Lucifers Hero

They will do what Crows did with Dangerfield. Say they will match and force Geelong to the negotiating table to get better than the AFL compo pick. No-one ever expected the Crows to go thru with the 'threat'. Ess will do it so they can play tough guy, beat their chests and show their members that they won't let him go cheaply. That is how they play the game. And if he did choose us Ess know we pay more than we want. And, I'm also not a fan of JD. He wants to leave the state.

He won't be on big $ so we can afford him. Being an RFA and technically no need to trade. As an RFA Ess will match whatever $ offer is made as likely will only get a 2nd rnd compo pick for him so will force a trade. So the problem as I see it is their tough line on trades. Last year they demanded a top 10 pick plus a player from Sydney (Heeney or the like) Sydney didn't bite and nothing happened. They will most likely demand Petracca or Oliver as part of a package. Anyone prepared to do that trade? Not me.

100% on all that. Re fwds: hard to do when we don't have a fwd coach or any coaches with fwd experience. Plapp, Stafford and Lewis all have a bit of the fwd coach role but some parts entirely missing from any portfolio. They are deliberate outcomes of last years review. No one responsible or accountable. Too many cooks in the kitchen!

I understand why the club boost defence and not tall fwd stocks at end of 2018 . They rolled the dice on Weideman and TMac but it did not work. No crime for trying. But knowing it didn't work they had the chance to fix the 'tall forward' problem (Jackson won't be a fix for several years) at end of 2019 and did not. To compound that they did not get a fwd coach as part of the coaching restructure so forward line and it and midfield connection is an afterthought and piecemeal attachments to other coaching roles (Plapp, Stafford, Lewis). Goodwin laments the problem of kicking a winnable score. He had a golden opportunity at end of 2019 to boost personnel; players and coaches and did not. I'd be very surprised if any other club has none of the following coaches: forward, ball movement, strategy. Nor do we have any with that experience as players or coaches elsewhere. imv that sits totally on Goodwin and Mahoney. No point them lamenting that we can't score effectively. Not sure why it is a surprise to them. They set it up that way on and off the field.

Clearly our GM Football and the Coach don't think so. They had the chance to fix it in last year's EOS review and did not. On a related note I understand why the club didn't boost the tall fwd stocks at end of 2018. They rolled the dice on Weideman and TMac but it did not work. No crime for trying. But knowing it didn't work they had the chance to fix the 'tall forward' problem (Jackson won't be a fix for several years) at end of 2019 and did not. Goodwin again laments the problem of kicking a winnable score. He had a golden opportunity at end of 2019 to boost personnel; players and coaches and did not. imv that sits totally on him and Mahoney.

Could be wrong, I believe swimming, surfing and golf are approved activities for players in hubs and if so players would be quite happy in Manly..

Ben Matthews is 'Stoppage and Contest' coach, Plapp is 'Midfield' coach. Not sure if Stafford has been cut. Ditto Lewis who was to be a part-time development/skills coach. No Fwd coach. What is worse no coach has forward player or coaching experience. Some say fwd coach is part of Plapp's responsibility. Our coaching structure makes it very obvious where the game emphasis lies: contest, stoppages, defence. Forward play is an afterthought and has been for years. The coaching structure suggests the only investment worthy of the fwd line is 'goal kicking'. And Goodwin laments our fwd efficiency and mid/fwd connection. Blind Freddy can see the paradox.

Don't understand why folks are complaining about the distance to travel to a full AFL sized oval just once per week. There aren't many AFL sized ovals in Sydney, especially in popular residential areas like Manly. I reckon the players prefer to stay in Manly and travel once per week than stay in/around Blacktown. They can swim, surf, golf in very nice surroundings. Hardly a hardship posting.

No. No. And, again No!

HS website has this headline: "Nine Demons won’t enter NSW hub". Can someone get behind the paywall to see who wasn't on the plane. Cheers,

NSW has closed the border to all Victorians effective midnight tomorrow night. Closed to all Melbournians midnight tonight. The AFL had planned to 'pause' the season after round 10 and bring Vic teams home. The season post round 10 is in serious jeopardy. And, if the club thinks it may need any of the players left behind it needs to get them and families out asap.

NSW has closed the border to all Victorians effective midnight tomorrow night. Closed to all Melbournians midnight tonight. The AFL had planned to 'pause' the season after round 10 and bring Vic teams home. The season post round 10 is in serious jeopardy.

Help me out here t-u. We knew by the end of 2019 that TMac and Weideman wasn't working and our fwd line was dysfunctional so I am baffled as to why we didn't fix it then. Recruiting Brown was a band-aid. Jackson could not possibly have an impact for a year or two. So no effective change to Tall Forwards to impact 2020. We did not recruit a Fwd Coach. Instead we hoped that extending Stafford's responsibilities to include 'goal kicking' and recruiting Lewis for skills development would solve the problems. They haven't. And to compound things further, we have no-one on our coaching panel that has ever played as or coached forwards. And now we are 'experimenting' with our fwd line set-up. Clutching at straws! My conclusion is that on and off the field our forward line 'solutions' have been piecemeal at best. So to hear Goodwin say efficiency i50 is poor and we lack fwd/mid connection/cohesion drives me mad. He is the architect of the above decisions. And going by his press conf yesterday he doesn't know how to fix the problems. Its like they are clutching at straws and some serious praying.

I hope Jetta and Jones are going. On every level it would be horrible leaving them behind. If they don't go it would be a terrible way to treat two much loved and loyal servants of our club. The AFL has not limited how many players can go. So I think that anyone who is not injured should go. There will be no scratch matches here so what are they expected to do back in Victoria. At least in Sydney they can keep learning and developing, especially the younger ones and New and Jonesy can mentor them. Even tho some have their cards marked we should do our best to keep developing them and give them some chance of getting to another club next year.

This may sound dramatic but I would let him explore his Free Agency rights. We would only get a 2nd round pick but importantly free up a huge chunk of salary cap which may help get us a KPF. I know a lot of people will shout me down but step back. If his name wasn't Viney would you not look to let him go elsewhere.

Not our worst but he was poor today; rarely read the flight of the ball correctly and made no second efforts. He is terrible below his knees and that is not knew. He cannot bend down which may be his past knee issue but today it looked like poor motivation.

Don't think so, DJ. NT gov would get free tickets as a key sponsor. All clubs have 3 game members so I doubt they are the reason our drop off is so bad: 22% on 2019 total.

During the game the other evening it was announced that the saints were within 1,000 members of their all time record. Carlton had 67,000 members in Feb, prior to covid being even heard of. 64,269 for total 2019. Our other membership contemporaries in North currently 4,000 down and Bulldogs currently 6,000 down are holding much better than us. Our membership is now where it was when Roos left. When the final figures come out in about a month we will be embarrassed at the fall off the membership cliff. And I will bet my bottom dollar that covid wasn't the primary cause.

We should win because right now Rich is worse than us and are distracted by hubs. But they will probably beat us with their usual strategies of: spreading quickly from the contest to get goals out the back because our mids/defenders take attacking positions and can't man-up of get back to goal square fast enough. an extra marking player in defence. Salutary to remember that in last year's ANZAC Eve game the Brownlow votes were 3. N.Vlastuin (RIC), 2. K.Lambert (RIC), 1. B.Houli (RIC) If either of those happen today and we don't have counter tactics ready then we have learnt nothing in the last 12 months.

Lever and T Mac also have babies born in the last six months. Others have young families with two or three pre-school kids. I would guess they will go for this round of games which will be for three weeks. They can then opt to come back and sit out the next round of hub games. And they have the option of taking their family with them. Or, if it all gets too hard for their family they can drop out of the hub at any time. Also, the AFL has flagged there will be a 'pause' at some stage when all Vic teams come home. Of course things change quickly so who knows. Edit: We fly out later today: clubs-begin-to-leave-victoria

This. One of the top 3 strategies op use to beat us. Rich were one of the teams that smugly pronounced: "Match them/let them win on the inside, beat them on the outside", before the game! And so it came to pass. Their players spread faster than us from the contest and had outside players so even when we won it there would be a turnover with fast movement into their fwd line and our attacking placed midfielders and defenders didn't have time to get back. I've not seen anything this year to say we have fixed this problem. Hopefully, tomorrow is the day.

You refer to which distressing possibility: covid-19 gets out of control in Victoria and shut down the country again? War in the South China Sea The Great Depression re-visted Ess wins the GF All the above

Each quarter being 6-8 minutes shorter is significant. Without tracking the stats, a lot of goals are scored during that traditional time-on when players tire, their concentration lapses and play opens up. Not saying there aren't other problems, just that this isn't a representative season so not sure too much action should be taken based on the low scores.

Did others notice the Ess fill in ruckman put out a straight arm to stop Grundy going for the ball at centre bouncers? Put him off balance a few times? Max was penalised for that many times in 2018, in particular vs Saints. I recall he trained with one arm tied down to stop himself. And while I'm on umpiring: since when has two handed scooping the ball not a free kick? Saw it a few times last night. Bulldogs have mastered the art.

Agreed. But they changed tack in the last quarter. Stopped bombing it in and started working the ball down the boundary with hand ball and short kicks which resulted in faster movement and Ess didn't have time to fall back. Buckley is a clever coach and knows when and what levers to pull. It nearly worked.