Oh careful, that's considered pathetic around here

Essendon* champion Matthew Lloyd summed up the feelings of most when he suggested the Bombers should tank against Carlton.

While he didn't use that word, everyone knew that's what he was alluding to by saying the Bombers should play it safe against the raging premiership favourite and focus their energies on Anzac Day against the troubled Magpies.

His theory stacked up given the hype and excitement around the Blues and the fact Collingwood was injury-hit and had four days to prepare for the biggest home and away game on the calendar.

Surprisingly, his old teammates didn't agree, but the Carlton players clearly did.

They arrived at the MCG clearly happy with life and expecting to go through their paces. Instead they were confronted by a hard-nosed outfit that has found the winning feeling

The injury excuse that Carlton fans will look to use was evened up as the day progressed. While Carrazzo's loss was big and defender Jeremy Laidler was forced to play out the game with a dodgy knee, the Bombers lost key forward Hurley in the opening minutes of the third quarter with a hamstring injury.

I am still shell-shocked. My worrying started when I heard the odds before the game.
Walking to the ground I hear Carazzo's injured and off and then 5 min later Laidler. I sensed it was going to be one of those days.
Essendon* and by that mean I mean Thompson employed the hawthorn model of being overly aggressive and bullying and unsettled us for 2 quarters.
It took till after half time to compose ourselves but when you play catch up footy, you can't miss simple set shots.
Just a horror day all round.
Anyone blaming McLean is kidding themself. He's a scapegoat. Sometimes when we are on the back foot, the superstars have to get dirty and stem the flow.
The difference between us on Sat and a Geelong or even Collingwood of last year is that they can sense things aren't going their way, batten down and stop the bleeding then wait for opportunities to score. Thats something we have to learn to do and fast because Ess has given other teams the blueprint which the middle rage teams, North, Syd, will try to emulate.

Boy oh boy did the hun enjoy that


Gloating, but unfortunately true gloating.


Presumptuous much?

Would've been like the office Christmas party down there.

Just spoke to Carlton director this morning, yes they're filthy & he basically told me to watch the team that comes out this week.

I'm certain they'll redeem themselves.

Just spoke to Carlton director this morning, yes they're filthy & he basically told me to watch the team that comes out this week.

I'm certain they'll redeem themselves.

The list of things we hate seeing against Essendon*:
- Them cutting us up on the rebound without getting touched
Check
- Watching injuries occur to important players
Check
- Watching smug pricks like Davey and Monfries cutting us up
Check
- Watching them benefit from bullshit free kicks and 50m penalties
Check
- Our guys going half-arsed at the ball carrier and missing tackles
Check
- Our guys panicking with the ball in hand and getting caught
Check
- Our guys missing easy shots on goal at crucial times
Check
- Our guys waiting for the easy ball out the back while they hunt in packs and work as a team
Check
- Fletcher running around on his own, doing what he wants (and kicking a goal)
Check

Henderson was one of our best. The amount of times he won a 50-50 contest and outplayed his opponent was one of the only positives from the match. The dropped mark was a monumental !@#$%& up, but he had plenty of credit in the bank.

Might give the papers radio & TV a miss for a few days.

It was the Essendon* loose man in defence, also the one in their attack and their other loose man in the middle which hurt us.

2 days later, I’m still really, really disappointed. I’ve got to admit I’d thought we’d moved beyond that kind of mentally-soft, ill-prepared, lazy performance. But clearly we haven’t. I thought we might finally be ready to compete with the big boys and have a serious tilt for the flag. But I’ve lost a little faith. Obviously our best is still good enough, but you can only be at your best some of the time. And we’re going to lose too many games if we can’t maintain a consistently high standard, even when we’re not at our best.

Up until half way through the second quarter, Essendon* we’re playing well but still didn’t look they believed they could win. We simply couldn’t/wouldn’t hold our nerve and guts it out for long enough. Defensively we were really, really poor. Sliced apart. And when you compare it to the really good teams (like Hawthorn and West Coast), I’m afraid we’re going to leak too many goals (no matter how well we play).

Reasons we lost:
1. Essendon* dominated the ruck. If you use the Pies match last week as the contrasting example, we dominated hit outs and (in particular) hit outs to advantage. Against the Dons, we did not have first use of the footy out of the middle and the midfielders were forced into being reactive.