We dominated in the ruck with Pittonet and Xerri missing but couldnt take advantage in the clearance/stoppages, you add in the spud factor that Nth have especially down back with Corr, Pink and Comden and I felt we let the game slip away. Nth are quick just like Essendon are quick but they are not very good as they showed scraping by over Essendon in an error ridden game the previous week and play an error ridden game like we do. Its disappointing to lose to a poor team like Nth and to even be in the situation where we are hanging on, we really should have put them away properly and won comfortably as they were not playing well enough to win. I noticed the stats were fairly similar except in the marks inside 50 which were 14 -7 in favour of Nth and when I looked at the season stats I see Nth have had 58 marks inside 50 to our 31 in with both teams playing the four games. We either dont have the method to create marking opportunities for our forwards or we dont have the players capable of taking marks which might be explained with losing Charlie and to a lesser extent TDK. We cant expect to kick all our goals from stoppages or opposition errors like we saw today and id question if the players have already reverted back to the old bomb it long strategy. Also way to much fiddling with the ball, Hewett in particular goes back every time to take his kick and is way to slow to dispose of the ball. Ainsworth was serviceable working up the field more, Hayward was terrible and Florent showed us again why Cox had him in the twos. Newman did ok in his return match and was solid, Cowan defended well at times, Derksen had a tough first game....Duursma and Trembath are talented kids and he got a bit lost at times but he did some ok things as well. Boyd looked a bit rusty after such a long break but used the ball well and Id persist with him.... Kemp kicked 3 goals but I remain doubtful on his future as our Full Forward and I think its a position Id be recruiting for next trade/draft period. Harry played a typical Harry game, couple of goals, some marks further up the ground but never really influential enough to move the dial. Cripps, Hewett and Walsh were mediocre over all and I gave Cerra a pass seeing its his first game back and he probably needs another month of solid footy. Hollands boys had a good third quarter and Ollie tried hard all day, Elijah teased with some classy stuff but he has no defensive game and a couple of his contests were average especially one half hearted spoil in the last quarter and we cant afford that. The list needs major renovation and the captain and in particular the coach look defeated from those last shots of him on the boundary line and we need a catalyst of some sort to break the cycle of losses and team malaise. The Crows losing tonight vs Freo wont make it any easier next game and with Weitering missing with concussion its looking like being another very tough task.
"We are going to hit them extremely hard over the next two to three weeks," he said.
"We are going to hit them back to the Stone Age where they belong.
Trump has the answers and said we can buy his Oil or take care of our own destiny by sending our military to the Strait of Hormuz to sort out the Iranians???
Nth very undermanned in the ruck so Id expect it to be very different to last game with no ruckman of the quality of Gawn to deal with and you would presume Darling will have to ruck as a part timer. Im giving Cripps and his troops one more chance and tipping us to win as Nth even though they have won two games dont play a great brand and were nearly equally as horrible to watch as Essendon last game. I like our inclusions and i think we can rebound and hang on for a win more based on Nth being terrible than us being brilliant and Id expect a few of our more notable players like Harry, Cripps, Hewett and Smith to have good games. Walsh will probably get the heavy tag from OSullivan and Weitering might have his hands full with Larkey but Id expect our stoppage game with Pittonet controlling the ruck to prevail and propel us to victory.
When each kicked their 1st goal, the entire 17 other teammates on the ground ran to congratulate them and celebrate with them. Both times.
Shows there is still a good connection (at least in part) between them.
I just hope fans keep stuff like this in mind when the AFL Media start selling them on disunity and fractures, as it has already been tried earlier this season.
Fans are only interested in winning games and premierships, the players could be holding hands and singing Kumbaya every training session but unless it translates into wins they wont care and I doubt whether most of them believe anything coming out from behind the 4 walls of Ikon park anyway after being fed a diet of PR Spin over the years.
He was sort of cornered into it. If he didn’t he was leaving Australia rudderless and leaderless. As you say Lods, there’s not really a lot he can do and even less he can do right now.
Agree, Albo has been hammered in Parliament question time as has Chris Bowen who has been forced to update everyday on the amount of Servo closures in regional areas and the effect on farmers and future food supplies etc and its a bit of pre budget damage control too. Reality is there isnt anything that can be done and Trump controls the timeline...
Foregoing an “ev road levy” at this point in time is a strategic move to promote a new infrastructure, a time will come to introduce it but now is not the time. Now is to allow the market to pivot from dinosaur juice to electrons, unless you’re beholden to big oil lp… ?
Agree you cant bring in the road tax now with world events or cut the import exemption, you want those who can afford the change to EVs to still consider it and not be put off by any extra costs. Id also add I wouldnt count on that road tax going back into the road system either...
Drop won't kick in until tanks are re-filled. All petrol currently in the sevo tanks has full excise paid.
People whinge about how much excise there is and whine when the cut isn't big enough.
Next if some economists are right in that cutting excise will increase inflation, hence interest rates - what's the reaction?
Short term I don't see it increasing inflation as fuel will still be expensive and it's not like it will generate a spending spree because average folk will still be out of pocket.
I think EBs point is that the judgement before a ball was kicked in anger was premature expectations.
After 3 games last year our % was 83.3% After 3 games this year our % is 72.9%......and we were luckily enough to hold on and win one of them.
Based on form.....i'm taking last year.
I know its hard to compare, but youre putting words in people's mouths again. Your contention was we'd go backwards where most were saying we wont miss Charlie. Thing is, are we missing Charlie? How about tdk? Or jsos?
Thing is this is what the discussion was.
Not whether or not we'd magically improve. How far back do we slide? Id wager with Charlie in, we might have done a bit better, but tdk was going anyway, and jsos is a hard one to quantify as he only averaged 12 games a season. What if he had missed these ones?
The Melbourne loss might not be as bad as we think, theyve at least got the bones of a premiership side there and some bonafide stars. We have a vanilla team, and we play vanilla footy.
I thought we had an improved team list/ game plan and now we play vanilla footy? Welcome to the dark side....
The argument I heard over summer was the list is much better and better placed and that the new game plan would make us better. Im not sure it's premature, a few of us predicted what would happen. There seem to be this idea that every other team would go backwards and that our brilliant new recruits would change our fortune. Hope you didn't put any money the on the outcome..
I'd call judgement after three rounds in... premature 'expectations'. Both for the team and individuals. We have a long way to go. We started last year 0-4 We're already ahead of that. There's a bit to play out on, and maybe off the field.
We started bad last season but I think we look worse this season. To me we are at rock bottom and back to the dark old days..
Evans hasnt hit the form he had late last season and Haynes is at the backend of his career and looks like its going to be a tough year with injury for him. I think we are worse than last season, at rock bottom and lucky to have one win on the board.
Evans has only played one game Haynes hasn't played any. But that's not the point...the point is that at the same stage last year these two were basically written off as a waste of space, but by the end of the season they would have just about been in everyones best 23.
So criticism of the new additions to the side is arguably a bit premature. Let see how they settle.
The argument I heard over summer was the list is much better and better placed and that the new game plan would make us better. Im not sure it's premature, a few of us predicted what would happen. There seem to be this idea that every other team would go backwards and that our brilliant new recruits would change our fortune. Hope you didn't put any money on the outcome..
But just be a little careful with judging some of the new players at the moment. The chief whipping boys in that thread were Haynes and Evans.
Evans hasnt hit the form he had late last season and Haynes is at the backend of his career and looks like its going to be a tough year with injury for him. I think we are worse than last season, at rock bottom and lucky to have one win on the board.
Labor have backtracked after saying they wouldn't cut the fuel excise last week and have bowed to public pressure and have cut it in half which I think is a sensible move short term.
Limited list talent wise being coached by a man who is struggling with a modern game plan which is foreign to how he really wants the game played and looks like a deer in the headlights when the momentum changes and gets that paralysed look which all Carlton coaches of recent times get. Zero leadership from senior players, the captain looks like he has checked out and I also question our fitness.
The talent wasn't limited in the 1st quarter!!!
The first quarter wasnt as good as it looks, Melbourne made plenty of errors and served up the ball, the first ten minutes was rubbish from both teams. Do we want to live in denial or do we want to face reality that it was a low grade team we were playing and that we still have a poor system. The Richmond game was another horrible game of poor skills despite the bright start, there are about 4-5 teams in the comp who play the worst brand of non watchable football and we are one of them, we play another on Easter Friday. Id rather see a good brand/style of play than an early flurry of goals caused by Nths self inflicted errors, we need to have a good system to fall back on to create our own goals when the other team are not handing us easy goals and thats what we lack...
Agree...Hayward and Ainsworth are handy players but not matchwinners and Id like the latter to spend some more time onball but Chesser and Florent are very average imo and I can see why the Swans let Florent go after signing him to that long deal. Chesser isnt a great contested player and I dont see what the List Management team saw in his kicking either, I thought the real difference in the game showed when the kid Lindsay and Fritsch had the ball along with K.Pickett of course and their footskills just knifed through our defense, hit up players and the goalkicking of Fritsch was A grade.
Fritsch always plays well against us.
Had it been even all game and we lost I wouldve been disappointed but the next day I wouldve said well they still have some excellent premiership players so okay, i wouldve given them that out and sais Kemp is only back after a year off as is Elijah, H is getting used to being the lone tall fwd, new guys are finding their feet etc BUT being 42 pts up and capitulating?! Absolutely terrible.
We look a rudderless mess and even in the 1st quarter I thought it was Melbourne's poor skills and defensive efforts that helped us kick 6 goals rather than any type of brilliant method. As has been discussed at length in the media and on most forums once opposing teams even up the contest at the stoppages we start to fall away and when we have to chase and defend we get overwhelmed with the workrate required to keep up. Individually we have some decent players but as a team we dont look organised or willing to work for each other and we need someone like a Luke Hodge type who can get in players faces and demand more effort and accountability when it gets tough.
