Lucifers Hero

Still no article on club website to announce his 100th milestone. Feel he deserves the recognition especially for the season he has had.

Longmire's strategy was simple: defend when playing against the wind (flood the d50, force fwds wide) and attack when with the wind. Its a typical strategy for any windy day/oval not necessarily Gazaly. We have played in Hobart enough to know that is a basic strategy. While its true we hadn't been able to train on the oval beforehand, a bit of googling would highlight it was going to be windy. Certainly knowing the conditions beforehand may have helped our goal kicking but it looked like we didn't have a 'windy day' strategy re when to defend/attack and paid the price by letting Syd get 5 unanswered goals in the 2nd qtr when they had the wind.

Don't listen to the coodabeens video then od. And don't listen to any coach or player interviews. I'll just say that the 'L' word grates on me too.

Learnings, even if we're losing. Learning is what we play for. Learning to handball, learning to kick straight. Like at auskick we're learning... That is so painful to listen to. We know other fans see us as 'losers' and media just make 'noise' but gee that cut pretty close to the bone. Someone should make Goodwin listen to it to realise how empty and trite his press conf are. No-one is fooled by his 'learnings' narrative; it is long past its used by date.

True, but I didn't get the impression there is much action behind the words. I heard no words or actions that showed a will to win. I shook my head when he kept saying we 'understand' what happened in the Sydney game. There was no reference that we have taken corrective action (he doesn't need to say what it is). Sure he said we have 'planned for' the Freo game; words which scare me given that so many times this year he or senior players have said those words after the game then excused the loss with words like 'the opp played differently to what we expected or we didn't adjust etc'. Great planning, not! Words are just words and tbh I don't want to hear the same hollow words anymore.

That is the impression I had from Goodwin's interview yesterday and from the selections. Worrying.

Anyone else get the impression from Goodwin yesterday that the club doesn't think it will play finals? Three things I noticed: 1. He started talking of the condensed fixture, travel, Alice, late arrival at Gazaly and conditions. It was like excuses are in the pipeline. 2. When asked about focusing at this intense time he talked about the opportunity for the club to grow, to develop, to continue to evolve, to be consistent and that is our aim. Lots of teams vying for finals and we want to use it as an opportunity to get better. No sense of expectation to play in finals. Hardly filled me with confidence. 3. When asked about the list he talked 'this year is about building ourselves up' and play in some games that will define us 'whether we play finals or not' 4. Selections. Have very little confidence in a win tonight.

The changes look ok on paper. Other than Sam I doubt if the rest of the fwds have kicked many more than a dozen goals between them. Neal-Bullen, Weideman, vandenBerg, Pickett, Fritsch, Melksham, Bedford, Preuss?? That is not an AFL fwd line. It isn't even a VFL fwd line. I know they may not line up that way but other than Petracca our mids don't kick goals either. Its good to see some speed but who is going to kick the goals.

Great post. Agree on every point. I looked on in awe at how Geelong were managing their players while watching us [censored] f.l.o.g ours. That most of our players are young and not yet 'AFL game hardened' was reason enough to manage their games/time. The number of our best/core players (all 4 top defenders, Weideman, Langdon, Gawn and various midfielders) playing over 90% game time in frequent games with little recovery time is gobbsmacking. Its no wonder we couldn't stick tackles vs Swans. iirc, in July Burgess said he had to calm the players and explain how they could cope with a condensed fixture and a 'no resting' policy. I feel the club has let them down and I wouldn't blame our players for being rather p....d off about it. I hope Goodwin and co don't ramp up the talk of condensed fixture, travel, conditions, arriving late at grounds etc etc. as excuses if we don't make finals. Such talk treats us like fools. We know they had a chance to manage it and didn't take it.

Doubt they will make top 4, Adam

We needed to rotate/rest only one player per game to keep our best dozen fresh. If the club thinks we didn't have enough cover to do that, then I give up. We have a fit and healthy list and cover is what the players 15 to 30 are there for. Instead we rotated player 15 to 22. Go figure. We didn't protect our best players and now, those little ole chickens have now come home to roost.

Ha, ha. I just opened a shiraz to prepare myself for team changes (and to cope with the extension of stage 4 restrictions virtually until late October ?)

A bit late in my book. I think it is the core players that should be rested. imv we should have rotated/rested sore players, midfielders and Weideman (who has been bashed around for a while and is still not AFL conditioned having played about 30 games) during the first condensed fixture or at the beginning of this condensed fixture. Now we are in a catch-22 where we can't afford to rest core players because of injuries to others. Edit: As an aside, I was a bit disappointed in Goodwin talking about the tight fixture, Alice, travel and arriving at Gazaly same day. All may be correct but if we had rotated/rested players when we had the chance, then those things probably wouldn't have taken the toll they have. It sounded like he was laying the ground work for reasons excuses for not making finals. He was not at all convincing in his expectations of what we will achieve. Hope he does a more convincing job on the players.

If @Tough Kentis right about 9 changes and Goodwin mentioned 6 names there is at least 3 others to come in so Kozzie could well be one. Would be surprised if he wasn't. There could well be a few surprise outs.

When asked who is in the frame for selection this week those mentioned by Goodwin were: Baker, Hibberd, Jetta, Lockhart, Bedford, Preuss. Its anyone's guess who might come out other than Brayshaw, Harmes and Jones who are injured.

Your mail is usually quite good so don't doubt it. Will be good to see the likes of baker (and Jordan?) get a go...at last. We know of 3 forced changes but 6 unforced? Hardly a way to stabilise a team...?

Thanks. As much as I wish we would do something similar to Richmond I just don't think our coach and FD see the need so very much doubt it will happen.

Roos and his wife Tami had this going at the Dees. It fell by the wayside when they left. Individual players have recently talked about (Viney, Petracca) about their 'calming' pre game routines. I think we are very different than Richmond when it comes to 'midfulness'. They had a coach and FD led 'mindfulness' program for not only pre-game but also in-game techniques. We have players trying to find their own method. Chalk and cheese. That the Roos' program wasn't replaced when they left suggests that Goodwin and Mahoney aren't fans of a 'mindfulness' program and we are unlikely to do what Balme and Hardwick did.

Nothing on the club website yet. Anyone seen a tweet or fb post? Hope they don't forget! Its a shame border closures prevent this little guy from Tassie being their to watch the 100th as he was for Christian's 1st. petracca-looks-after-his-little-mate Hadn't played a game yet had time and care to share his opportunity with a great kid. No accolades sought. It was Lucas' dad that let the media know about Christian's befriending of his son.

No argument from me on that one OD. For several years I have said our Line Assistant coaches don't have the experience at AFL level or in the lines they are trying to coach. Like the senior coach they are learning on the job, so to speak. A club can afford one or two of those but not a complete coaching panel. And the FD person that hasn't changed that should have long ago is the GM, Football.

Sad isn't it. Roos' approach was to teach players the foundations in sequence: 2014 - defence, 2015 - contest, 2016 - attack. In 2017 and 2018 that was turned on its head to predominately 'contest' and 'attack' as shown in the 'numbers at the ball, ballistic, play on at all costs game plan' with an 'agressive zone' defence that regularly leaked goals 'out the back'. The 'defence' part had been relegated to a distant third. It got us to a prelim but the foundations were shaky. 2019 was a mess and best forgotten. Now in 2020 the coach is trying to re establish the 'defence' foundation. It works sometimes and not others. Hard to undo the programming of young players that were taught to attack at all costs. So when the pressure is on they revert to their 'basic' programming of ballistic paly. In the process of the new 'defence' players have forgotten how to 'contest'. Our defence is not yet up to scratch. We are 18th in tackles for a team having 'contested football' as its mantra!! We can attack in a 'ballistic' but not an effective way. God give me strength! The foundations are a bit all over the shop. Hopefully, one day we can find the balance of what Roos' started: defence, contest, attack.

All good, EO. Your comments on the topic were quite fair.

I'm reluctant to comment as culture is so complex. But here goes: I didn't refer to 'weak or 'soft, 'good' or 'untrustworthy' culture. I'm not sure culture can even be compartmentalised like that. My reference to Dusty/Connors/King wasn't about their behaviours per se, as you say people are basically decent and anyone can make mistakes. Using those examples was to highlight Rich and the AFL keeping dirty lanundry in-house and covering it up, downplaying an incident if it becomes public or if they have to, use a 'wet lettuce'. Connors was an exception. Notice Dusty didn't get the same treatment for the same behaviour. Stack is in the same boat as Connors; would senior players have been expelled for the finals series? The cultural message to players is 'if you get into strife its ok, we will whitewash it (unless your are an unimportant player and can be dispensed with). A 'good' culture would say: you get in strife you wear the consequences, regardless of who you are. Most clubs try and keep dirty laundry in house. I referred to Richmond because of the assumption that their recent on field success equates to 'good' culture. From the outside it seems to me that part of Richmond's culture (whitewashing dirty laundry) hasn't changed during their successful years.

Hardwick's offensive comments (to Longmire and Ox) and his player's antics this year suggests the culture has not changed: think Martin, Connors, King in the not too distant past. The success of 2017 to 2019 simply enabled them to keep their dirty laundry in the cupboard. Even then some became public: Martin and the chopsticks. Culture anywhere is notoriously difficult to change. It gets passed down from one group to the next. Its built into the folklore of a club. And often it becomes a 'self-fulfilling prophecy' be it good or bad. The cycle keeps repeating.

Yeah, good point. MFC has been pretty decent at delisting players early so they can be taken as 'Delisted Free Agents' (which cost the receiving club nothing but a list spot). Thinking about it a bit further, shrinking player lists may deter clubs from taking DFA's.