I'm guessing Parish will sign with Ess for 2 years at which time he will be a RFA.

An outstanding article on how we changed over the preseason. Players went to Stafford's farm on the Mornington Penisula with no other coaches. The rest flowed from there with some big changes and little changes. It has been an all club effort. Far too many positive descriptions in the article to list. Special mentions were for Gawn, Viney, Petracca, Goodwin, Williams, Yze and the Board (for quietly changing the president). My take is that everyone has bought in and the whole club is now on the same page. Have we ever had that 'luxury'? This may not be the year of The Demons but I am confident we will be in contention for a lot of years to come. Premierships are incredibly difficult to win. If we there abouts for the next 5 years, playing prelim and grand finals I will be fairly happy. Get a flag or two and I will be ecstatic!

In an ideal world he would be rested, if my hunch is correct, that he is playing with an injury. However, lots of players go on the field carrying an injury: our own Salem for a number of weeks, Cripps, Neale, Max last year etc. They take pain killers and get injections. It seems to happen often, especially if the view is "playing doesn't make an injury worse"; an approach I don't particularly like as resting will, as you say, be good for recovery.

If people are looking at Melksham's stats last week they are looking in the wrong place. 10 d, 9 k and 4 m doesn't look great until they realise he played only 54% game time: barely played 2 quarters. I think he is carrying a foot injury perhaps connected to he one which kept him out for a while several years ago. Last week he enabled two goals in the first quarter with pin point passes, to keep us close to Adelaide. He barely played after the 1st quarter. He was far from our worst vs the crows - not even in the bottom 6 given his low game time. I'm not a Melksham but I can see that he plays a valuable role most weeks.

I misread the AFL site. A medi sub hasn't been nominated for this week.

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In: Salem Out: Jetta No surprise

Teams announced in about 30 minutes. Andy @Demonland will need to get the 'Teams' thread ready.

Liquour stores are an essential service, od so no excuse for not replacing that single malt Hang in there buddy.

Agreed. I was referencing to the poster's comment on success of other recent lockdowns with restrictions promptly lifted, implying the same will happen this time. This time is different. I'm sure the government didn't announce a longer lockdown to not upset everyone. This time we all need to get used to being locked up again for at least a few weeks.