Ted Lasso

JHF is totally screwing himself and Norf with the way he's behaving IMO, neither S.A club is going to offer big money for a kid having on field tantrums in his first year, and Norf are just not going to get much trade wise, they're likely going to be forced to hold him to his contract and hope things improve.

I was thinking this as well Darling probably isn't the personality we'd ideally love, but there is no doubt a fit Jack Darling is a step up from Brown or Weideman. If he came as steak knives in a deal that also included a really strong draft pick or picks, i think that's probably a reasonably good outcome for us.

I'm calling it early, Richmond are going to make a statement tonight. i have a feeling they're about to get on a bit of a run. Tigers by 36

Chuck it in a brown paper bag, and give it to Luke Jackson and Angus Brayshaw so they sign on

I think it was a few years back Max went down and we actually performed more strongly from clearance because we became less predictable. I think all of the players should embrace this, hopefully a few guys really get after hunting the ball and our form starts to turn, i think at times the players do just take the dominance Max has for granted a little bit

It's pretty tough to assess what Jacksons value would be beyond to say i think personally i'd want an established player and picks, i think losing Jackson, having that immediate impact would be beneficial rather than purely just draft picks, especially if he went to Fremantle where the picks are more likely to be in the teens

Geez it's obvious when these media commentators pull a story out of their behinds, Unsigned W.A player receives significant offer from W.A team, i mean come on. hopefully Dogga re-signs over the bye weekend just to make him look stupid

Worth noting that Gus as a half back is right up the pointy end of the league for Marks and intercept marks. He's really shown he's a bit of a unicorn player down there because he's so good in the air but also quite a good aggressive half back. I'm bloody glad not to be a coach because when you've got a guy of this quality in multiple positions it's a hard choice.

To me it does make the most sense that a smaller Victorian team re-locate to Tasmania, ultimately it's a national competition and we have 3-4 excess Victorian teams that are in debt, heavily reliant on the AFL just to run and fairly irrelevant in terms of on field success. Going to Tasmania for one of these clubs has the clear potential to greatly improve one of these clubs in terms of financial standing and relevance, and i understand the history behind clubs and why they don't love the idea, but surely from a practical standpoint it's a pretty straight forward one.

For periods yes, i think Gus should play wing and rotate through the midfield. I think we really need to increase rotations through that area to keep players fresh. I also think we should look at Tracs forward/mid split, we might need him short term up front to give us a target

I think there is a mental component to it as well. last year we were hungry and keen to prove ourselves, this year i think we kinda know our best is the best and i am sure there are some individuals who are battling with maybe looking ahead a little bit too much. I reckon it's important to remember that none of these players have been in this situation before, being reigning premiers and looking like a fair chance to go back to back, it would be incredibly challenging to stay in the moment i reckon. So i think where we are is due to a whole lot of factors, but gotta hope that the form turns around fairly quickly so we can lock up that top 2 spot and get some more silverware.

I think we'll win another 5-6 games in the run home, return to form in a pretty serious way, finish top 4 and be in a pretty good spot to have a good crack at it. I am going to predict that Fremantle fall away slightly and we play the Cats in a qualifying final and the Lions in the big dance.

I would ask all posters who actually believe this team is unfit to go back and really look at last season. In the same block of games we lost to the Crows, Pies, Giants, Dogs and drew with the Hawks. we faced almost identical criticisms from the media in terms of our lack of run, suggestions we'd been found out and if we don't improve our scoring we can't win the premiership our form between rounds 10-19 last season was incredibly patchy, we didn't win more than 50% of games but from round 20 we significantly and suddenly improved and hit our best football right in time for finals, almost by design. This year i believe we're in exactly the same phase, the only difference is due to injury and unavailability our backline has been compromised the last 3 weeks and we've struggled to stop opposition momentum. With Steven May in the side i believe we'd have won at least 1 of those games. I almost guarantee this team will set themselves and really lift for the Lions game, but i strongly believe we are setting ourselves to play our best footy when it counts.

Personally i feel watching us play that we're lacking the dare with the ball that we had at our best, we're just going a little bit slow, sideways and doubting ourselves too often. I think we play our best when we attack and play on instinct and if we do turn it over we back ourselves to win it back. that's what turned around the grand final and won us the flag.

We had exactly the same problems at the same stage last year, i distinctly remember the same commentators saying we can't score, and we can't win the premiership unless we address it. I think there are a lot of reasons for it, but one of those in my opinion is because we've banked early wins we've gone about a process to try and ensure we peak at the right time, and that means both this season and last we've had a flat patch in the middle rounds after a win streak. we were never going to just win all 23 games and smack everyone in finals. but i am still very confident we will be there abouts and give ourselves a huge chance to go back to back.

It appears the Pies had some Intel on Max's injury and deliberately targeted it all day. I've decided to baselessly blame Jeremy Howe.

Out: Disco, M.Brown, Chandler In: May, Weideman, Bedford

Short answer is no, i'd say we're probably in the heaviest part of the phase now and we'll slowly release it over the next 2-3 weeks and look to be cherry ripe for the run home. I think honestly we've just had a few things go wrong on field at the same time as we've not quite been at our greatest physically, we've got a few players who i think are playing injured, a few who are pretty banged up and losing Steven May has absolutely killed us. I think we had a little bit of a blessed run with injury in 2021 and 2022 is a little bit closer to just what you'd expect, especially given we now have Selwyn Griffith in charge who has a very similar program in place to Burgo, but not identical and sometimes individuals respond differently to subtle changes in the conditioning program.

I couldn't disagree more. i'd suggest Luke Jackson would be one of the most valuable players in the competition trade wise, not just because he's already a premiership player and rising star winner, but his potential is almost endless. he's 20 and good enough to be a number 1 ruck in a top 4 side. Losing Jacko would really suck, but i have a level of confidence in the fact if he did leave we'd be compensated pretty well and Jason taylor and co would be able to use the early picks we'd likely get to really re-set us to stay near the top for a long period of time.

Collingwood supporters are a special breed of gross, honestly the Boo's you were hearing may have just been them trying to talk but their lack of education, teeth and hygiene in general does make it difficult for them I for one say we let them celebrate their June premiership they seem to think they've won

We are 100% loading. the last 3 games we've gotten into a dominant position and then run out of legs. Form, confidence, opposition tactics, our players being a little banged up in some cases are all factors, but there is no doubt in my mind our lack of run, energy and spark is due to a heavy loading phase. the same 3 rounds last year we went 1-2 and dropped off dramatically, with commentators saying we were shot.

I reckon teams are just taking LJ a bit more seriously these days and putting in more effort into stopping him. No clue if he will stay or go, but we will be fine either way. I'm sure the club has plans in place for either situation.

Can't wait to see the BS token punishment that comes of this and the story being very quickly swept under the rug.

I have been shocked at the development of this kid, don't be surprised if he really makes this spot his own. He's a very capable one on one defender but his reading of the play is very good and knows when to peel off. if he's come in for Adam Tommlinson it could really suggest it's going to be harder and harder for Tommo to gain a spot as a defender in this team

That's as strong a media performance from a player as you'll ever see, Raw, you can see he's hurt and dissapointed, but articulate, doesn't duck any questions, sets boundaries well. Such an impressive guy.