Will we make finals?

[X_box_X]

I take comfort knowing that we travel well.

We start underdogs in our next two but I'd expect that we at least halve the ledger. It's more likely than not that we come away with more than zero points from our next two matches.

 

[Dogsman16]

I didn't realise how bad our draw is.

Its worse than I imagined.

The next 6 games are tough. We just have to pinch one of the next two.

 

[doggies ftw]

I didn't realise how bad our draw is.

Its worse than I imagined.

The next 6 games are tough. We just have to pinch one of the next two.

Yeah it’s not well. The ladders chockers as well, Geelong went to 2nd after winning yesterday, even winning just one of the games we lost earlier year we’d be in the hunt for top 4 - massive waste of a year

 

[The Inbetweener]

Would be handy if GWS beat Collingwood today

 

[Next Waiting]

Would be handy if GWS beat Collingwood today

The Suns are players and influencers over the next 2 rounds...and beyond.

If Pies beat GWS, the best result in the Port game would be a Suns win as they play Pies (next week) at home. They're in the race and gives them a reason to beat the Pies.

If Collingwood lose one of their next 2 games, it means we could lose 3 games and just scrape in ... possibly.

Cats at the cattery and probably Melbourne loom as 2 likely losses. Have to win the rest...unless the Pies falter.

 

[Doggy]

The Suns are players and influencers over the next 2 rounds...and beyond.

If Pies beat GWS, the best result in the Port game would be a Suns win as they play Pies (next week) at home. They're in the race and gives them a reason to beat the Pies.

If Collingwood lose one of their next 2 games, it means we could lose 3 games and just scrape in ... possibly.

Cats at the cattery and probably Melbourne loom as 2 likely losses. Have to win the rest...unless the Pies falter.

Noone has ever missed on 13 wins.. ever

 

[Next Waiting]

Noone has ever missed on 13 wins.. ever

Maybe it will, maybe it won't, but it can happen this year. Almost as likely as 13 plus %

 

[Norm De Guerre]

Yes and we’ll be in the top 4.

 

[doggies ftw]

If we do make it we’ve had a hell of a preparation and that obviously would mean we got our best back, so you’d have to say we’re a genuine chance IF we make it.

I dunno on one hand we’re good enough and we’re finally playing to a structure that allows our best footy forward of the ball but on the other hand we’ve consistently shat the bed when we’ve needed to step up this year and the defensive woes are serious.

I’d say it’s more likely we shit the bed again on the run home tbh but who knows if we put it all together we can win the flag - not enough evidence to say we can do that convincingly tho

 

[Anja_Nees]

We’ve mostly beat up on the weaker sides (except for the meltdown against Adelaide, which might end up being the difference).

I’ve always thought percentage can be a better guide on where a club is at than points. I remember the Lions winning 5 games in a season but with a 90+% and they were top four the next year. We’re very good there.

I think we’re in the best 6-7 sides this year. We should beat GWS, Hawthorn and probably Saints from here. Likely need two others. Sydney, Geelong or Freo probably the most likely.

 

[footscray1973]

Wouldn't be so sure. Saints were crap last night but Shitney are overrated and are worse at home

Not trying to be a smart ar5e here, but since our difference of opinion on the Saints, they've gone 0-3, and as someone who is no fan of theirs, I'm rather enjoying it!

 

[Dog 36]

I just hope we are clear on mathematically possible and been realistic.

Don’t think we make finals I hope we sort out now what we have to for 2023 and beyond and not have the line mathematically possible to deter us from that

 

[Doggy]

Not trying to be a smart ar5e here, but since our difference of opinion on the Saints, they've gone 0-3, and as someone who is no fan of theirs, I'm rather enjoying it!

Shitney have been rubbish as well .. despite winning a few

 

[hutchy31]

Shitney have been rubbish as well .. despite winning a few

They’re really poor at contested ball - at least that’s what it looks like to me (not sure to what extent that’s backed up by stats).

Apart from WC the game earlier in the year v Sydney was about as dominant as we’ve looked, just didn’t put it on the scoreboard and it got close late.

I just don’t see how that game style (Sydney’s) stands up across a month of finals footy. One game, maybe two - but not three or four.

 

[dogwatch]

A lot of the discussion seems to be "what a terrible year to stuff it up - very open comp - if only we could have made the finals we'd have given it a real shake - what a lost opportunity" etc etc.

To me this seems flawed logic. If we're going to be such a decent chance to win four games in September surely we are near certs to knock off at least three of the big shots we have to play over the next 6 weeks? That just leaves GWS and Hawthorn, so add those two (no gimmes I'll admit but they are games we should be winning) and there's your 13 wins.

I'm upbeat ... as long as we don't get another run of injuries to senior players. We're already playing well and while I'm not confident about the Brisbane game we will have the following to return after that - Hunter, English, McLean, Bruce, Bailey Smith

3

Bailey Smith

Age

24

Ht

185cm

Wt

86kg

Pos.

M/F

Career

Season

Last 5

D

18.3

5star

K

8.5

3star

HB

9.8

5star

M

2.3

2star

T

3.8

5star

CL

2.7

4star

D

19.8

5star

K

9.6

4star

HB

10.2

5star

M

1.8

2star

T

3.2

4star

CL

3.2

4star

D

14.8

4star

K

7.6

3star

HB

7.2

5star

M

2.0

3star

T

3.4

5star

CL

1.6

4star

and Richards. Bring them in for whoever you reckon our bottom 6 are and we're only going to get better. Potentially much better.

Here's the run home to save you looking it up:

Brisbane (A)​

Sydney (A)​

St Kilda (MS)​

Melbourne (MS)​

Geelong (A)​

Frem (MS)​

GWS (MS)​

Haw (UTAS)​

​

Summary: we should be able to get 5 wins and a place in the finals easily. 6 or even 7 wins is not out of the question if we hit top form and that might give us an outside chance at the top 4.
If we can't beat 3 of those 6 sides in contention then there's no point us playing finals anyway because we obviously wouldn't be good enough.

 

[doggies ftw]

A lot of the discussion seems to be "what a terrible year to stuff it up - very open comp - if only we could have made the finals we'd have given it a real shake - what a lost opportunity" etc etc.

To me this seems flawed logic. If we're going to be such a decent chance to win four games in September surely we are near certs to knock off at least three of the big shots we have to play over the next 6 weeks? That just leaves GWS and Hawthorn, so add those two (no gimmes I'll admit but they are games we should be winning) and there's your 13 wins.

I'm upbeat ... as long as we don't get another run of injuries to senior players. We're already playing well and while I'm not confident about the Brisbane game we will have the following to return after that - Hunter, English, McLean, Bruce, Bailey Smith and Richards. Bring them in for whoever you reckon our bottom 6 are and we're only going to get better. Potentially much better.

Here's the run home to save you looking it up:

Brisbane (A)​

Sydney (A)​

St Kilda (MS)​

Melbourne (MS)​

Geelong (A)​

Frem (MS)​

GWS (MS)​

Haw (UTAS)​

​

Summary: we should be able to get 5 wins and a place in the finals easily. 6 or even 7 wins is not out of the question if we hit top form and that might give us an outside chance at the top 4.
If we can't beat 3 of those 6 sides in contention then there's no point us playing finals anyway because we obviously wouldn't be good enough.

Yeah that’s the thing though, if we’re good enough to get in from here it means we’ve blown the year as we should then definitely be top 4 and one of the better sides in the comp, with a really really good chance of winning the flag. It’s hard to make an argument that we haven’t butchered the year with team selection to be quite honest, not that that’s been our only problem of course

Looking at that run I think we have to win at least 2 from Lions, Swans, Geelong, Melb which is doable, whilst not dropping one against Saints, Gws, Hawks & IMO Freo we should beat at home.

 

[footscray1973]

Shitney have been rubbish as well .. despite winning a few

My point was Saints are stinking it up, as they often do. 0-3 and looking more and more likely to miss given their run home.

 

[doggies ftw]

GWS struggling to even get through Pies defence - we let them absolutely waltz straight through us last week. What is breaking down so badly to make us so poor at defending the ground?

 

[dogwatch]

Yeah that’s the thing though, if we’re good enough to get in from here it means we’ve blown the year as we should then definitely be top 4 and one of the better sides in the comp, with a really really good chance of winning the flag. It’s hard to make an argument that we haven’t butchered the year with team selection to be quite honest, not that that’s been our only problem of course

Looking at that run I think we have to win at least 2 from Lions, Swans, Geelong, Melb which is doable, whilst not dropping one against Saints, Gws, Hawks & IMO Freo we should beat at home.

OK, so you agree we will make the finals then. And if we don't we were never good enough anyway.

Perhaps the discussion should be: will we make top 4?

 

[Doggy]

GWS struggling to even get through Pies defence - we let them absolutely waltz straight through us last week. What is breaking down so badly to make us so poor at defending the ground?

Different conditions help

 

[doggies ftw]

OK, so you agree we will make the finals then. And if we don't we were never good enough anyway.

Perhaps the discussion should be: will we make top 4?

I think we can make finals but it’s going to be tough, but if we do make finals from here we’re clearly in the best 4 teams in the comp but we’ve thrown our season away by not finishing in the top 4 and that’d purely be down to ridiculous team selection earlier in the season imo

 

[dogwatch]

Since 1994 when the finals system moved to a top 8 (albeit with a different playoff formula back then) the eighth side has only had 13 or more wins on five occasions. The average number of wins for the eighth side has been 11.8 and the lowest number of wins has been 10.

Since 2013 when the AFL had bedded in the 18-side comp (a year after GWS started and 2 years after GCS) here are the wins the eighth placed side had:
2013 11
2014 12
2015 13
2016 12
2017 12
2018 13
2019 12
[2020 - disregard - it was a 17 round season due to Covid]
2021 11

So while it's reasonable to think we will need 13 wins we would have a pretty good chance of playing finals with 12 wins.

 

[dogwatch]

Since 1994 when the finals system moved to a top 8 (albeit with a different playoff formula back then) the fourth side has had 13 wins on four occasions but none since 2013. The average number of wins for the fourth side since 2013 has been 15.44 and the lowest number of wins has been 15.

Since 2013 when the AFL had bedded in the 18-side comp (a year after GWS started and 2 years after GCS) here are the wins the fourth placed side had:
2013 15.5
2014 16
2015 16
2016 16
2017 15
2018 15
2019 15
[2020 - disregard - it was a 17 round season due to Covid]
2021 15

So based on that I reckon we'd need 15 wins to make the top 4. That means 7 wins from the last 8.

One factor that affects these threshold is how skewed the competition is. If there are a few easybeats (as there were in 2011 and 2012 when GCS and GWS joined the comp) you tend to need a higher number of wins because most of the premiership points are being shared by a smaller number of teams.

This year could be such a year with North, West Coast and Essendon all being pretty putrid. From the 42 games they have played they have won just 6 between them ... and I expect most of those were against each other.

Conclusion: 13 wins should be enough for a top 8 spot but 15 is the likely minimum for a top 4. And it could end up being 16.

 

[maddog37]

GWS struggling to even get through Pies defence - we let them absolutely waltz straight through us last week. What is breaking down so badly to make us so poor at defending the ground?

Great question. Zone is falling down too many times.

 

[brmi]

I see no reason why we won't make finals and go deep. Tough run home but a few blokes back available for selection and getting some form back I see the results going like this

Brisbane (A) Win
Sydney (A) Win
St Kilda (MS) Win
Melbourne (MS) Loss (although quite confident this could go either way)
Geelong (A) Loss
Frem (MS) Win
GWS (MS) Win
Haw (UTAS) Win

Can seriously see us going all the way again this year.