This post sums up the trouble with this club (no effence intended at all BTW)...........this is EXACTLY what Ratts & Co will spend all week doing rather than trying to win the game and let Essendon* worry about us. We are reactive rabble who have little chance of winning.

When did we last beat this mob ? And that was when we were playing well.

I heard the Essendon* Cheer Squad will be throwing marchmellows out on the gorund and handing them out to Carlton supporters.

One way or another, our season ends on Friday night from my point of view. It's either our last respectable contribution to the AFL season by ensuring these flower don't make the finals, and essentially booking our spot in making up the numbers.

I reckon we'll win this one, albeit in ugly fashion. Where I think we'll succeed where St Kilda didn't, is that we have the players to tag Essendon*'s midfielders en masse. St Kilda didn't pay Essendon* that respect, instead preferring to play the likes of Hayes and Dal Santo head to head with Watson and Stanton, and paid the price for it. In fairness to the Saints, the loss of Jones and Baker would not have made that an easy task.

For mine, it's shut down Jobe Watson, beat Essendon*. Jobe's performances are somewhat lower against Carlton than compared to his career averages, last time around, we were prepared to have Kade Simpson run head to head against him, and whilst Simmo was probably our best on the night, and kicked two going the other way, I reckon Watson got the three Brownlow votes on the night. In recent years, we've tried Gibbs on him without much luck, and Grigg did a serviceable job last year before Watson went off injured, and I'd like to see Grigga get the lockdown job here too.

Stanton is another one I'd like to apply a hard tag to. He runs hard and has a massive tank, he sets up a lot of their scoring chains, and is a smart player. On the other hand, he's shown he struggles to break a tag, and is quite inconsistent. I don't think Carrazzo has the motor to go with him, and got absolutely pantsed by him last year. I'd give the job to Walker. There's no obvious matchup for him in the Essendon* forward line as such, he's got the mongrel in him to frustrate Stanton at the stoppages and also run with him.

A real probing question at the moment will also be how do we stop Michael Hurley's run out of the back half? Hurley managed to rack up 30 touches and 13 marks, running off Koschitzke on Friday night, and I get the feeling that this could quite easily be another Brian Lake scenario. It's also the first time he's ever played against the Blues ("gee, you don't see that very often, do you?"). Waite has to play forward here, and play deep. No excuses. As I've said a few times this year, rewatch the tape of the Saints match and see how well he managed to keep Gilbert accountable. This has to happen again, and we didn't have that luxury against Lake.

Heath Hocking is another bloke who consistently lifts against us. Will take either Murph or Judd, and has done alright this year on the opposition's best midfielder. Am hoping it's Murph, as I think the West Coast game showed, with LeCras tearing him a new one, he can struggle one out with a smaller quicker opponent in the forward 50, as he can be found to over-rely on his teammates to give him a chop out. If he goes to Murph, we need to be willing to send him forward, and try and create the necessary space to isolate them.

Houli was probably BOG for the Bombers on Friday night, but the flaws in his game are still fairly obvious, he doesn't man up, and his disposal by foot is questionable. Put Ryan Houlihan on him, as arguably our most damaging player in terms of, ahem, "scoreboard pressure", and test this out. HOULIhan on Houli you say? What an enticing prospect.......

The Ryder/Hille conundrum is one that will, if anything, highlight how big a hole Kreuzer leaves more than any other challenge this season. While I think Warnock will certainly hold his own around the ground, I simply can't see who mans them up when one goes forward, with Waite needed up forward. Bower presents the best option for Ryder at this point, and would keep his spot based on this alone, despite his absolute shocker of a game against the Pies. Thornton is well undersized, Austin doesn't quite look right to me playing deep in defense, and would probably give Jamo first crack at Gumbleton. Simon White would be very handy right about now. I reckon play the third ruck, and hope we can tire them.

Monfries is another that keeps me awake at night. The diving for free kicks, the junk time goals last year and so forth. Regardless, did a hell of a job on Sam Fisher as a defensive forward on Friday night, and I expect him to go to Russell (or perhaps vice-a-versa). Should be a decent battle between the two '04 draftees.

I expect Fisher to stay in, to reprise his role as a defensive forward on Fletcher from last year. Ratten still raves about that performance, which really wasn't THAT great, but seems to have kept him in a job, along with the convenience of having a one year deal that others did not at the time. Oh well, regardless, ton up for Fish.

Joseph did a decent enough job on Zaharakis last time around to probably replicate it this time around, did a respectable job on Davis yesterday, whilst Zaharakis copped a hiding from Goddard. Otherwise, perhaps a run with role with Davey?

Will be a decent challenge for Eddie to go up against McVeigh after he towelled up Milne last week. Betts does have one thing going for him in that McVeigh is a flower of a bloke, I suppose.

So my ins and outs? Not exactly set in concrete pending the VFL game today, butttttttt........

In: Thornton, Armfield, Robinson, Jacobs, Houlihan
Out: Carrazzo, Garlett, Henderson, Johnson, Ellard

B: Thornton (Neagle) Jamison (Gumbleton) Russell (Monfries)
HB: Joseph (Zaharakis) Bower (Ryder) Scotland (unaccountable)
C: Walker (Stanton) Judd (Prismall) Grigg (Watson)
HF: Houlihan (Houli) Waite (Hurley) Yarran (Reimers)
F: Betts (McVeigh) Hampson (Hooker) Fisher (Fletcher)
R: Warnock (Hille) Murphy (Hocking) Simpson (Lonergan)
INT: Armfield, Robinson, Jacobs, Gibbs (definitely 22nd man)

Given the rubbish that has been delivered over the past 6 weeks and all these "make or break" games where we have basically rolled over, very hard to see any change to that this week. Still, I live in hope but each week it gets more difficult. My question is - after all the pressure and discussion with full time professional footballers/coaches, why is the same crap getting put up every week? Maybe they are not just good enough and those wins against St Kilda nd Geelong were abherations masking deficiencies under pressure. Seems as though it is endemic when you read the Bullants thread as well. We are missing players - Kruez, Lucas, White but the core of "quality" is still there.
In some respects the end of the season cannot come soon enough to start the process to mend the broken pieces of our club. To think they are not broken is delusional as the on field performances speak for themselves.

Currently

Essendon* $1.95
Carlton $1.85

I'll start off by saying this: we haven't beaten Essendon* the last 6 times? we've played them, and I'd expect this will be number 7. I'm tipping Essendon* because I don't have proof that this Carlton team can beat them.

If it meant not winning another game this year, I'd gladly take a win over the Scum this week. Apart from the fact that they are the very essence of evil in this world, they gave us Glen Hawker which is reason in itself to hate them.

Essendon* supporters need to be put into their rightful place. They are the most deluded football followers out there. In fact, the majority of Essendon* supporters are nothing but theatre goers who think that Jay Neagle is a star in the making (he aint), that Kyle Reimers is tough (he aint - he's a pissweak whiny little bitch), and often only find out their team's result when reading the Herald Scum (thank you Robbo) the following day.

I hate them and everything to do with them. I despise every piece of fabric in their guernseys and I loathe every blade of grass on Scum Hill. Their list is made up of cheats and criminals, and they learn all they know from the greatest cheat of them all in Matthew Nights. Their lack of skill in the footballing department is supposedly made up by their expertise in the sniper department. They are the cause of everything that is wrong with this world and I will wait and wait for however long it takes to beat them and when we do, I will sing our song with gusto and remember the day the navy blues put a sock in the mouths of those pricks.

and breathe...

The problem we have is that we are diabolical and there is precious little in the reserves. Jacobs is the best Ants player and we can't play three giant rucks. Our coach has finally put down the stats sheet and said some hard things. All that was missing was a realisation that the buck stops with him, and either his messages and game plan are way off or he doesn't have the authority to get the players to do what he wants. How many times does he have to say "bring your mouthguards to training." We are a rabble. We don't run hard enough often enough, we are totally static. Has Ratts ever watched Geelong? How about we run with the ball, attack, try and win and go down swinging, at least then all the players might be on the same page.

Having said players have lacked courage now, if he is selective in who he drops, he brands the droppees as the soft when half the team are soft.

After about 8 weeks of crap, we need to make changes, but it is a bit like swapping deck chairs on the Titanic.

Honestly I don't know what to do. I'd like Setanta back, but the setanta of 8 weeks ago. Hadley has been tried before. Davies looks a distance away.

I am just devoid of ideas. Maybe I should be on the MC.

Really this is a test for Stats Ratts. he has made every excuse known, now we play a side below us, with a crap coach, less experience and who recently got flogged by the bottom side. Ratts has had 6 straight losses to understand their gameplan, but his own players don't understand our gameplan so I guess it's asking too much to understand the Bombers game plan. If we win, it is not some great achievement, it is really about time. You should expect to beat bottom of the ladder sides when you are in the 8.

If we lose this it will indicate that Ratts has lost the players (and most of the supporters).

At the moment we have a committee who have endorsed poor decisions in the way we went about getting a coach and then compounded it by extending his contract too far, too early. Our drafting is looking average. Fairly easy when you have a top 10 pick, why can't we get anything later in the draft? How many quality players have the pies got beyond the first round of the draft? How many have we got?

Our rookie successes - Joseph, Carrazzo, Jamo, are looking more like rookies every week. How can players go backwards as they appear to have?

I am sick of it. Almost 10 years of mediocrity and more to come. We are the new Richmond, and Richmond look like something we are not - a weak list that gets a long way on discipline and determination.

Will any committee members be up for re-election? Can we at least vote somebody out at the end of the year?

Our drafting is looking average. Fairly easy when you have a top 10 pick, why can't we get anything later in the draft? How many quality players have the pies got beyond the first round of the draft? How many have we got?

Not a bad post SLT, but the overall tone concerns me. You're very concerned with stopping Essendons better players and I sense that this is what Carlton's thinking has been for awhile now. How about, as radical idea, we say stuff what they might do, lets just go out and do our thing. No taggers - anyone who's been making a living tagging can have a spell and be replaced by a ball getter. I'd love to see us lose some of the reactiveness and let the opposition worry about what we're doing for a change.

Oh, and no way would I drop Ellard or Johnson either.

Our game plan looks non existent because the players are not working hard enough. How frustrating would that be for the coach? When the team has a work rate that compliments our game plan we have looked great but at the moment players are waiting for someone else to do the dirty work.

I guess my frustration Swan is that all coaches have game plans and structures and processes, the thing that distinguishes good coaches (apart from the players) is their ability not just to have plans but to get their players to implement them. Guys like Ross Lyon, Rodney Eade, Clarkson (hate him) and even Dean Bailey and Hardwick seem to have authority and strength of personality that puts players in line, but Ratts can't get the players to play the way he wants. Coaches need to be able to get effort, and discipline and intensity from players. Ratts hasn't proved he can do that, and Friday is a crucial test. If we bomb against the Bombers we may not win a game for the rest of the year.

Having said players have lacked courage now, if he is selective in who he drops, he brands the droppees as the soft when half the team are