pro: too sick to get to the game last night

con: able to see it on tellie and again this morning.

pro: I am not so sure about those 5 to 6 players like Caz, Geelong hurt many of our players last night men v boys.

pro: but the result was about what I expected because we are kids to their men and that makes all the diffference in the world and many of the holes and crappiness that people are weeing themselves over at the moment will dissipate as the lads get older/stronger/more experienced.

Con: I am not so down on JR, think he has had some good games and a super half a few weeks ago and, like Betts, JR is forced to chase an awful lot to cover those in our side who do not chase. Truth is though, it was a poor game last night, as if the ferocity of Geelong got to him.

con: I thought Stevens was shocking last night.

con: Fish is struggling, but sticking him out on the wing made it hard for him to hurt the only way he can, a couple of grabs in front of goal.

con: Should never have dropped Edwards.

pro/con: Cloke at CHF is fine, but then we must accept the belting in the ruck.


possible pro/future cons: Can we try Benj and Ando? I do not care what Benj has shown in the bullants - try him, see what happens. He has pace and we looked slow again last night.

I would love for us to try Aisake and believe it will never happen - jesus I wish i followed a side that took risks at the selection table - but then, apart from greener grass, I might never have seen those 8 flags in my lifetime.

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This type of slight is alien in the more cultured part of the world - Walsh. Its up there with mad dogs, Englishmen and the midday sun!

Not sure if that is right Frank. I think last year we won 4 out of the first ten including beating highly fancied Dogs and Port who made the granny. This year we have beaten the bottom three, but only really impressive win was against C'wood. We have been smashed by the Saints, the Cats and the Lions and this year we have Judd and Stevens, another #1 draft pick and a group of young players who are bigger and better.

I'd say the jury is still out. We seem to be better but we still get flogged by the teams that have flogged us over the last few years and haven't played Hawks or Dogs.

I think we concentrate too much on uncontested possession and nowhere near enough on intensity, tackling, and contesting.

I expect us to be considerably better than last year, and over the next 4 weeks, with several winnables, we shall see, but at this stage our record is similar to last year except Stevo is not injured and we have the best player in the country playing for us.

PRO:
I missed the game
armfield

CONS:
I missed the game
bowers injury

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"You don’t get much more Navy Blue than Stephen Kernahan" - Marc Murphy

Ditto.....

thought it was a pretty woeful performance last night, and agree that one of the worst things I saw was nobody taking the mark for Bower when he was clearly in alot of pain.. but something that continuously bugs the hell out of me is...

a) people bagging Setanta's kicking; its actually pretty darn good so stop generalising and assuming he is a poor kick because he doesn't have a footy background...IMO Carraz is a hell of a lot worse and his kick in's are atrocious, atleast Setanta generally hits a target (even if its probably not the best decision) ...and... nobody in the team seems to place much confidence in his abilities, which again, are probably better than a few who play week in week out, which is a disgrace in itself as these people have been playing footy their entire lives...

b) bagging Setanta as a defender... he made a couple of blunders last night, but played exceptionally well last week, and, um, incase you hadn't noticed, the entire team was pretty dirt poor last night! Setanta had 18 touches of the ball, (albeit mostly uncontested possies), and played on Lonergan, Tiffany Hawkins and to a lesser extent Ottens when forward... who collectively garnered 18 touches in total, and kicked two goals between them (which were both Lonergans, neither of which were scored directly against Setanta)... his decision making can be poor but if he played for a better team I think that may improve. It just annoys the crap out of me when you guys bag him out when he tries so hard... Ratten was outcoached again last night...Fev went 78 minutes or something like that without a touch...and nothing was done to get him into the game!!! C'MON!!!!!

Go Blues.

Pro and Con:

Tigers will take the heat off us again

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Mjonc signing off at 8888

Fully agree, Difference is now we have more value on our list that we can trade. Was difficult with Deluca, Beasy, Campbell, McGrath, Digby, Clarke etc on our list to spark interest in anyone.

I think at themoment Fisher is everyones favourite trade bait topic, but on current form, we may not get much.

Cons:

*It truly felt like an away game. Of the 47,000 there it felt like only 3,000 were Carlton people.

*The Paul Bower injury with his family over from WA & watching in the stands (although it was bound to happen).

Pros:

*The game gave us an indication of where we're at and where we need to get to.

*Clokey's mark...I said in my training report he looked pumped and his first half was very good imho.

*I came away feeling ok about our future - especially our 2 hard nut youngsters in Armfield and Browne and the Hampson/Kruezer ruck combo.

Well said Doc.

In addition I think a big Pro to games like this where you are playing a brilliant team on-song is that you can work out which players can lift in intensity, which ones are treading water and which ones won't be any good at finals football (sort of like Budzy's thread). From watching the game it was pretty clear who was floundering and who was finding ways to lift them and their team-mates.

Pros-

JUDD
For somebody who is injured, he was a star last night. Easilly our best and whilst i still say we should have rested him, was great to see him play so well when he is still so far off his best. Has re-invented himself similar to what Kouta did when he came back from his knee.

SETANTA
Wasn't a brilliant game nor was he in our best 5, but at least he's showing that he is in our best 22 now. He's consistancy over the last couple of weeks has been good.

SIMPSON
Thought he was gone.......... very inspiring to see him come back out and figure in our best.

GRIGG
Think he's coming along quite nicely.




Cons:-

Where the hell do i start?

THE LAST 6MIN BEFORE HALF TIME.
Jesus.......... i have never before been so ashamed to be a Carlton supporter. What a disgrace that was. It serioulsy made me sick. And don't say that the tactic worked because we got that goal. We were THUMPED last night. We lost all respect going into halftime and Geelong made us pay! Discgracefull play...... don't do that shit again!

OUT-COACHED.
I love Ratten and think he has improved this team in such a short period of time more than Pagan did in 4 bloody years. But Shit, he was lost last night. The shot of him in the coaches box said it all. He had no answer.
This 'Going Wide' & 'Playing the Flanks' style of play is obviously something he has worked hard on but it's clearly not working and i say it every week.
In fact, i'm pretty sure that our first goal for over a Quater of footy came as a result of playing through the corridor. Correct me if i'm wrong on that.
Protection MUST be given to Judd and why the hell wasn't anybody tagging Ablett? 13 Touches in the 3rd and not a player on him.

RUCK
Kruezer's gotta be given a spell in the Bullants. Bring in Aisakie. I don't care what his attitude is like and i don't give a shit if he's ready or not. It's worth a bloody try. Hampson & Kreuzer had just 13 hit-outs between em. What's the worst that can happen if Aisakie comes in? TRY SOMETHING DIFFERENT!

BALLS.
Few players out there who need to grow a pair.

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"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit"
- Aristotle

Pros
- Gibbs: will be a very fine player
- Grigg: coming along nicely
- Armfield: showed some promise
- Waite to return next week and Thornton will be better for the run.
- Browne and Hampson tried hard.

Cons
- Bowers injury
- Fisher: unless he starts kicking or setting up goals there isn't much point him being in the side.
- Carazzo & O'Hailpin: I feel nervous whenever they have the footy in their hands.
- Stevend & Scotland: poor defensive pressure/chasing...same old same old

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There is no footy god

Yeah , it was one of those defining games I felt..

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There's so much I could say...

pro; armfield, browne, gibbs and hampson

cons; jamo, waite and hadley not there!
bowers injury!

time for stone clod austin to come in. [while jamo and bower are out its time for austin]
how good did amfield look. looked like he had played 100 games fantastic as goes with browne.

Ive just got home to Myrtleford after attending the game at the dome. For what it's worth here is what i saw.

We continually kick down the lines when we gather posession. Now this is OK as long as you have the heart to gut run when the ball spills over to the opposition as it will some of the time. When the players wont gut run with their opponents, it allows their midfield runners like, Corey, Ablett, Wodginski< Varcoe and the likes to run the pill down the guts to open forward lines because all of our boys have gone to the contest. It is just stupid undisciplined footy. Look at the amounts of goals kicked by their midfield runners. Throw in Johnson getting the ball lace out and their is 2 thirds of thier score.

As I said all of this happens because we go Skinny, and do not yet have the poise to hold onto the ball in tight situations, and we just flick it around until we cough it up and then wont gut run to rectify it.

Postives....Im struggling to find any when the basics arent in place to be competitive. And I'm not MELVEY under another name. Im just shattered at the way the boys played tonight. If that is Ratten's game plan [ Always go skinny, dont use the corridor and flick the ball around by hand and foot] then I really am depressed.

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Go BLues

I think on this years games G Ablett is the best player in the country, and dont get me wrong, I love Juudy, however he is second best at this stage.

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Go BLues

Pro-
That someone close to the club can aknowledge what a woeful performance that was and how little future we have with some who played last night. Some of the deficiency is due to a skill level that is below AFL

Cons-
Russel Bentick Wiggins need to be replaced and are not AFL players
- We lack outside players (Houlihan & Walker are injured)
- Tackling generally way below AFL standard. Body strength is just not there. Is this a function of youth or deficient conditioning
- Murphy and Gibbs are too slow. They need runners around them
- Match Commitee selection. Our future was better served playing Pfeiifer and Edawards than Wiggins and Bentick
-Slowing the game down and chipping. I would have rather the message got out to Russel and Grigg to take the game on and break the lines. Thise two especially are not their to just mark and kick

Just read this...couldnt agree more

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Go BLues

The run home must have messed with your mind if you couldn't find any positives from Saturday night.

I guess the point I am trying to make is, you can have the best players in the comp going around for you, but if they play individual footy, to a game plan which they cant execute, then all the positives in the world arent going to matter.

And i acknowledge that there were some good things from last night, but they are out weighed in my mind by missing basics.

And dont get me wrong it shits me to death that i sound like MELVEY for once on my life.

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Go BLues

Its not Ratten's game plan, but we're not ready to execute his game plan so we have to improvise a little at the moment until the players are ready.

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"The ability to speak doesn't make you intelligent." Qui-Gon Jinn 15-05-2005

"there’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the [Western Bulldogs] than there is of any change in the Labor Party." Julia Gillard 18-05-2010