North to go winless in 2024?

[MisterMarcus]

The comparisons with Melbourne are ridiculous. We were in the wilderness between 07-14 with major improvements coming after Roos was appointed. North have not played finals since 2016 and are 2-3 years away from turning over the list even more before Tasmania enters and guts the draft. They don’t have that long to start making inroads and improving.

It’s going to be a tough slog to get anywhere the next few years. Drafting has to be really good and Clarkson needs to work some magic to get them moving.

North missed the 8 by a single game in 2018, and by two games in 2019. They were still competitive and in the mix.

I'd put 2020 as the better "Ground Zero" season for North, the equivalent of Melbourne 2007 (when the Dees finished 14th and were very clearly falling off a massive cliff).

 

[Lsta062]

They've won 4 games in their last 51 matches and you think they will win 4 in the next 15 weeks?

I literally said that I don’t think they’ll get to 4 wins lol

 

[Lsta062]

North will be the team to end the Suns away win drought, Richmond will pull out whatever stop is needed not to lose to them and i can't see them beating WCE no matter where it's played.

Yeah they’re definitely not locks. I just think that those games are games they may be able to look forward to. Don’t think they’ll go undefeated though

 

[Lsta062]

They also play hawks in the last round in Tassie and that could be anything by that round

Yeah, but I excluded them because North Melbourne can’t seem to get close to Hawthorn at the moment. The other three I mentioned lost to North in the last two years

 

[HBFlanker]

Big big chance to go winless for mine.

Its a mentality thing. They genuinely dont know how to win.

 

[LukeParkerno1]

Big big chance to go winless for mine.

Its a mentality thing. They genuinely dont know how to win.

You'll see them win a game or two, GWS in their first year even won a game. Could easily beat Richmond next time round for one, Hawks at home or whatever, and then there are the Dogs who can lose to anyone if Bevo is coach. WCE at home would be a chance especially if Reid is rested.

 

[Howard Littlejohn]

Big big chance to go winless for mine.

Its a mentality thing. They genuinely dont know how to win.

It didn't bother me too much at the time, as it was the expected result, but I think the players lost hope after the Brisbane game.
For the first time there wasn't a stretch of even a few minutes of the attacking flair that seemed to be part of a "let the kids just play footy" stage of development at the start of the year. Which is a fair enough way to go about it, learn what they do naturally at AFL level, and then start building the discipline and structure around that. And it hasn't returned.

A tough start to the fixture, and by the time some potentially competitive games came around all spirit was gone. Would a different fixture have resulted in anything different? Probably not in terms of wins, but maybe not knocked the stuffing out the group as early as seems to have happened.

 

[HBFlanker]

It didn't bother me too much at the time, as it was the expected result, but I think the players lost hope after the Brisbane game.
For the first time there wasn't a stretch of even a few minutes of the attacking flair that seemed to be part of a "let the kids just play footy" stage of development at the start of the year. Which is a fair enough way to go about it, learn what they do naturally at AFL level, and then start building the discipline and structure around that. And it hasn't returned.

A tough start to the fixture, and by the time some potentially competitive games came around all spirit was gone. Would a different fixture have resulted in anything different? Probably not in terms of wins, but maybe not knocked the stuffing out the group as early as seems to have happened.

Agree on this. Last 3 weeks haven't been good enough. Especially playing middle of the road opposition.

 

[demondavey]

North are basically in the same position your team were in 2012-3.

Melbourne's "last gasp" was 2006, so they'd already endured 6-7 years of bottom finishes, false hopes being dashed, change of coaches, and uncompetitive beltings. Good draft picks being wasted or botched or poorly developed, tick. Terrible culture, tick. No apparent light at the end of a long dark tunnel, tick.

Literally everything was the same as for North going into 2024. I can't see one thing different between North 2024 and Melb of that era, except that North don't have two rookie expansion teams to beat up on for easy wins (which is basically all that kept Melbourne from going virtually winless both seasons).

By your own criteria, Melbourne should have been packed up and f'd off without a second thought a decade ago. But eventually you turned it around. Why can't North.

Melbourne would never have been folded. They are the MCC.

Melbourne were rubbish for 7-8 years. Once Roos came the worm turned. North are playing in a harder competition with another expansion team coming in, taking more picks. It’ll be this year and next before they have gutted the list and even started to rebuild. By then Tasmania are knocking. So by then the list has to be pretty ready to go. Will Larkey hold on that long? LDU will probably go.

There’s a lot of work to do before even getting anywhere competitive.

 

[Clive Kepler]

They will pinch one probably when absolutely least expected.

Always happens.

 

[Taper]

Big big chance to go winless for mine.

Its a mentality thing. They genuinely dont know how to win.

Richmond are looking horrible at the moment, on current form the odds going into a game between the two would be something like this:

• North $2.30
• Richmond $1.60

 

[Priddis Is Done]

Just close them down alredy

 

[GastevsBeard]

bizarrely even when we have been competitive post-flag era, North have been our bogey team

If we played them next week we lose by 8-10 goals on form

 

[The Devils Advocate]

Perfect storm brewing.
Essendon media hype all week, building Essendon up.
North Melbourne getting shat on all week by the media.
North play their Grand Final against Essendon every single year.
Essendon won't turn up, North will.

 

[kaiserchief13]

Perfect storm brewing.
Essendon media hype all week, building Essendon up.
North Melbourne getting shat on all week by the media.
North play their Grand Final against Essendon every single year.
Essendon won't turn up, North will.

Doesn't matter a lot of their players are simply too s**t

 

[Kangapirate]

Perfect storm brewing.
Essendon media hype all week, building Essendon up.
North Melbourne getting shat on all week by the media.
North play their Grand Final against Essendon every single year.
Essendon won't turn up, North will.

Is that why we never beat them? Lol

 

[The Devils Advocate]

Is that why we never beat them? Lol

Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti is retired brother. You're all good.

 

[RUNVS]

I genuinely don't understand how North can be so bad as they last played finals in 2016.

That is almost 8 years of rebuilding, and yet they not only have nothing to show for it, they still have huge holes in their list.

They really feel like a team that started rebuilding 2 or 3 years ago based on where they are right now in their list build.

 

[Jim Prideaux]

I genuinely don't understand how North can be so bad as they last played finals in 2016.

That is almost 8 years of rebuilding, and yet they not only have nothing to show for it, they still have huge holes in their list.

They really feel like a team that started rebuilding 2 or 3 years ago based on where they are right now in their list build.

They’ve had some bad luck along the way, and they also have to contend with being a less attractive prospect for free agents. Add to this the highly compromised draft, which at this point has become a farce.

They need some soft cap assistance along with a good senior player or two, but most of all they need some hope.

 

[RUNVS]

They’ve had some bad luck along the way, and they also have to contend with being a less attractive prospect for free agents. Add to this the highly compromised draft, which at this point has become a farce.

They need some soft cap assistance along with a good senior player or two, but most of all they need some hope.

From the 2017 draft onwards picks inside the top 20 they have had include

2017
Pick 4

2018
Pick 8

2019
None

2020
Pick 3
Pick 13

2021
Pick 1

2022
Pick 3
Pick 4

2023
Pick 2
Pick 4
Pick 20

So since 2017 they have had 10 players inside the top 20, 8 of those players being inside the top 10.

8 top 10 selections in 7 drafts (7 top 5 selections) should be enough for a solid foundation.

 

[Jim Prideaux]

From the 2017 draft onwards picks inside the top 20 they have had include

2017
Pick 4

2018
Pick 8

2019
None

2020
Pick 3
Pick 13

2021
Pick 1

2022
Pick 3
Pick 4

2023
Pick 2
Pick 4
Pick 20

So since 2017 they have had 10 players inside the top 20, 8 of those players being inside the top 10.

8 top 10 selections in 7 drafts (7 top 5 selections) should be enough for a solid foundation.

I’m not doubting any of that, those are the facts and they are undisputed.

However, that isn’t the full picture. They have had some awful luck with their coaches, coupled with the unfair nature of free agency in its current form and the intangibles of player development.

I’m not trying to say they are without fault, but I feel that it is unfair to wholly put their current situation on them.

 

[jakson68]

Every chance North don’t win a game.
Clarkson was a great coach but I think the game has evolved and he hasn’t

 

[banzai]

Every chance North don’t win a game.
Clarkson was a great coach but I think the game has evolved and he hasn’t

We play them in round 20. We have a crazy hard fixture up until that week apart from the Hawthorn game, really no other winnable game. Be a huge chance we go into that game with only 1 win.

 

[Cmarsh]

Seems some North supporters want the AFL to come in and intervene administratively.

If that did happen though, just not sure if the AFL would actually make it any better.

 

[Fire]

Hey, whatever it takes to get rid of Rawlings is fine by me.