Game Day Round 9: Essendon v Freo Dokers, Marvel Stadium, Saturday 18/5/19, 7.25pm AEST

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ESSENDON BOMBERS

Deary me. What a farce.
Played like s**t, looked like s**t.
Delivery into the forward 50 may as well have been non-existent. High floating pot shots to a forward line without our best marking targets in Daniher and McKernan.
Sydney are not a good side. The fact that we played so horribly and still somehow ended up only losing by 5 points is an indictment on them.
With that said, we shouldn’t have lost. A disgraceful lack of knowledge of the rules from Swans captain Dane Rampe and the umpire afield SHOULD have won us the game after the siren, with Myers taking a shot from the goal line.
Alas, the umpire didn’t pay the free kick, which is completely against the very black and white rule which is set in the AFL’s own rule book.
Unbelievably, the AFL threw their support behind the umpire who made the extremely clear mistake, with even the CEO saying it was “good umpiring”. Allowing players to break the rule directly in front of you is good umpiring now?
Perplexingly, the league then came down hard on Rampe and slotted him with a fine. A fine in which he did... Nothing wrong. Even though he certainly did.
Fantasia injured again.
Smith out for months.
Gross.

SYDNEY CHEATS 11.11 77 def. ESSENDON BOMBERS 10.12 72

BEST: Hurley, Heppell, Merrett, McGrath, Hooker
GOALS: Fantasia 4, Parish 2, Bellchambers, Merrett, Stringer, McKenna
INJURIES: Hurley (Ankle), Fantasia (Quad), Smith (Knee), VelvetSledge (Heart)
REPORTS: Nil

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FREMANTLE DOCKERS

Freo will be pissed that they were unable to conquer the Tigers when they were ripe for the picking.
The Tigers lost two key players before half time, and were still able to hold off Freo in Perth.
At least Nat Fyfe was able to somehow escape penalty for his elbow to Tom Lynch’s head, further proving the point that the only way to avoid certain MRO scrutiny is to win a Brownlow.
Matera continues to be a polarizing figure, coming off 5 goal performances to only kick 1.3 last week.
Walters, Mundy, and Luke Ryan are all going to be a problem for us tonight.
Can’t wait for that spud Taberner to come out and kick 5 against us again.

FREMANTLE 12.14 86 def. by RICHMOND 17.9 111

BEST: Fyfe, Lobb, Walters, Mundy, Taberner, Ryan
GOALS: Fyfe 3, Switkowski, Hogan 2, Lobb, Taberner, Matera, Mundy, Colyer
INJURIES: Nil
REPORTS: Somehow Nil
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ESSENDON EMERGENCIES
Zac Clarke, Jayden Laverde, Jordan Ridley, Dylan Clarke

FREMANTLE EMERGENCIES
Ryan Nyhuis, Mitchell Crowden, Sean Darcy, Travis Colyer

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ESSENDON INS: Mark Baguley, Josh Begley, Joe Daniher, Dyle Longfark, Ben McNiece
ESSENDON OUTS: Orazio Fantasia (Quad), Devon Smith (Knee), David Myers, Brayden Ham, Zac Clarke (All Omitted)

FREMANTLE INS: Conor Blakely, Taylin Duman
FREMANTLE OUTS: Travis Colyer :'(, Ryan Nyhuis (Both Omitted)

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Wholesale changes after a garbage loss has a weird way of making us all feel better. Even if a lot of them don't make much sense, it looks as though the selection panel are actually DOING something. Play the kids, drop Myers, WHERE IS FRIDGE, it all works!

If there has been one thing we're almost all united on within the storied halls of this board, it's that Myers needed to be dropped to the magoos. His game last week was the quintessential David Myers experience. A lack of effort, getting to the wrong spots, becoming a liability in the midfield, and blocking players like Darcy Parish who actually go for the ball. Not to mention the fact that he didn't even torp the ball with his shot after the siren. I'm not mentioning the post issue here, because I give it plenty of air time a little later on. ****. Regardless, Myers has been dropped. Joining him is the perennial spud, Zac Clarke. Sure, we gave him a crack because he's tall and we need a back-up ruckman. As far as I'm aware, that's where his positive attributes on the field end. Numerous times throughout his handful of games in the red and black, he has handed the ball over, turned it to opposition, and would have lost almost every single contest he's been in. We're reaching Ty Zantuck levels of spud at this point, and we need to reign it in. Horrible, horrible performances. May not even be good enough for VFL. Also dropped. Brayden Ham didn't do much wrong, but he simply isn't big or developed enough to impact the contest just yet. Kid might still work out.

Just when we think last week's farcical AFL-fuelled gobshite couldn't get worse, Fantasia is injured. A quad. Multiple weeks out. Our most important player, arguably our best forward, goneski. Jesus, this sucks, couldn't get much wor- Oh HEY Smith has a new lesion in his knee which doesn't have a PCL for some reason! And now he's going to miss 6-8 weeks, or maybe even the season! Cool!

Crippling sarcasm aside, and there is some good news regarding who is coming IN to the side. Sure, Baguley is back, which no-one except for DERO wanted, but that was a foregone conclusion as soon as he went out last week. The big moustached All Australian Joe Daniher is back, and will be filling in for Bellchambers in the ruck. Hopefully he has another dominant game, even though he'll be on one of the game's most in-form defenders in Alex Pearce. Joining them in the team is the ever-committed defender in Ben McNiece, coming off some brilliant performances in the VFL, alongside everyone's favourite mid-season ring in, Dyle Longfark. After a long time in the AFL wilderness, he's been brought back in to moonwalk rings around Nat Fyfe and show him who the real powers are in this here midfield.
Special mention to Josh "Fridge" Begley, who is returning after a 387 day lay-off with a ruptured ACL and subsequent knee reconstruction. A powerful, strong, mid-sized forward with great goal sense and a brilliant shot at the big sticks, Begley may prove to be a stabilising element to an Essendon forward line which has about as much structure as a puddle of puke.

Regrettably, Ross Lyon has seen fit to drop our old mate Travis Colyer, who was traded to Fremantle from Essendon at the end of 2018. This is super annoying, because he's such a nice guy, and I also wrote a big paragraph about him for the Key Players bit just below this and that's a pain in the arse. Also Ryan Nyhuis was dropped. Or something.
Returning to the Freo side is the experienced Connor Blakely, and perhaps the worst name in the league, Taylin Duman. It's like his parents couldn't decide between Taylor and Jayden, and just mashed them together. Why?
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ESSENDON BOMBERS – #9 – DYLAN SHIEL

Another week, another slather of stories about the star recruit, Dylan Shiel. Heavily tagged and shut out of the game last week, Shiel had little impact on the Sydney match-up, though still somehow ended up in the papers. On Wednesday, numerous articles popped up debating whether or not Shiel would be regretting his choice to move to Essendon opposed to Carlton, a team with one win all season. Slow news day? It would seem so. Dylan’s choice to move to the Bombers was not about immediate success. He can see the potential that the club has around its list, and has said this plenty of times now. The core group of players are easily good enough to win a flag, but premierships aren’t won by just having good players on every line. Unless you’re Manchester City. It’s about teamwork and gelling as a unit. Dylan knows this better than anyone. There is not just one star in our midfield, there are a few of them now, and he’s contributing to that. While I guarantee that he’s irritated about our piss-poor start to the season, he would NOT be alone in that. Most players would be absolutely BLEEDING over these past few weeks. He has committed himself to the club 100%, and is a crucial part of it. One such other player who would be bleeding right now is...

ESSENDON BOMBERS – #18 – MICHAEL HURLEY

The best one-on-one defender in football, Hurley is, alongside Cale Hooker, one of the most pure Essendon people you could hope to have on your team. He loves the club, loves the fans, loves the players. He also loves the contest. One thing you can never take away from Hurls is the punishment he puts his body through to make an impact on the ground ball. This week, he will pop up against one of Freo’s tall forwards, which could end up being either Hogan, Taberner, or Rory Lobb when he heads down to rest from the ruck. You back Hurls in at almost any contest because of the ruthlessness he shows towards it every single time. A steadfast, pure footballer’s footballer, Hurls is one of the smartest players we have on our list and he is seriously underrated by a vast majority of the footy community.

FREMANTLE DOCKERS – #20 - MATT TABERNER

And then there’s this dopey twit that always manages to pull an insane, 5-goal performance straight out of his urethra, before doing sweet ****-all for the remainder of the season, or at least until he plays us again. Alongside elite company such as Steele Sidebottom, Marc Murphy, Gary Rohan, Tom Hawkins, Shane Edwards, Isaac Heenry and Jason Johannisen, Taberner is within a select few individuals who rip us several new orifices every single time they line up against the boys from Tullamarine. And it’s s**t, because he’s honestly just not that good for the remaining 51 weeks of the year.

FREMANTLE DOCKERS – #7 - NAT FYFE

Perhaps it's my victim complex rearing it's head after the garbage footy week we've had. Maybe it's a general dislike for the match review officer. Maybe it's Maybelline.

However you look at it, Fyfe should be considering himself extremely lucky to be playing this week. The old chestnut of "insufficient force" doesn't seem to hold up when it's a regular player in strife, but when old mate Fyfey clearly raises an elbow, and cleans up the opposition, all's fair. Play on. You've got a Brownlow, it's like a free pass.​


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It’s been coming for a while now, but the absolute state of the game right now is so far gone that people are walking away in droves.
Horrendous umpiring. So bad now, that it’s at the point where it has cost us two games this year.
Non-sensical match reviews. No suspensions for stars of the game, while lesser lights cop it.
The iron-fist ruling style is nothing new. Jackson, Demetriou, McLachlan, they all did it, but at least Jackson did it decently. The issue we have with the current ivory tower is that they all truly believe that they are best for the game, but are steadily proving themselves completely out of touch with the people which they are catering for; the footy fan.
The Dane Rampe incident on the weekend is nowhere near the first major ****-up of the season, but it’s the most pertinent right now. The simple non-decision, or lack of will for the umpire to pay the rule and follow the rule book, cost Essendon the game, and has set a very dangerous precedent. Apparently, now, umpires can interpret free kicks, even those in clear black and white. Think about the further mistakes though.
Umpires boss coming out after the horrenodus ANZAC Day umpire showing which cost us the match, justifying everything saying it was technically correct and good umpiring.
Then the AFL CEO coming out after last week’s ****-show, saying that it was good umpiring even though the call was technically incorrect.

What?

And then you have s**t like getting Birds of Tokyo to play ANZAC Day; something literally no-one asked for, and no-one wanted. A sacred day on the footy calendar, turned into an entertainment piece.
Getting a fraction of the Black Eyed Peas to perform last year’s Grand Final, when they haven’t been relevant in a decade. If you’re going to have entertainment, make it Australian. Hell, get Russell Robertson to sing. I don’t give a s**t. The consistent flirting of a Twilight Grand Final, when the players and fans consistently say they don’t want it.

There is far more to come on the way I currently feel regarding the administration and it’s golden throne right now, but for now, this week’s festering potato-left-under-the-sink-for-three-months nomination goes to the AFL and it’s self-important pissdickery.​


Round 1 Nominee: Dylan Buckley, GWS
Round 2 Nominee: Dan Hannebery, St Kilda
Round 3 Nominee: Steven May's Groin, Melbourne
Round 4 Nominee: Mitch Robinson’s Fortnite Obsession, Brisbane
Round 5 Nominee: Ben Brown's limp-dicked diving, lol Norf
Round 6 Nominee: Daniel Wells' glass body, Collingwood
Round 7 Nominee: The BigFooty Swear Filter
Round 8 Nominee: Sydney's Football Department (This one didn't end well)
Round 9 Nominee: The AFL
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Let me start with a hypothetical. Say you’re 16, and you’re working at your local McDonalds. It’s 9.55pm, and you finish at 10. It’s a Friday night and you’ve been slaving away in the hot kitchen for a solid near-four hours, and you’re stuffed. You just want to get out, put the L plates on the car, and drive home so you can enjoy your super cheap post-work feed that the boss sorts out for you after your shift. Then an order comes in through the Drive Through.

Two Big Macs, one McChicken meal, and 2 large chocolate sundaes.

Sweet, no problem. You wait for the grill team to get the burgers ready, and while that happens, you lose focus for a bit and make two small caramel sundaes. You take the food over to the drive through window and pass it to the obese woman inside with her two fat children with her playing some dumb game on their iPads, and she stops you. “Uhh I didn’t order the caramel sundaes”.
“Crap,” you think to yourself. “I’ve buggered that one up, that’s a pretty bad mistake, how embarrassing”. Then, out of nowhere, your boss pops up from over your shoulder and says “See, you said large chocolate sundaes but our employee here was really feeling the vibe of two small caramel sundaes, and realistically your order is up for interpretation as we see fit based on the situation”.

Now you see just how ******* stupid the AFL and it’s dimwit CEO look at this point in time.

Just like ordering a heart-attack in a bag at Maccas, where the order is RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU ON THE SCREEN, mistakes happen; but they are fixed right then and there. Immediately.
In the case of last Friday night, a rule was broken. It was called out twice. In front of two field umpires, two boundary umpires, and a goal umpire. Jake Stringer and Conor McKenna (a bloke who’s been in the country for a few years and before that didn’t know the rules of the game) called the Rampe post climb out immediately, and it wasn’t fixed. The umpire simply said “Down, down”, and let Myers continue his kick. If we go off the rule book that the AFL has implemented, then that was 100% the wrong decision. 90% of the AFL world acknowledges that the Rampe incident deserves a free kick at the goal square to Essendon, and the other 10% are Swans supporters with their heads in the sand. Good on Jimmy Bartel for bringing it up on the coverage, and good on Hamish McLachlan for reading the rule, as it appears in the rulebook, on live TV so everyone knows it.

From that point, it became a further ****show. With the whole AFL world condemning the action, acknowledging that Essendon should have won that game, albiet undeservedly, the onus was placed firmly on the league to comment on the mistake. So what do that do?

The boss comes out and says that it wasn’t a mistake. He makes some s**t up about it being a good “spur of the moment” decision, and ticked the umpire’s call off on radio. The boss, the CEO, is completely okay with players, a team CAPTAIN nonetheless, openly and brazenly breaking the rules, with his own officials letting him and his team off. There’s a word for that behaviour Gil. It’s cheating.

Openly, ignorantly, brazenly cheating. And once again, we are at the arse end of it.

Did the saga end there? No. And for some reason, this is the part where I actually feel for Dane Rampe and his stupid moustache.
The AFL, having publicly ticked off his dumbarse behaviour, pops up and slams him with a fine for climbing the post. The very thing that they’ve ticked off is the thing that they’re fining him for? I... What?!

However, with that said, they also have completely suspended the fine. So they’ve let him be a ****wit, let the umpire just let it go, ticked it all off and approved it in direct violation of their own rules, before publicly condemning him and fining him a solid amount of money before saying, “Don’t worry about paying it Dane. We’ve got this”.

There is no person alive who could make heads or ******* tails of this cluster****. You could revive Einstein, show him this series of events, and the poor prick would be so confused he’d wish he was back in the grave. And this is supposed to be the biggest and best game in the land? Christ. The A-League's administration is performing better than the AFLs at this point, and that is, 100%, a shocking indictment on the current crop of suits running the league.

How are we to believe that the people running the league have the game’s best interest at heart when they refuse to acknowlege simple mistakes, let alone work on fixing them? You can’t turn a blind eye to the frankly shocking performances from umpires this year and just hope people will stop noticing. Last week, the umpires practically handed the win to Collingwood over Carlton on a silver platter with triple, yes, TRIPLE the free kicks that Carlton were awarded. This is the second time that the flogs from the Holden Centre have been kissed on the dick by the men in green in the space of a month. You know it’s bad if I support Carlton on the topic, because **** Carlton.

And THEN, you have the Match Review Officer with Gil’s hand so far up his sphincter he could flick his tonsils. Two separate occassions in two weeks where Gary Ablett, for all his positive attributes, raises a full blown elbow to the head of an opponent, far off the ball, and is let off. Two weeks straight. Nat Fyfe lines up Tom Lynch, raises the elbow, and cannons it directly into the big Tiger’s head. Let off. Nothing to see here. Meanwhile, young Norfie Sam Durdin bumps as per the rules of the game, and as a complete accident, Gary Rohan gets knocked out. Suspended.
Give us a spell. I generally err on the side of dodging the “protected species” tags made popular on social media, but there is some serious weight to them now. If you bring people to the game, and sell tickets to line the AFL’s accounts, then you could almost commit murder and you wouldn’t have a single consequence.
At this stage, it seems as though the AFL can do no wrong. Any mistake made by the higher-ups or the officials is greeted with immediate approval from the ivory tower of AFL house, and leaves the rest of us scratching our heads.
The league is in trouble, and the season of 2019 is proving to be a defining moment for a lot of people who once loved the game. With the current mob in charge, the game is being driven into the ground for entertainment value. The cost?

The passion and love we once had for the sport.

But hey, Gil, passion and love for the game doesn’t put money in the bank, does it?

-VS

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ROUND 18, 2018
Marvel Stadium
21/7/2018

ESSENDON BOMBERS 13.21 99
def.
FREMANTLE DOCKERS 11.4 70

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ESSENDON BEST: Merrett, Fantasia, Zaharakis, Heppell, Goddard
ESSENDON GOALS: Fantasia 5, Brown 3, Smith 2, Myers, Zaharakis, Baguley

FREMANTLE BEST: Neale, Banfield, Wilson, Walters
FREMANTLE GOALS: Walters 3, Johnson 2, Mundy, Matera, Neale, Sutcliffe, McCarthy, Cerra

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CHANGES SINCE THEN:

ESSENDON OUTS: Goddard, Smith, Dea, Fantasia, Myers, Brown, Colyer, McKernan
ESSENDON INS: Redman, Ambrose, McKenna, Begley, Shiel, Stringer, Francis, Daniher

FREMANTLE OUTS: Neale, Banfield, Johnson, Sheridan, Sutcliffe, Giro, Darcy McCrafty, Jones
FREMANTLE INS: Hogan, Taberner, Fyfe, Blakely, Lobb, Conca, Brayshaw, Switkowski

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MELBOURNE:
TV:
FOX Footy (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST)
RADIO: Maquarie Sports Radio, Triple M, ABC Grandstand
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

SYDNEY:
TV:
FOX Footy (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST)
RADIO: Macquarie Sports Radio
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

ADELAIDE:
TV:
FOX Footy (LIVE at 6.30pm ACST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 6.30pm ACST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 6.30pm ACST)
RADIO: Triple M, ABC Grandstand
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

PERTH:
TV:
7mate (LIVE at 5.00pm AWST), FOX Footy (LIVE at 5.00pm AWST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 5.00pm AWST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 5.00pm AWST)
RADIO: ABC, 6PR, Mix 94.5
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

BRISBANE:
TV:
FOX Sports 3 (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST)
RADIO: Macquarie Sports Radio
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

TASMANIA:
TV:
FOX Footy (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 7.00pm AEST)
RADIO: AFL Nation
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)

DARWIN:
TV:
FOX Footy (LIVE at 6.30pm AEST), FOXTEL Now (LIVE at 6.30pm AEST), Kayo Sports (LIVE at 6.30pm AEST)
RADIO: AFL Nation, ABC Grandstand
MOBILE: AFL Live Official App with LIVE Pass (Unmetered on Telstra Mobile Network)
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The Dockers couldn’t beat a depleted team last week on their own home turf, so what hope do they have against a depleted team in Melbourne?

Plenty.

Freo by 22.
 

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Would like for Worsfold to eyeball each player in the eye pre game and tell them "you don't perform tonight your spot will be in jeopardy for next week" time to become ruthless no more nice club.
Why? They know he wouldn't mean it.
 
Great write up as usual VS - loved the rant and agreed 100% with all you say. I am done with watching AFL games live. I find I notice the umpiring too much, instead of it being something that happens in the background. I get no joy from any of this, I miss supporting my team. **** the AFL.
 
Sep 2, 2008
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Essendon
Great write up as usual VS - loved the rant and agreed 100% with all you say. I am done with watching AFL games live. I find I notice the umpiring too much, instead of it being something that happens in the background. I get no joy from any of this, I miss supporting my team. **** the AFL.

Didn't go tonight maybe because I'm getting older but I cant be arsed going to every game anymore rather watch them at home.
 

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Dwayne Russell just called Ambrose... Langford?
That's what I heard too, I thought maybe I didn't see which player it was properly with the wide camera angle... :think:
 
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