Rich v Melb

[nut]

Gasper excellant

Johnson = Class

Ottens needs to get a bit of mongrel in him.

Richo was Richo. Not too worried about form. Takes a while to get going.

Stafford should have dominated in the ruck but was ineffictive with his hit outs. Looked good around the ground thou.

Hilton impressed.

Fiora looks lost. Needs more guidence.

Rodan was good when on the ground.

Was suprised to see Krakker start in the centre and not Rodan.

A typical Cameron performance. Didn't see to many of them last year.

Tivvers was good.

Chaffey plays Tall. Might lose for a few weeks.

Shultz looks good.

Newman looks promising. Would have been nice to see him in the middle more.

Cog's was dissapionting. looked a bit flat. Will get targeted this season.

If biddiscombe plays in H&A then were in trouble.

Melbourne impressed.

Our around the ground work wasn't bad. Our forward line was ineffective which is why we lost. I think we need structual changes down forward.

Put Blumfield, Holland and Campbell in that side and it looks a lot better.

All in all not to bad. Melbourne sure did look on the job.

 

[kretchy]

Agree with most of what you said nut.
Thought Hilton's comeback was good we really missed him last season. Agree that if Biddiscombe plays in the home and away we are in real strife. Good to see Gaspar back to somewhere near his best form.

 

[wagstaff]

Originally posted by nut


Ottens needs to get a bit of mongrel in him.

When was the last time Ottens took a contested mark? Round 22, 2001? For me that is the key to him being a dominant factor, not his ruck work, and it was disappointing to see him have no impact on the forward line last night.

I wouldn't be worried about anything else from last night, it's early days and despite the score there was plenty of promise there.

I think Melbourne just worked harder then Richmond did (that was shown up by Dermie's observation in the last quarter that there were three Tigers waiting to receive a soft kick across the half-back line) and actually had some crumbers in the forward line, something that Richmond is still deficient in.

The skill level is still a bit of a worry though.

 

[CJH]

Melbourne worked a lot harder at getting numbers around the ball, especially in the hardball situations. This is a sign of a team that is running harder. That they are doing it and we aren't is of absolutely no concern in February!

What worried me was that we still appear too structured up forward. Too reliant on a big forward taking a mark and not enough midfielders pushing forward to create options.

I was surprised that Schulz was as big as he was - I was expecting a complete pretzel but he has pretty good size and moves well across the turf. Didn't get to see too much football from him though!

Chaffey played the role of a hard grunt, something that we crave and something that I always knew he should be capable of. Was our best player.

Biddiscombe's final nail in the coffin was when he missed Johnson by 10 metres and put the ball out on the full when under no pressure whatsover. That kind of kicking is an even bigger liability that Duncan's!

 

[Damp Squarie]

Any chance of gettin Johnson back?

 

[foo fighters]

Basic errors was the theme of the night.Slipping over, constantly dropping the ball.One thing that will never change is that when Bowden was on Wheatley he allowed him so much space on the 50 meter line and it was quite obvious that he was the designated kicker for 9 points.As i was walking out i had to tell myself that it was only feb

 

[Fwoy]

I hope the likes of Biddiscombe, Mills and Hyde enjoyed their last senior appearances in AFL football...

 

[Somefella]

Simply put: You weren't hard enough at it.
Plus you lack a decent half backman and 3 or 4 midfielders. But most importantly CRUMBING FORWARDS!!!! You saw how Neitz went last night... had a shocker (though the delivery wasnt great and gaaaaaasper had hold of him all night) but our crumbing small forwards did the job.

Not your greatest performance. But a win over you was just what we needed, you bastards beat us twice last year!

 

[nut]

Originally posted by Fwoy
I hope the likes of Biddiscombe, Mills and Hyde enjoyed their last senior appearances in AFL football...

What I've seen of Hyde , I wouldn't right him off.

 

[Tiger_Of_Old]

i agree with most of the comments regarding friday,s game.its only feb.
the fwd structure is a huge worry.it showed out big time.when otto and richo didnt mark it where was our crumbers?outside of rodan and krakour who is there?
was pleased to see krak get a run in the middle surely a good sign of danny expanding krak,s dutys.
overall im not unhappy about losing considering the pace of the wizzars cup is played out.
will be interesting come mid-season the sides who reach the semi.s and final if they burnout or not.

cheers!

 

[TheFoxhat]

It's no use slashing your wrist yet it's only the PRE-SEASON,although i wouldn't want to have to go to Geraldton in W.A next weekend to play the dockers either....

 

[Richmondfan#1]

Perhaps Rogers could have been in there crumbing?

I didn't see much of the game so can't really comment on much of it. But I do feel sorry for them having to go to Gero, haha, they'll have to beat off the weirdo's. And the Dockers too.

 

[peejay]

I guess Joel will be Joel again going by his performance.

 

[Rodan#18.]

Originally posted by Fwoy
I hope the likes of Biddiscombe, Mills and Hyde enjoyed their last senior appearances in AFL football...

Bidders..;.yes.

Mills and Hyde could be offered as trades but I can see them getting another year. Depends on the depth of the draft.

re : pre-season loss ; not losing any sleep over it,

 

[CJH]

Originally posted by nut
What I've seen of Hyde , I wouldn't right him off.

What I've seen of Hyde, I'm surprised he is still on the list! A poor man's Greg Tivendale!

 

[One-eyed Tiger]

Originally posted by nut
What I've seen of Hyde , I wouldn't right him off.

Sorry Nut but have to disagree.

Reckon Hyde's yet another outside left-footer who doesn't exactly relish the physical side of the game and won't make the cut. Dime a dozen.

Will be disapponted if we sink low enough to have to play Hyde or Biddiscombe this season. They are both in last year of their contracts and don't expect to see them again after this year. Club was hamstrung at end of last season because of them. Reckon they would have prefered to hold on to Ednie ahead of these two. Because of our Salary cap problems we have only 36 players on our list. Once these guys and possibly Clinton King, Andrew Mills, Matty Rogers and Duncan Kellaway disappear at the end of this season we should have room on our list for some more youngsters. Maybe get close to 40 players again. (Maybe bit harsh on Rogers and Dunc but one of them will go)

Andy Kellaway being late to the game made a couple of things obvious. Joel Bowden is not a defender! (I'm not sure what he is actually! maybe a forward where his unpredictability could be an asset and also where maybe his mistakes won't be so costly) Getting Holland back is tantamount to our season. Our backline without Holland is a worry. If Andy Kellaway or Gas go down we're stuffed.

On a more positive note I was happy that Krak started on the ball. Richmond seem reluctant to play him there. Spud may have come around to the idea after he played OK on the ball in the All Stars game in Darwin. Rodan was getting time on the ball too before he hurt himself.

Liked the look of Shultz for the small amount of time that I seen of him. Looks big enough (bigger than some of the Melbourne youngsters anyway) to play a bit of senior footy this year and will be disappointed if he doesn't debut at some stage. If he does OK expect door to be shown to Vardy. Whilst on youngsters (Didn't Melbourne's play well?) I was disappointed Marty McGrath didn'y get a game. Frawley had stated not to expect a win because he was going to experiment. Please, please, please tell me we were experimenting. Please tell me we weren't going all out to win. I thought that sort of statement would have opened the door for someone like McGrath, especially with our lack of small forwards. Spud's big experiment seemed to amount to Krak and Rodan getting some time on the ball. Was also hoping to see Sigthorpe.

Liked Chaffey and Hilton's games. Coughlan seemed to have a bad case of the fumbles. When he did get it tended to throw it onto his boot to nobody. Will get better but at the moment (and probably with good reason) does not have confidence in his fellow midfielders and trys to do it all himself. Kane Johnson will probably end up doing the same. Cameron looked good. Thought Rogers was OK in his tagging. Reckon this or crumbimg forward is his future. I know Campbell doesn't like playing forward but his smarts may be required up there if Chaffey, Cameron, Newman, Hilton, Zantuck etc can hold the backline together. Tivendale and Pettifer looked bigger. Tivvers looked good when he got the ball just didn't get it enuf. Still not sure about Pettifer and Houlihan - fingers crossed. Andy Kellaway handy when he eventually arrived. Staff good too.

All in all still optimistic for a reasonable year, hopefully improving steadily as the year progresses. Optimistic we will develop a plan B for our forward line for when the big blokes aren't firing. Some would say I'm dreamin, I'd prefer to just be OPTIMISTIC!

Cheers All


As a side note Torney did some good things for the Crows on Saturday night. Looks like he could be part of a successful unit this year. Hope he goes well.