Lucifers Hero

lever-backs-star-teammate-to-push-through-and-face-lions Answers to above question: Lever played down fitness concerns over Charlie Spargo, who spent Friday night in hospital after a hit to the throat, and Bayley Fritsch, who played through a knee issue. Both players were only walking laps on Monday morning, with Fritsch's left knee strapped. Other fitness news: Lever was on a modified program and trained inside instead of with the main group, but Melbourne officials said he would be fit to face Brisbane. Petracca completed a light session with his teammates at Gosch's Paddock on Monday morning, albeit with a slight limp and with tape around his right calf. Lever: "I think he'll have a bit of a lighter week. But he'd have to tick off a fair few things". The defender was confident forward Tom McDonald could make an impact if called on, despite having just one VFL game to his name after a long-term foot injury. Melksham also had a knee issue. Add those to BB and Jackson's bandaged knees, Oliver's thumb and Max looking so so we seem to be a team of the 'walking wounded'.

From Bigfooty: All a bit ho hum, really. Looking forward to taking Melbourne out of the finals. We can’t pressure like Sydney is and we won’t get Melbourne so off. Plus we have no idea against Melbourne whatsoever Melbourne look very fragile, skittish even. Blueprint to beat melb is clearly shown by pies and swans this year. High pressure and switched on defensively as a whole team. Whether we are capable of producing that consistently across 4 qtrs is the big question No way we can play Mitch and mathieson on the G. Need runners on the G. Let’s see if we’ve learnt our lesson Playing smaller in the forward half critical I think Sydney just showed as well you need a **** tonne of pressure so Melbourne's wingers can't frolick away Melbourne lost all structure in their forward half tonight. It was beautiful to see. Bring on the Demons. We have nothing to lose. We lose, and it is what it is. Melbourne lose, and it's straight sets in a year they were meant to have their dynasty. Melbourne have been very beatable all year, it’s really only us that have made them look like invincible. Zorko to rip the Deamons hearts out by playing his best game for the year and totaly refusing to engage in the niggle. The only difference with the Dees is they defend, Tigers don’t. Only slight spanner in the works for us. One of my biggest observation was the Swans ability to stop the ball at the source. Constantly intercepting their handballs in close, not allowing the release kick. You need to be there to pressure them not necessarily with a tackle, but deny that first link in the chain. Swans did it all night. They didn't wait for Dees player to take possession. They literally crashed into them so there was no clean exit at all. Who would've thought. Melbourne struggle against teams applying pressure... FWIW they aren’t overly confident on Dees board. Because of the kerfuffle last game I reckon this is going to be a nasty game. If we are in the game at half time, I will back us in. They're too busy arguing about the % of Dees supporters in the crowd from last nighy Always, there have been soft kills everywhere last few years and we’ve missed every one of them. The fact that they've belted us every time is going to do their heads in if the game is competitive into the last quarter. My favourites: How am I supposed to concentrate at work all week? We have no smart small defender that can go with the skinny Melbourne bloke. Forgot his name. Kicked 6 in last years GF. He's going to chop us up.

Any update on Spargo's and Fritsch's injuries?

Wasn't the club's concern for Petracca the corky/contusion rather than the fracture? And it could be the former that caused him to be limping. If he doesn't play it is more likely to be the corky that keeps him out.

Agreed. Hence why I wouldn't be chasing a small forward. We have other list priorities.

Yes. Any other player even at 100% can be ignored by Brisbane.

Haven't seen red and blue out in the Bayside area. Must be waiting to see if we make or win the Prelim 🤔

De Goey to have scans for a shoulder injury. Unless it is mega serious I can't see them not playing him against Freo.

This attendance/noise discussion has been happening on DL nearly all year. I'm glad people can vent about the desired level of dees support at games. Maybe its time to give it and the dee fans that do their best, a rest.

For mine, Petracca plays: While in the midfield Oliver is less likely to be tagged. We need Harmes or Brayshaw to mind Neale Even parked in the goal square he is dangerous as his many snaps out of pack goals show. He is unselfish around goal and if he can't kick he will hand ball. Petracca will attract a midfielder or a defender when forward. Not playing him just makes Brisbane's life easier. I just can't see any player we bring in being better overall value than Petracca.

Doesn't rate them or doesn't rate them more than Kozzie, Spargo and Neal-Bullen? We are in agreement that there aren't small forwards out there. Which is why other teams have chased Chandler and are chasing Bedford. If there was more exposed form they could also be chasing Laurie. Maybe the club needs to ask Neal-Bullen to look at his trade options again. Harsh maybe but somehow we need to make room for players in the wings or lose them to other clubs.

For mine, Petracca plays: While in the midfield Oliver is less likely to be tagged. We need Harmes or Brayshaw to mind Neale Even parked in the goal square he is dangerous as his many snaps out of pack goals show. He is unselfish around goal and if he can't kick he will hand ball. Petracca will attract a midfielder or a defender when forward. Not playing him just makes Brisbane's life easier. I just can't see any player we bring in being better overall value than Petracca.

You don't rate Bedford, Lauire and Chandler? Not sure who is around that is better than at least one of them. Wondering who would a new 'pressure small' displace from our starting 22?

Fox is reporting that Ess has made a play for De Goey. Imagine the nightmare for a new coach of trying to manage him and another high maintenance 'bad boy' in Stringer. Ess sorely need a big bodied midfielder but they would be wise to adopt a NDH policy.

Sydney has always beaten us at post clearance possessions, especially at the G where there is room to take those possessions them move into space. It was far more obvious in the days we played 'bees to the honey pot' with numbers. Now we hold our positions better. But we still fall for it. In the words of recent jargon: 'we are being beaten by what we know'. But it is more than that. We back in our system. For good reason; it has worked well for us in the past and against lesser teams and lesser coaches. With a few exceptions I don't see many tactics to 'take away the opps strengths' until we have to make some moves, in game. Sydney however went in with a plan to take out our play makers: tagged Salem, sat a player on Langdon, put Mills on Oliver at stoppages and not sure what they did to Lever after quarter time to take him out of the game. Right there is the disruption of our defensive wall and disruption of our ball movement coming from our defensive half. The resulting pressure on the ball carrier forced us to over hand ball or pass into congestion resulting in turnovers. What was it 11 goals from turnovers (not sure how many we scored that way). Last time it was 7 goals from turnovers to our zip! That is their MO against us. Again I'm not sure why we were 'beaten by what we know'. If we play them in the GF we need to be a lot smarter. We can't just 'back in our system'; Sydney have shown multiple times they can dismantle it. And if we play Geelong in a PF we can't just back in our system as they have also learnt to dismantled it. Longmire and Scott are the two canniest coaches in the league. But, lets not be beaten by what we know.

In a way we have a de facto conference system where newbie teams play each other rather frequently than the better teams hardly at all. As a result, I wouldn't be surprised to see a newbie team or two in the finals. Just hope it isn't at the expense of a top team as happened in the 'conference' system year. Or worse keep a top team out of the top 4. Hopefully, the cream rises to the top.

Salem was tagged on Friday night by Ryan Clarke. Longmire did his homework on our playmakers and concocted a plan to minimise their impact. Often he used his less lights in these roles freeing his playmakers. Another example McInerney on Langdon and neither had a big impact, albeit Langdon was involved in a bit of the play.

I wonder what has happened to Freo this year. From PF to being beaten by WCE and thrashed by Geelong where they scored just one point for the whole game. Mentioning Geelong, I noticed they are on top then saw that we don't play them this year. Question: have we played them at all since they entered the competition in 2019? Even allowing for the 'conference' system, covid interruption and the fixture not pitting newbie teams vs established teams, it would be really weird if we haven't played them. I wonder if there are other teams (exlc this year's new teams) that we haven't played?

Anyone know how Charlie got the throat injury. Going to hospital with it sounds similar to the injury that Dangerfield got when Toby Green charged him and got several weeks suspension for it.

What makes you so confident of that; just asking?

Is there any vision of the incident? And of the incident where he got the corky/contusion Was it truly an accidental or was there an element of the Selwood 'accidental' kick to Oliver's hand about it. Buddy also whacked Petty which brought him to his knees for a while. It was a sniper 'drive-by' hit to the mid riff so not sure if he was winded or it hurt his ribs. It looks like if Buddy can't get a kick he will make his presence felt and hurt opp players. Possibly more damaging than on the scoreboard!

From Foxfooty: The Herald Sun reports both the Bombers and Kangaroos have the cash to lure 2021 Coleman medallist McKay from the Blues, who have a potential cap-squeeze in the coming years with plenty of young talent needing new contracts. McKay is due to become a free agent at the end of the 2023 season, as was teammate Charlie Curnow before he recommitted on a six-year deal ahead of Round 23. Carlton believe they will be able to convince McKay to stay - both on financial grounds, and because of how he feels about the club - but a massive rival offer could make things interesting I'd rather use the Jackson picks and $ to get McKay THIS YEAR in his pre FA year. If he goes as an FA next year and Carlton improve the best they will get is a mid teens compo pick. We took Steven May and Hawks took Brian Lake in their pre FA year. Forget Grundy. We need to fix our forward line, pronto! Get a lesser ruck support and McKay then Max can do what he does best: 6 x AA ruckman. Getting McKay this year would give us a much better balanced team. Let's not wait!

Accidentally put this in the Game Plan thread. No idea how I got there as I almost never read it. There is a stark difference between rnd 23 vs Lions and last night. In rnd 23 we switched play and centered the ball deep i50. The result was we kicked a high score and were accurate. Reverting to the kick-down-the-line, into- the-pocket didn't look deliberate. It was partly Sydney forcing us to play that way and partly when under pressure players/teams revert to habit. We went back to what was most familiar. It is a miracle Fritsch kicked any goals let alone 3. When we got possession up the ground he was literally sandwiched between two Sydney players. Fritsch's opponent would walk him into a the back of another Sydney player who was pretending to causally walk backwards and they sandwiched him. Even when they separated the front player still stopped Fritsch getting to space. That plus Max and BB not having anywhere to lead left us going to the pockets where the ball came to ground and our lack of pressure allowed Syd to move the ball out. All that aside, what surprised me that we started the last qtr 2 goals down in a low scoring match. Why oh why did we not switch to an attacking game? There was no way we were going to beat Sydney playing our defensive/contested game from 2 goals down. Attack was the only way to win. Take some risks; play the corridor. Hell we may as well lose my 6 goals as 1 point but at least give us some chances.

The noise for the two 2018 finals at the G was out of this world. We roared goals much much more loudly than last night. No logical reason why the difference. It took Sydney fans a long time to get going. Once they hit the lead they didn't stop but until then it was fairly quiet all round. Maybe covid flattened spirits in more ways than we realise.

To me this is the key to getting the crowd roaring be it a large or small crowd. When Hunt, Langford, Rivers, Harmes take a run down the wing, get a handball chain going or Kozzie chases/gets a player or the ball then every time one of them goes near the ball the crowd roars in anticipation. That anticipation gathers a life of its own and the crowd roars at less exciting things so the noise becomes fairly constant. Those little moments to excite were few and far between last night. It was a dour game and the crowd responded accordingly.