Autopsy Dogs get the job done for Bonty's 200th

[ScragCity]

Mitchell's presser was interesting. Said something along the lines of "If you think about how you expect the Dogs to beat you, it looks like them beating you up in the contest, winning stoppage, Bont dominating and English dominating.

Well we won contested possession, won at clearance, Bont's impact was limited (although hes still incredible and still had an impact) and English was beaten pretty convincingly in the ruck (again, star player and still found a way to impact the game)."

The point was that the Hawks pretty successfully took away our biggest strengths but we still found a way to win. Historically we would have lost that game. I can't remember the last time we got belted in centre bounce that bad and won, if it ever happened.

 

[Philthy1]

Mitchell's presser was interesting. Said something along the lines of "If you think about how you expect the Dogs to beat you, it looks like them beating you up in the contest, winning stoppage, Bont dominating and English dominating.

Well we won contested possession, won at clearance, Bont's impact was limited (although hes still incredible and still had an impact) and English was beaten pretty convincingly in the ruck (again, star player and still found a way to impact the game)."

The point was that the Hawks pretty successfully took away our biggest strengths but we still found a way to win. Historically we would have lost that game. I can't remember the last time we got belted in centre bounce that bad and won, if it ever happened.

If we can get a bit more out of our bottom 6 players (McNeil, Scott etc), Duryea finds some form, A Jones continues to progress, and Weightman can close the gap between his best and worst, we are back on track.

 

[ScragCity]

If we can get a bit more out of our bottom 6 players (McNeil, Scott etc), Duryea finds some form, A Jones continues to progress, and Weightman can close the gap between his best and worst, we are back on track.

McSteal is giving us plenty. Two handball intercepts that lead directly to goals yesterday. That's what he's in the team to do.

 

[Substance]

Our 2 best players played their 7th best game of the year, and we didn't have our 3rd best player. Hawks also had their best side in for the year. From that perspective a 5 goal win was decent enough.

 

[Libbaaaa]

Feel like Cody just needs to be told to play a traditional small forward role, tackle and put pressure on rather than try be a mini Naughton. He can do it.

 

[dogwatch]

I find the attitude of supporters of the ‘big clubs’ an interesting case study. When they’re not going well there’s a natural tendency to look for comfort in historical cliches and rhetoric around previously unsuccessful and struggling clubs. It’s a mindset of ‘well we’re ordinary but we still own a natural position in the power hierarchy above Footscray irrespective of how bad we are’. As time has gone on and we’ve elevated ourselves above the historical struggles and had the shackles released, there’s an almost desperate reaction from your Essendon, Hawthorn, Carlton, Richmond fans to cling onto the past. You see it in the regular attacks. ‘The Dogs get more free kicks’. ‘The Dogs throw it’. ‘The Dogs were gifted their flag’. Absolute garbage. You then see supporters like The Dees and St Kilda who win a few games and feel they need to try and put distance between themselves and the ‘historical Dogs’. Sorry for the long rant but I really do find the whole thing quite fascinating from a human perspective.

A worthy topic for a thread of its own.

We are guilty of similar behaviour at times. Maybe having been so close to extinction in 1989 and 1995 we have an instinctive "devil takes the hindmost" mentality but I often see comments here about North should be banished to Tassy, or denigrating comments about GWS's supposed lack of fans (wishful thinking?) etc. By rights the clubs with fewer members like WB, North, StKilda and maybe Melbourne ought to be offering solidarity to each other. Probably too much to expect that from the fans though. It's a tribal sport after all.

As for the supporters of the big clubs, they are only just realising that the AFL era (for all its other shortcomings) has provided much more of a level playing field since the turn of the century. Old Establishment Money and OB connections can no longer guarantee permanent residence at the top end of the ladder. That may be a bit hard for them to digest. That stuff still has some influence but all of the equalisation measures of the last 35 years (though still imperfect) have made a pronounced difference to the league. We should be grateful for that because we would no longer exist otherwise.

 

[doggies ftw]

Hawks turn around in the clearances has been really intriguing, they were 18th last year. Traded out Mitchell & O’Meara and have jumped to outright first.

It’s not helping them win footy at the moment but that forward line is just a genuine shambles (especially with no Lewis) but they’re going to be a real handful when they fix that up.

They play a great brand of footy right now, dominate in the middle and slingshot from halfback. It’s how I want us to play to be honest, If Mitchell had our list playing that style we’d be the best team in the comp by a fair margin

 

[Hobdog]

A worthy topic for a thread of its own.

We are guilty of similar behaviour at times. Maybe having been so close to extinction in 1989 and 1995 we have an instinctive "devil takes the hindmost" mentality but I often see comments here about North should be banished to Tassy, or denigrating comments about GWS's supposed lack of fans (wishful thinking?) etc. By rights the clubs with fewer members like WB, North, StKilda and maybe Melbourne ought to be offering solidarity to each other. Probably too much to expect that from the fans though. It's a tribal sport after all.

As for the supporters of the big clubs, they are only just realising that the AFL era (for all its other shortcomings) has provided much more of a level playing field since the turn of the century. Old Establishment Money and OB connections can no longer guarantee permanent residence at the top end of the ladder. That may be a bit hard for them to digest. That stuff still has some influence but all of the equalisation measures of the last 35 years (though still imperfect) have made a pronounced difference to the league. We should be grateful for that because we would no longer exist otherwise.

Some really good points. I’d agree that we are definitely guilty of sone of that behaviour. I think we’ve been pretty level headed overall with our attitudes towards other smaller clubs. Contrast that to the arrogance of Melbourne fans who seldom bothered to turn up prior to 2021.


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[Pugz89]

Keep in mind the $40 million is from the sale of gaming machine assets, not per year. The Hawks no longer hold pokies on their books.

We also had a significant cash injection when we sold our previously held pokies licenses so it’s not fair to specifically criticise them when they’ve exited the industry like our club.

But we used the funds from the sale to put towards our VUWO works, it seems Hawks are expecting their new premises to be full funded by other entities..?

 

[gangsta deluxe]

Mitchell's presser was interesting. Said something along the lines of "If you think about how you expect the Dogs to beat you, it looks like them beating you up in the contest, winning stoppage, Bont dominating and English dominating.

Well we won contested possession, won at clearance, Bont's impact was limited (although hes still incredible and still had an impact) and English was beaten pretty convincingly in the ruck (again, star player and still found a way to impact the game)."

The point was that the Hawks pretty successfully took away our biggest strengths but we still found a way to win. Historically we would have lost that game. I can't remember the last time we got belted in centre bounce that bad and won, if it ever happened.

The problem is that hawthorn are terrible.

 

[BallaratBulldog]

The problem is that hawthorn are terrible.

They are not playing as bad as you think of late.

 

[Dazb86]

I find the attitude of supporters of the ‘big clubs’ an interesting case study. When they’re not going well there’s a natural tendency to look for comfort in historical cliches and rhetoric around previously unsuccessful and struggling clubs. It’s a mindset of ‘well we’re ordinary but we still own a natural position in the power hierarchy above Footscray irrespective of how bad we are’. As time has gone on and we’ve elevated ourselves above the historical struggles and had the shackles released, there’s an almost desperate reaction from your Essendon, Hawthorn, Carlton, Richmond fans to cling onto the past. You see it in the regular attacks. ‘The Dogs get more free kicks’. ‘The Dogs throw it’. ‘The Dogs were gifted their flag’. Absolute garbage. You then see supporters like The Dees and St Kilda who win a few games and feel they need to try and put distance between themselves and the ‘historical Dogs’. Sorry for the long rant but I really do find the whole thing quite fascinating from a human perspective.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

I watched the game on kayo to try to find what all the sooking about frees was about.

It was 2 missed free kicks at the start of the 3rd quarter. That was enough to say the game was rigged

 

[maddog37]

I don't understand how we can pay for Gold Reserve seats and be surrounded by mouthy, obnoxious Hawks supporters at our home game!?! Just about ruined the night for me. I'm going to write to the club and let them know that if I want to sit in the Hawthorn Cheer Squad I don't have to pay many hundreds a year per seat.

Other than that....brilliant to win for our captain.

I must agree here. You look at the back of the stands from row P onwards and it’s all bulldog supporters looking down on a heap of Hawks fans closer to the front seats.

It’s the same when we play any of the MCG tenants at Marvel. Something stinks here and we are getting dudded.

It really detracts from the enjoyment of the game and has me questioning the value of a gold membership.

 

[Mutt]

Where is your seat?

2nd level Bay 31.

 

[Mutt]

Bont and English were down on their output for the year - and let's be honest in large part of our season so far was their contribution (we would have lost by 3 or 4 more goal to the Saints if it wasn't for English!) so even though the final margin was probably a goal or two less than what we would have hoped for pre-game, in some ways the other 20 players other than English and Bont actually exceeded expectations.

Which happens when a team that dominated the stoppages and contested ball actually loses it.

The forward line played well with Naughton playing an excellent game and we've become accostimed to it that it's almost blase. His ability to add more tricks to the marking-only player he was 2019-20ish shows great self-investment to develop and improve his game.

Not quite thinking Jones is a gun in defence like others but he was very good and I think O'Brien and Keath cop a lot of stick, especially as they both were exposed by the fact we kept losing it out of the middle in the 1st half (every key defender looks bad when they can keep pumping it in). We equalise the stoppage game in the 2nd half and all of our sudden our key defensive unit can shut the game down when they can actually defend the full length of the ground.

Williams is good when he uses his size on the wing to get free, and is confident to kick long now that we have three big targets and two proper small forwards down there. Always hard to back up from last week but he's the type of player who always plays well the more simple he keeps his game.

And strangely, one of the worst games I have seen Macrae for a while. He didn't make any out and out clangers, so it has sort of gone unnoticed, but he accumulate a bunch of poor little decisions consistently throughout the game - shallow entries I50 when the deeper one was better, handballs to players in no less of pressure than he was, kicking long when they had an extra tall in the pack so he had to switch it etc. Not sure what was up with Macrae but it's clear through 7 games he's no longer the three-season All Australian midfielder he once was and if we want to go deep in finals he has to find it, surely.

Macrae seemed to win a heap of contested ball though. I thought he really stood up for the Captain last night.

 

[Hobdog]

I watched the game on kayo to try to find what all the sooking about frees was about.

It was 2 missed free kicks at the start of the 3rd quarter. That was enough to say the game was rigged

Why am I not surprised! It’s never backed up with facts or pragmatism.


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[1961grandfinal]

Just putting it out there, Bont obviously was a bit quieter yesterday and maybe it's a mixture of the high standard he sets himself, the occasion and honestly how good Hawthorn were in the middle, but the fact that we didn't have Libba, had Bont play the game that he did and still won by 5 goals was pleasing.

In the first half, he was like a man among boys. Never seen such dominance when he got the ball in hand, his skills and movement were so far above the rest of the team, heres to another 200.

 

[glenashley]

We just don't have a history of thrashing teams (maybe once a year we do it)?

Compared to Dee's and cats (cats only won 3 games but by an average of 73 points!)

% is so important and can be worth a few ladder spots at the pointy end (or effectively another win).

 

[dergert]

2nd level Bay 31.

I'm actually thinking of upgrading my level 3 seat. It's far too crammed up there

 

[Mutt]

I'm actually thinking of upgrading my level 3 seat. It's far too crammed up there

Level 2 is awesome - still close to the action but just elevated enough that you can see the play unfold.

 

[dergert]

Once we fix our midfield and forward entries (same tune for 20 years now) we will have a sniff this year.

Confident we have the back 6 working well. JJ's inclusion has been great. He will never be tagged there now with Dale and Richards copping the most heat.

 

[dergert]

Level 2 is awesome - still close to the action but just elevated enough that you can see the play unfold.

Feels as if the stadium have moved the general admission seats closer together? Probably in my head.

Or I've just gotten bigger.

As a side note, did anyone else feel the stadium wobbling on level 3 where the works are happening? Pretty unnerving

 

[Charlie Bucket]

Level 2 the better view and better facilities, but the atmosphere is shithouse. Everyone sits there and golf claps.

Level 1 in amongst the action and the vocal fans is the best experience at Marvel by far. For a stadium that sometimes makes it easy to hear a pin drop at times during games, you’ve gotta be sitting where the action is otherwise it’s a pretty s**t stadium in regards to atmosphere.

 

[GetDimmaBack]

Feels as if the stadium have moved the general admission seats closer together? Probably in my head.

Or I've just gotten bigger.

As a side note, did anyone else feel the stadium wobbling on level 3 where the works are happening? Pretty unnerving

Yeah, it was happening on Level 1 as well - I thought it was just me!

Kinda comforting to know I wasn't the only one

 

[manutd/dogs]

I'm talking about a player that gets us closer to really competing in finals again. Not one that fills a spot better than the current iteration of Alex keath.

Ryan Gardner might do a fine job of being the latter. It's not the former though. He still makes mind nubbingly s**t decisions a lot of the time. Same with Jones and keath.

Yeah, I get you, but that being said, personally, I think the guy our club considered to be by far our best key defender last year (7th in the B&F) can be that guy you're talking about. The realities of the salary cap mean you simply can't pad a D50 out with Darcy Moores. There is still a big hangover in a lot of people's minds from earlier on in Gardner's career when Bevo was gifting him games for his development and he was, admittedly, pretty terrible. But a lot of that was simply nerves. He has the tools and we saw him last year beginning to use them. Just watch what happens when Gards comes back in -- Jones will be freed up to go into serious beast-mode. Right now he's having to do too much 1on1 defending. Gards may well get replaced, but I feel there's at least an equal chance he makes it. I truly believe he greatly adds to our D50 set up when fit and that we'd be best served spending our assets elsewhere. The next few weeks will be interesting.