Mid-season review - what do you want from the rest of the year

[msb]

IF Sydney fail miserably this year we can start talking about the draft. The draft for the fans is a concession after an awful season. So lets forget about that for now because our season, while it hasn't been fantastic, is not as bad as Fremantle.

Of the remaining rounds, I'm embolding games I think we ought to win.

Collingwood (h)
Adelaide (a)
Nth Melbourne (h)
Essendon (h)
Carlton (a)
Melbourne (a)
St Kilda (h)
Richmond (a)
Geelong (h)
Collingwood (a)
Brisbane (h)

That is little different to what I would have said at the start of the season. Do it by blooding younger players or by going with experience, I don't care. Just keep doing it.

I'd also like to see the reserves kick into gear. With 8 games to play the small competition is still there to be taken, and by most accounts our reserves have been playing like the seniors - with too many lapses in performance. Get some consistancy so we can hang our hat on the future of the club, with or without senior performance.

*I know DoK, Thornton and a few others have been playing well, just like J Bolts in the seniors. But we need more then a few names week in, week out. For the past 5 years Richmond has had Richardson, Brown, Bowden and not much else.

@@@@!!! Not another 2 losses to collingwood! Cant we just beat them ONCE this year??!!!

[laughingnome]

@@@@!!! Not another 2 losses to collingwood! Cant we just beat them ONCE this year??!!!

Yeah - in the finals when a loss hurts them the most

[liz]

I just want us to win the next 14 games - including a 100 pt win over Collingwood next weekend and a one point, after-the-siren com-from-behind win late in the season to ruin their finals chances.

Oh, and Bazza to fire up and win the Coleman and Goodes to blitz the Charlie. It also rankles that we played in two GFs decided by barely a goal combined, won one and yet still don't have an NS medallist in our midst. So Kirky to win the one he was robbed of in 2006.

Not too much to ask is it...

[Melbournehammer]

Perhaps my memory is fading as I don't remember seeing any "flashes" of anything by the half way mark of 2005 other then a VERY ordinary football team. We had had no spectacular wins, had not beaten any team of note except PA, the previous years premiers, who were themselves ordinary all year and had been comprehensibly thrashed by WC and Saints.
Maybe I'm kidding myself but I don't remember thinking there was even a whole heap of potential at that stage of the year. I do remember being shattered when the wonderful Stewie went down and thinking that our season was gone with him.
As I said before, in my head I know there will be no miracle come backs this year, but I think Roos has it right when he says he will wait for the next two games before doing anything rash.
If, by some miracle we scrag wins against our two biggest nemesis' we'll all be jumping back on at a rate of knots and fancying our chances against the Cats and Saints.
I guess the bottom line is that I love my footy team, I'll support them through thick and thin and I just don't get the defeatist attitude so many on here have.

actually i remember thinking we had potential - but i remember this more because 2003 had been recent and we were still on the way up. we were beating brisbane regularly, had shown that we could beat st kilda, and were always competitive.

but we were also lucky. My memory is that year everything went right - fev got suspended when we were due to play them, mooney got suspended when we were due to play them, and so on.

And we had two styles - we could play a slow patient build up and every single time hit a player on the lead. But we could also play a fast brand which involved taking LRT off and having a whole team of runners. So I often thought we were in the game

I don't have that feeling with us any more. I have absolutely no expectations with geelong, the second and third quarters against st kilda were so painful to watch, the bulldogs game is a replica of our last three games against them - we are competitive un til they break us open kick about 4 (or 13) goals in a row and we simply dont have the skills to peg them back.

Against Hawthorn i was just pleased that we got close. And that was against a side which had no tall defenders and was playing stewart dew on michael o'loughlin - I remember O'Loughlin circa 2003 and thinking how regularly buchanan could hit players inside 50 with passes which went about 10 metres. Buchanan can't hit a barn door and o'loughlin can't beat dew on the lead.

So I'm in the we are fading fast camp but they are my team and I will go every chance I get - including up to sydney to watch a side whom I cannot stand probably wallop us yet again - a side whom collingwood fans at previous games have leaned over to me and said - you make us look fast - and that was when they had licuria and buckley and not thomas and dick...it would just be nice to not have an honourable defeat against them - you know where they get out to a 50 point lead and we late in the game bring it back to 24.

[swans_premiers]

For "Defeatist" read realist and you will get it

22 players on each team.
All can kick, mark, handpass, tackle etc.

Anyone who's ever had a good game can replicate it.
It all comes down to belief and confidence.

ATM geelong and saints go out EXPECTING to win.
Melbourne go out EXPECTING to lose.
Deep down everyteam EXPECTS to lose to cats.
Right now Sydney EXPECT to win at home and do. We EXPECT to lose away to good sides and do.


You guys can sit here and give us reason after reason why we're not going anywhere this year. I can sit here and give you reason after reason why there's reason to belief. What's gonna matter is which side Roos and the players take wether we pull our socks up...make a charge towards finals and top 4 and give it our best shot or give up.We all look back at 2005/06 and think wow great times everything was good then.

REALITY is it wasn't. you look back at the threads here, after a few rounds, mid season after getting thrashed by saints, after the eagles loss in perth, even during the geelong game...etc etc the chips were down.

Nick davis summed it up well in shaking down the thunder...
"I thought this is too good a team and too good of an opportunity to waste"

RIGHT NOW...we are one game off 4th. You can look at Collingwood and Crows game and think "oh no they always beat us." Or you can look at them and say you know what "it's time we beat these guys" and you know what...I choose to believe we can and will n I hope you do too because hope is a magical thing.

[Jewels]

22 players on each team.
All can kick, mark, handpass, tackle etc.

Anyone who's ever had a good game can replicate it.
It all comes down to belief and confidence.

ATM geelong and saints go out EXPECTING to win.
Melbourne go out EXPECTING to lose.
Deep down everyteam EXPECTS to lose to cats.
Right now Sydney EXPECT to win at home and do. We EXPECT to lose away to good sides and do.


You guys can sit here and give us reason after reason why we're not going anywhere this year. I can sit here and give you reason after reason why there's reason to belief. What's gonna matter is which side Roos and the players take wether we pull our socks up...make a charge towards finals and top 4 and give it our best shot or give up.We all look back at 2005/06 and think wow great times everything was good then.

REALITY is it wasn't. you look back at the threads here, after a few rounds, mid season after getting thrashed by saints, after the eagles loss in perth, even during the geelong game...etc etc the chips were down.

Nick davis summed it up well in shaking down the thunder...
"I thought this is too good a team and too good of an opportunity to waste"

RIGHT NOW...we are one game off 4th. You can look at Collingwood and Crows game and think "oh no they always beat us." Or you can look at them and say you know what "it's time we beat these guys" and you know what...I choose to believe we can and will n I hope you do too because hope is a magical thing.

Thankyou, at least there's one other believer on here with me.

[RedRosie]

For them to get on with it ! These RDO's are making me killing me .

[Primmy]

I feel we recruited very well last year when we went for two fast players (Hannebury,Heath) and Lewis Johnstone for a key position.We chose to grab their signatures then let them finish schooling commitments in Victoria and we will gain the benefit next year.The draft will,apparantly,not give us the choice we would be going for as the GC seems to have it all wrapped up.We therefore showed great insight by what we did in 2008.Hopefully we will reap the benefits.
I haven't given up on DOK either.Some players come on quicker than others.

I am glad you haven't given up on DOK. I meantersay, Kirky didn't come good until 2003, and he shocked us with "who is that bloke!" during the Manika practiced match in 1999, still couldn't get a game until well after than, and that is all being sent home unwanted etc etc. That has to give you pause at least!

And I like our new kids. Nearly all of them.
We will just have to wait and see.

BUT, I would also like to see the kids playing like seniors and not being (IMO) intimidated by the guys who have already "been there done that". Other than Bulldog and occasionally McVeigh, they appear to be holding back and waiting to be lead.

[Nico]

I am glad you haven't given up on DOK. I meantersay, Kirky didn't come good until 2003, and he shocked us with "who is that bloke!" during the Manika practiced match in 1999, still couldn't get a game until well after than, and that is all being sent home unwanted etc etc. That has to give you pause at least!

And I like our new kids. Nearly all of them.
We will just have to wait and see.

BUT, I would also like to see the kids playing like seniors and not being (IMO) intimidated by the guys who have already "been there done that". Other than Bulldog and occasionally McVeigh, they appear to be holding back and waiting to be lead.

Perhaps they are holding back because of the game plan they must play.

Look at the Bulldogs right now. They are playing fast, close in, hard running football. We are not even playing our close in football any where near what we used to. The Bulldogs are off the leash and relishing it. They run to space on the HFF all the time. We run to the HBF and and when we finally release the footy all our players are in the back half. The Bulldogs almost always kick to a VERY free player or hold the footy until they have one.

[BigD]

I'd like to see the Swans thrash the Pies next week.
Beyond that I'd like to see them play some consistent(good not bad) footy and put together 4 good quarters each week instead of clocking off for a quarter or two and letting the opposition run rampant.