I was sitting amongst a group of Carlton supporters last night and everyone was of the same opinion, Ratten is too reactive and has no plan B. Have had my doubts too and i hope the club has the balls to do something about it if things go pear shaped this season.
How many games do we "not turn up to"? Who's fault is that?

I mentioned before the game that we have dropped Thornton twice for two losses, nobody backed me up then. Bring him back and watch the difference it makes to our forward line.

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Between our dreams and actions lies this world

Agree about Thornton, at least he is a marking option. Something we didnt have last night. Waite played too far up the ground yet again and when the ball did come into our forward line, which was more often than St Kilda did, there was noone to mark or make a contest. He must be pretty frustrated.

That's the point, teams won't let us play the way we want. It's happened for four weeks, and yet we turn up and think it will be different. What did we do different last night to allow us to play the way we need to play to win?

I'm still really, really disappointed this morning.

We've had about two years now where we've been a hunted side and we still can't cope with it. Last night really confirmed to me that we are a mentally weak team. We have missed golden opportunities to cement spots far too many times these last few years and it's just not good enough.

Our depth players are either not up to it, not ready for AFL yet, or injured.

Having one day where everything goes wrong is excusable, but we've had 2 in a month now.

Can someone please explain to me how we are smashing teams in hitouts yet taps are not going to advantage?!



What I have been annoyed about is that he is dropped not based on form, but based on a perception that he is not needed. It frustrated me no end seeing certain players out there last night who really shouldn't have been selected.

well we did have two Shite losses in 95........

I know.... I'm clutching at the moment!

on another note - when does our contract at Etihad finish?? Piss it off and play at the G

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- I work hard, because millions on welfare depend on me -

Ratten clearly isn't a Thornton fan.

Rd Carl Opp Diff
1 39 32 7
2 47 37 10
3 50 32 18
4 35 38 -3
5 30 40 -10
6 28 41 -13
7 37 42 -5

Clearance stats above. Obvious decline since Carrazzo injury...it was clear after the first two games without him that there was a clearance issue yet we still have seen little change, even with dominant ruckmen.

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"You are being watched. The government has a secret system. A machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I know because I built it." - Finch

2 out of 7

It is a worry we are still Flaky after being diagnosed with flakyness 3 years back. The club has been doing everything possible to address it but it flakyness still keeps raising its ugly head. I am sure we can all name the players that have the bug.

Still i am not writing off the season. All we need is to find something for a good run of wins. Our draw could help out there.

Like someone posted earlier, I dont think we will have a problem getting up for a big finals game on the g. Its these mid season games at ES against midrange teams that hunt us that cause us grief and bring out the worst in our list and coaches.

I don't think it's a form problem.

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I hope Essendon* folds.

Thats the big question. The shining hope is that in all 4 games the moment we lifted our workrate and intensity we actually looked pretty good against these tactics. We need to work on finding that enrgy from the start and finding touch again and then look at how the opposition tactics hold up. We need to engage in the arm wrestle and not expect things to open up. Little tweaks to the line up and game plan will also help.

IMO If that fails - then and only then do we smash it up and start again.

For now we have to be solution focussed and not get down for too long. The shake up from this loss could turn out to be just what we need. Still a lot of football to be played this year and few more ups and downs to deal with.

Differing circumstances and standard of opposition, admittedly, but I think it could be safely argued it's 3 out of 7 - a win's a win, sure, but we were awful against GWS. Again, as with the Essendon* and St Kilda performances, we were (mentally?) ill-prepared and poorly coached.

He's got a really good record against certain types, like Rioli and Ballantyne. But seems to really struggle against others like Milne. He got smashed by Milne in the equivalent game last year, and almost cost us the win.

So many things went wrong it's hard to know where to start.

I still feel that as bad as we played, if Walker hadn't played on and missed early in the 2nd which resulted in an immediate saints goal, coupled with 3 other misses that 1/4, followed by Waite diving for a mark he couldn't reach allowing the saints to easily sweep away for a goal followed quickly by another, we would have won. They sucker punched us and once they got in front, they congested us and caught us on the break.

The team selection was baffling. Why was Bower there? We had no match up for him so that he and Jamieson would have to be hidden up forward. We easily could have used another runner ie Lucas or a leadup forward ie Thornton. Joseph on Milne was a stupid move.

I can accept losses but not like this.

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T E A M

Using these two words in a sentence to convey a different meaning.

I would like to smash that little flowering flower Milne into next week and smash that flowering little flower and make sure that he would need to see an Occupational Therapist for the rest of his flowering life.

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"Hence you will not say that Greeks fight like heroes but that heroes fight like Greeks"?

Winston Churchill

Disappointed the Garlett isn't hitting the scoreboard as much, but I thought he was pretty good as a high half forward. One of our few forwards who won the ball and brought it forward.

Clearly something was wrong with our defensive set up. They simply sliced right through it all night. And some of those goals from defensive 50s were inexcusable! I don't know if they had extra numbers back compared to ours, but there rarely seemed any space in our forward 50, and there always seemed a mountain of space in theirs. Either the coaches have a problem, or the players did a really poor job at shutting down the opposition from scoring. You're never going to win when the opposition scores so heavily and so easily.

If Waite doesn't fire early he doesn't fire. Throws in the towel when it looks like its not going to be his night. PLays from behind and flies for stupid marks.

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"I had to eat"

bower was OK compared to Waite!

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I'm more disappointed that the suffocating pressure that Garlett & Betts put on opposition defenders last season seems to have evaporated.

And it seems to me to be a symptom of the team in a wider sense in that there seems to be a lack of gut-running & desperation to be first to the contest and to keep the ball in our forward 50 at all costs. We are allowing the opposition an easy run from our F50 to theirs due to an overall lack of accountability and poor skills & decision making.

At one stage in the last quarter the Saints switched play in the middle with a long kick across the centre square to where four Saints players were on their own and one Carlton player was running to make a contest.

Our game play is so dependent on (a) first use of the ball and (b) precise use of the ball and there is no apparent strategy for retrieving possession once it is loss apart from hoping the opposition stuff it up.




Edited: being my own grammar Nazi

Compared to Waite, he was J Brown. Waite was awful yesterday.

But my point is what was Bower's role? He seemed to be a running player/link man. His disposal isn't up to that. Why was he selected? He's a defender, currently our 3rd tall defender. He had no matchup while we had no answer to the small forwards.

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T E A M

So who is putting their hand up in the magoos?