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It's been another big season of disappointment for Carlton, but things are finally looking up for them. After winning our last three meetings by a combined seven points, they've blown us away by eight here. I'm sure that will please the sort of nuffies who show up outside Princes Park to eyeball players when things are going wrong. Just don't mention how the other wins were in games that had major implications on the season, while this was just two average sides who can only beat North Melbourne 50% of the time fulfilling contractual obligations.

Despite this game being officially designated a slopfest before the first bounce, I'm more upset than the time they beat us in a sudden death final. That night ended in death by failure to take opportunities, but not without some good performances (including Joel Smith's best game as a forward right at the same time his urine test was setting off alarms at the lab) while Saturday night involved us conceding goals to such a wide variety of randoms that Jamie Shanahan would've fancied his chances of getting one. 

Meanwhile, after the muted highs of last week we went back to moving the ball with the grace and poise of a Little League team. Like most losses this season we avoided brutal defeat, but the clock must be ticking towards an opposition getting serious and using us for target practice. But not Carlton, who deserved to win but showed about as much to get excited about for the future as we did last week. Like us, they should be happy to get any sort of win at this stage of this season, but I'll eat Bruce Doull's headband if this thrilling rivalry isn't relocated to the bottom four within a couple of seasons.

Thanks to Pickett's one man operation inside 50, we were still a chance of winning late in the last quarter, but the final result didn't leave me with any sense of one that got away. With limited exceptions we're such a flat, tedious side that even losing thrillers no longer excites passion. I'm against messing around with the season to eliminate dead rubbers (ask a Richmond fan if they enjoyed thrashing West Coast), but it's hard to watch us ebb away slowly. This side is like your granny going from robust health to a nursing home in two years, and while old Ethel is hanging on for dear life you get the feeling there's sad singing and slow walking in the near future.

Maybe there'd be a bit more light at the end of the tunnel (refer to the title of this post) if Oliver wasn't robbed blind out of a potentially decisive free in the final minutes, but maybe start by not letting the VFL All Stars run riot for 3.5 quarters. This also requires suspending your disbelief that he wouldn't have punted the ball straight into Jacob Weitering's hands like most of our other inside 50s. We were jibbed on that decision but you've got more oomph left than me if you can muster up the appropriate level of anger. We're so boring as an organisation that Carlton fans had to punch on with each other to fill in the time.

After one week as a normal person it was back to watching at home, and having never watched a second of the 2023 Semi Final highlights because why would you, I had no idea how close the winning goal was to hitting the post from an open goalsquare. Talk about sliding doors moments, we'd have lost the Prelim just as badly as Carlton but what's his name would have been #1 seed in blooper videos until the end of time.

There were about 100 more grand clangers and cock-ups in this game but none that anyone will remember/care about other than Steven May going through an opponent like a freight train. It would have been piss funny if we'd snatched an undeserved win at the end, but the overall vibe of the evening was sadness. The only signs for either side were all some variety of "Danger, cliff ahead". Maybe all the previously unknown characters who had a field day against us will go on with it, but they'll never get a more welcoming opposition than this. If Voss doesn't send Goodwin a hamper to say thanks then he's got no manners.

Even after 12 losses I still can't bring myself to fill up the hump of hate. The only truly dreadful ones (though watch this space) were in rounds 2 and 3, and since then we've been the blandest losers in AFL history. I still think our coach should pull the pin before the ugly losses begin, but it's just cruel pinning the latest loss entirely on him. He did a token playing of some kids, and the players had plenty of opportunities to execute, we're just lacking zing, and even though the Blues have been disappointing this year we couldn't just wait them out like North.

The Sunshine + Rainbows faction will howl that we only lost by eight points and stop being so miserable, but you may as well try citing Expected Score to prove that if XYZ happened differently we'd be in the eight. Cobblers. Maybe we could squeak out another couple of wins (e.g. St. Kilda in Alice Springs), but the whole experience has been such a soulless struggle that I refuse to believe there's an alternative universe where our season is still alive. 

The official margin was eight, but the famous 'feels like' margin was about four goals, and as Carlton are only slightly less shite than us I don't know how you'd get anything from this match other than a full scale chub (or equivalent) for Kysaiah Pickett. I'd obviously have been cheerier if we'd come back to pinch it, but the joy of laughing at combustible opposition fans would just mask what I still expect to be a grim future.

Fair to say everyone in the media was secretly going for us, because while it wouldn't really matter if we lost by a sensible margin, they were guaranteed a spot of carnage if Carlton lost again. Unfortunately for them none of the sides which might take advantage of a diminished, lineup battered by months of disappointment were available. Instead, they took on the AFL's equivalent of the Make A Wish Foundation, and we bent over backwards to make them comfortable. Like Charlie Curnow arriving without a goal for a month, then kicking one inside the opening minute after finding our backline had more open space than the Mojave Desert. 

When Curnow also got their second I had visions of him kicking 14 in the greatest return to form ever seen, but to our credit we slowed him down from there until he was gifted the sealer. Unfortunately this came at the cost of a bunch of people who may as well have been called Mr. X having a jolly old time of it. For two hours on Saturday night there was more activity at Kingsley Manor than Heathrow Airport. 

For once we were efficient in converting inside 50s, mainly because there was only one. On a night of dropped marks, this one worked in our favour because Pickett got to have his shot on the run instead. Mind you, considering some of the mad shit he did later it might have been one of those games where he'd plonk them from anywhere. Our only problem was getting it to him, because he's not going to drag down pack marks and most of the kicks forward were being chopped off with the greatest of ease. We tried the Melksham/Harris Andrews scam on Weitering and it slammed the brakes on Milkshake's hot run of form. He couldn't beat him in the air, had no room for outmanoeuvring in one-on-one contests, and at one point van Rooyen cut across his lead in a way that made it look like they'd only just met.

Melk did get one after playing up front on contact against a different opponent as if he'd been bashed in the upper body with a cricket bat. Whatever's going on in the Carlton coaching box, they weren't silly enough to let that happen again, and while Melksham had a red-hot go all night he was never a serious factor again.

Things got better once we stopped looking like conceding every time the Blues crossed halfway. Pickett got a second after a beautiful kick from Windsor. He didn't do a lot more, but this was enough to make me genuinely hostile to the idea of playing him at the other end of the ground. It seemed like they tried to fill that role with Sharp, which was a noble attempt at doing something different in an otherwise pointless game but I can't see that catching on.

On the subject of things we can stop doing ASAP, enough of van Rooyen as second ruckman. It's not his fault we won't pick a second ruckman, but he spent the first quarter looking awkward around the ball and being flogged in ruck contests by Mark Internet. Just park the guy inside 50, kick it at him and let's judge what happens next.

Now that we'd gone beyond Carlton looking like they'd kick 27 goals from 30 forward entries, we were very much back in the game. So what more could you ask for than gifting a goal right at the end of the quarter after Chandler wandered somewhere in the vicinity of the theoretical protected zone. He wasn't having the slightest influence on the kicker, but that's the half-baked, randomly adjudicated rules for you. How about a 25 metre penalty for the administrative shit that nobody really understands? Keep the 50 for egregious crimes like poleaxing your opponent after the mark or threatening to eat the umpire's dog, but have a lesser penalty for any offence based on the umpire interpreting angles or distance. Greg Swan, if you're reading I am available to join the competition committee and will not be nearly as annoying to sit in a room with as Patrick Dangerfield.

We had a chance to wipe that unfortunate goal out in the final seconds, but as usual a long, hopeful kick landed 30 metres out directly with a key defender and no Melbourne player in the same area code. You never know when we'll rip 10 minutes of glory from our arse and kick a few goals on the bounce but it always comes as a surprise, because for the rest of the game we make it look unwatchably difficult. I promise anyone who can't watch Saturday footy now that it's off free to air that you missed nothing here. 

There were air fryer infomercials on other channels that were more entertaining than watching 22 of our players. Even Petracca and Oliver aren't really worth watching these days. I don't doubt either of their efforts but they've reached the limit of what can be done in this side, and I've come to terms with letting both go if that's what they want. But not at any price, we're hardly going to be attracting top free agents at the end of the season so I'd rather slap the golden handcuffs on them than be swindled into paying huge chunks of their salary to regain a love of life elsewhere.

I've always said if given the choice I'd take Petracca over Oliver (despite him trailing 4-2 in Jakovich Medal wins), but the highlights package for Clayton's 200th game was a great reminder of all the iconic stuff he's been involved in over the years. Obviously nothing's ever going to beat that goal in the Mad Minute, and subsequent appearance in the most iconic MFC photo of our lifetime (NB: not this one) but his sixth sense handballing and ability to duck and weave in traffic like The Matrix was ace. Now, like so much else post-2022 he's just diminished. I appreciate the regular coalface extraction, and he has played decent games this year but since whatever happened off-field a couple of years ago the star power is gone.

Petracca seems to have more to give, but I think his life force for doing it with us is fast disappearing. After that Sydney game when he was beaming and his mum was dropping the magic on national TV I thought we were close to the big "Fuck getting more followers on Instagram, I'm staying" speech but we're getting closer and closer to him slamming down the fresh start card. You'll know it's coming when stories that paint the club in a bad light for the King's Birthday 2024 fiasco conveniently start appearing in the media around Round 24.

We achieved peak tedium in the second quarter, and it was an almost entirely forgettable quarter other than somebody called Moir putting Moir pressure on the already jam-packed Kingsley kueue by equalling his previous career goalkicking tally by half time. The answer to the traditional question "Moir, Moir, Moir, how do you like it?" was "not in the slightest". Our response was a set shot from  40 metres out by recent first round draft pick Jefferson which helicoptered into the hands of a defender barely half the distance to goal. 

I feel for him because he's got Billings style Resting Terrified Face, but later in the quarter he dropped a sitter of a chest mark and I was ready to chuck any notion of preparing for the future and play McDonald, Petty or Darren Bennett at full forward instead. The spilt mark formed part of an all-time putrid bit of play where the loose ball was kicked to van Rooyen, who didn't hear the umpire saying it (allegedly) hadn't gone far enough, then having to panic handball to Windsor who wasn't ready for it and could only let off a hasty snap for a point. 

After a first half that was as much of a spectacle as that Richmond/Essendon disaster, I'd have thought all 36 players on the ground at the siren would have slinked away as quickly as possible. Instead they did some fake fighting that was so weak it didn't even attract fines in a year where the MRO has already pirated $36,000 from our players for various crimes. All we learned from the footy equivalent of drunks going through the motions in a pub carpark was from the slow-mo replay that showed Oliver has really yellow teeth. If I was a dentist that would've been the final straw after already enduring pure sporting slurry since the first bounce.

We were 19 points down and struggling to score against a side who have been leakier than a ferry in the Philippines, but Kayo did their bit to lift spirits by playing the clip of Harley Reid kicking that goal against us last year about seven times during the break. I know they can't sell all the ad space during breaks, but would you not either: a) get a wider variety of clips to play, or b) plug some of your thousand footy preview/review shows. Unfortunately, one of the spots they did flog was a reboot of Toyota's Legendary Moments with even more punchable 'comedians' than last time. 

By the time I'd seen Reid's goal in every break I was scared about playing West Coast, even as the score in the corner of the screen showed they were in the process of losing comfortably to Richmond. I don't suppose the timing is going to work for us to bring Yze back once his apprenticeship is over. And why would he want to come? Coaching us now would be like buying a decent looking house that's about to have the roof collapse.

The game couldn't have been much worse unless the ground was accidentally covered in sewage at half time, and the third quarter was time for our once a week outburst of exciting football. First JVR outmarked somebody who appeared to be named after former NSW premier Barry O'Farrell, then Fritsch continued his relatively Fritsch vein of form (fingers crossed for a job calling from the Fox Footy studio with material like that) and the margin was back under 10 points. Appropriately, the main character for the few minutes when we were worth watching was Pickett. First he kicked a set shot from a ridiculous angle from the left side, then did a checkside/banana/spinny thing from the opposite spot and you could imagine him single-handedly carrying our corpse over the line. At least for the 30 seconds until we let them kick a steadier. 

And that was pretty much the end of the non-clobbering related excitement. Tholstrup got the hook five minutes into the quarter, and I don't understand why you wouldn't just make the change at half time and save the departed player from having the camera focused on him looking dejected. He was hard done by to have to warm-up and go back out there for a token appearance, but can't have had any argument with being taking off because he'd done nowt. 

In came Lindsay, the only Round 1 debutante still yet to kick a career goal, who failed to extend his record of 0.5 due to a shot missing everything. Meanwhile, the Carlton guy with 0.0 in his first three games ended up having three shots, and was mobbed after a goal like he'd just won a Grand Final after the siren.

The only remaining item of interest for the quarter was May absolutely killing somebody improbably called 'Frankie' in a collision. There was no bump or leaving of ground, so I understand he'll probably get a life ban but am keen to hear what alternative options he was supposed to have considered in the 0.1 seconds available. Rather than saying "what was I supposed to do, let the guy run on to a loose ball inside 50?" I'd claim to not have even known the Carlton player was there and claim that he got in the way of my very normal running for the footy.

On the famous 'football act' scale, running towards a loose ball outranks leaping in the air to smother a handball, but Frankie went to Concussionwood (including a flying tooth) so in conjunction with the sight of blood pouring from the victim's head, May's stuffed. I'm not going to demand Supreme Court action if he gets rubbed out (and ironically he'll be out next week with a concussion of his own), but let's not get excited and pretend this was done with the same savagery as that time he shirtfronted the SME into an alternative dimension.

A 10 point margin is nothing, but I had serious doubts that we'd a) score, or b) stop Carlton from scoring. There was a spot of excitement when Pickett set up Fritsch's second, before we rolled over and died for a few minutes and let them kick two goals - one to a defender, one for the player's first in league footy. And that should've been it, except Pickett punted one through off the ground to keep the prospect of a wholly undeserved win alive.

I'm not sure it ever really got 'interesting', but the margin was dragged back under a goal when Jefferson dropped a mark but got a free after being caught in a Jake The Snake Roberts style DDT. I honestly expected him to kick into the man on the mark or OOF at right angles, but he chipped through an unconvincing set shot and we were a chance of either nicking this in comedy fashion, or Laurence Angwin was going to magically teleport onto the ground and kick the winning goal. 

We never got the chance to grab the lead and somehow get rorted, because the rorts came first. I despise blaming umpires for losing, especially considering all the dumb things we'd done for four quarters, but Oliver was absolutely ransacked out of a free after a rundown tackle at our end. His reaction verged on dissent, but the umpires were obviously too embarrassed to pinch him for it. They had their revenge down the other end when he was done for hanging off Curnow at a stoppage, allowing the once out of form spearhead to wallop through the winning goal from Jeff White 2005 territory.

Technically there was time to pluck two goals from our arse, but while they have some similarities to the 2022 edition Carlton that was prone to falling for things like that, we're connected in name only to the 2022 Melbourne that may have taken advantage. I'm sure everyone associated with Carlton enjoyed it, but I missed seeing Voss reach back and yank a couple of knives from his back by unsportingly turning the TV off with a few seconds left, safe to assume we weren't going to benefit from some mad 50-50-goal-free-goal insanity. We didn't, and thus ended another game that doesn't look bad on paper but makes you think about moving to a lighthouse in the Galapagos Islands.  

Can somebody please come up with a one-off finals gimmick that means we don't have to play the last three weeks of the season? I'm convinced all of Hawthorn, Footscray, and Collingwood are going to pay off a season of 'not quite there' performances by unmercifully rooting us.

Next Week
Just as we've rediscovered the joy of kicking set shots (and not much else in this case), it's a chance to redeem ourselves against St. Kilda after the off chops insanity of our previous meeting. You couldn't honestly blame the conditions last time, but now it'll be happening under a roof so there really is no excuse. We've got to create the chances before they can be missed, and our old pal Ross Lyon will be rubbish his hands together in glee at the chance to salvage something from a season that's somehow been even worse than ours (for now) by eliminating all avenues to goal. I suspect he'll be happy to win 30-15, so there's a chance this could end up as the all-time lowest rated Channel 7 game between two Victorian clubs.

The obvious omission is Tholstrup who has tested the 'play kids' theory over the last two weeks. I still blame them for dropping him after an encouraging performance on King's Birthday, but considering the players who have slogged all year in the Reserves for minimal opportunities (hello Bailey Laurie), it would be a violent extraction of piss to pick him next week. If Laurie can't get in the starting lineup next week then why in god's name is he signed until the end of next year? Whether he's a long term player or not doesn't matter anymore, you've got him for another season so give him a go.

Had Jefferson's game ended on his double blunders I'd have directed him to the VFL so vigorously my thumb fell off, but I'm almost seduced by the idea of keeping him in the side but nah. Even if there's no obvious replacement let's just put the last few weeks down to development and try something else. I don't know what that is considering Turner will be required in defence, but it might force us to go against core beliefs and try something different. 

I've got a revolutionary idea, pick some sort of second ruckman so van Rooyen can concentrate on playing as a forward. Before watching Casey mug Carlton in the VFL I'd have continued the campaign to give Verrall a game, but Johnson kicked four goals in the first half so he'll definitely be back at the front of the queue. Not much of a ruckman, and doesn't help my fervent belief that we're going to break Gawn by playing him in a bunch of pointless games, but if they're not going to give Max a rest then JVR may as well benefit. Besides, in a classic case of overreacting to minor details that you don't know the full story of, Verrall didn't even start as first ruck so I doubt their interest in playing him. Not getting a touch for most of the first half didn't help his cause.

The only other thing I learnt from the VFL is that Carlton had a player called Stirling Phipps-Potts, who may be the most Melbourne-named non-Melbourne player since Rochford Devenish-Meares. It was party time for double barrel surnames when their first goal came from Denver Grainger-Barras, before Casey proceeded to win in a canter. I suppose if the senior side had that many unknown players their Reserves were always going to be fill-in heavy.

I've got NFI what's going to happen. St Kilda are crap, but we've already made them look good once this year. It may come down to which side's senior players can muster up the enthusiasm to play like the game means something. I think these changes leave us one short on the bench so it's reader's choice on who you want to fill the gap.

IN: Laurie, Howes, Lindsay (starts), Johnson
OUT: May (one reason or the other), Jefferson, Sharp, Tholstrup (omit)
LUCKY: Chandler, Viney
UNLUCKY: Billings, Culley, Kentfield, Petty, Sparrow

2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Kysaiah Pickett
--- Light years ---
4 - Bayley Fritsch
3 - Judd McVee
2 - Clayton Oliver
1 - Max Gawn

Apologies to Langford, McDonald, and Salem who may have scored a slice of the action due to lack of competition. 

Leaderboard
It's ever so slightly on at the top of the leaderboard, but Gawn must remain favourite when Pickett would need to overcome a 13 vote gap with only 25 left to hand out. No change in the other awards, though the Seecamp will probably be down to Bowey vs Turner once May falls victim to the footy culture wars.  

47 - Max Gawn (WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
34 - Kysaiah Pickett
24 - Jake Melksham
--- Abandon all hope ye beyond here ---
20 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
17 - Christian Petracca
16 - Clayton Oliver
15 - Daniel Turner
13 - Steven May
11 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tom McDonald
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon
8 - Bayley Fritsch, Christian Salem
7 - Xavier Lindsay, Jack Viney
4 - Tom Sparrow
3 - Judd McVee
2 - Jake Lever, Harrison Petty, Trent Rivers
1 - Harry Sharp

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
Take your choice on Pickett from the boundary line, but the one on the right side was so beautiful that it's unlucky not to replace his goal against Port as the clubhouse leader. Neither happened in a win, so the one he kicked from the square last week before going on to do bugger all is ultimately worth more than either of them. 

Final thoughts
Where else would you rather be? Actually, don't answer that.

Punching down

Contrary to what people who love content say, there's nothing wrong with an end of year slopfest between rubbish sides. Feel free to explain how this game would've been more interesting if played as part of Group D in the AFL Mid-Season Cup. The moment it was over it meant nothing, but we won, and mysteriously picked a windy day to start kicking set shots so who's complaining?

The MCC will be right behind mid-year cup games in front of 1500 people at Arden Street because it will clear the July calendar for them to put on half-baked friendlies involving popular European soccer teams. It's obviously a for profit organisation now anyway (though I bet not as far as the taxman knows), or they wouldn't shut half the stadium and create Chinese traffic jam style congestion in the lower concourse at half time.

One thing I'll say for the clods who run the place is that nobody expected the third largest home and away crowd ever between these sides. Bad news for the lucky ground staff who got a shift and thought they were going to have an easy day with none of the usual Collingwood fans smuggling in guns or texting in threats to Michael Voss, only to end up managing people movement more chaotic than the Fall of Saigon.

Big club fans would scoff over 35,844, but it's off the charts considering where these teams are at. The turnout can either be credited to whoever came up with the Kid's Day theme, or both sets of fans thinking their side was a chance of winning. Neither applied to me, it just happened to be a rare case of my schedule aligning with the fixture instead of Melbourne either being interstate or having a bye every time I was free to go. This was by no means worth watching again, but it did leave me 2-2 in live games this season. It doesn't make up for all the great wins missed in our fleeting glory era, but it's a Melksham-esque comeback from watching our season-defining capitulation to North.

Other than a few trashbag quarters spread over to games against Gold Coast we'd been better than you'd expect from a 5-11 team but that's a pretty sad consolation prize. The highs haven't lasted long enough, which is why we're in this mess. Still, this result puts the Spitebury Plan back on the agenda, as we're now one spot ahead of last year. In 2024 we finished 14th with 11 wins, now there will be (restrained) street parties and possible mid-table mediocrity if we get that. It's a funny old game.

The theme may have been young people (and lucky we didn't lose, or it would have been called the Hitting The Skids Game), but our only attempt to match it on-field was playing Jefferson even though he's got the physical presence of Cale Morton on a three week hunger strike. I'm pleased to say that even adjusting for opposition quality this was easily his best game, but I'll still be huffing oxygen before Round 1, 2026 if we haven't found somebody sturdier to play down there.

I'm all for the playing of what limited 'kids' we have, but after Gawn's rare hands-down loss at the hands of North last time, I'm biased by novelty but thought this might be the week to go down the other end of the age/experience scale and give him some help by picking Tom Campbell. Instead we opted for the proven strategy of running Gawn into the ground/costing van Rooyen vital development time as a forward, but we won (not because of either of these things) so after recent disappointments I'll take it.

Joy of premiership points aside, I still think we're heading towards a massive cliff in the next couple of years. After looking like they were about to rocket past us in Round 2, North has settled back into the 'emerging' category, waiting for enough draft picks to pay off so they're not still in a crumpled heap by the time we get there. North showed signs for the future here, but as we know from the #fistedforever decade sometimes teams build to a certain point, then nuke themselves with internal turmoil and general stupidity.

If we'd lost you can guarantee I'd be saying it looked like going wrong the moment Pickett swooped on the ball at the first centre contest, then stuffed up a bounce which led to North going into attack. It wasn't good, but struggles to qualify for the top 20 blunders in a first half where we took bad options, and handballed like everyone was wearing a prosthetic arm. The good news was that we looked inept, but North failed to make the distance from a 40 metre set shot and it's lucky Essendon and Richmond had just put on a game so bad nothing could compare. 

In the end, this turned out a decent game if you could turn your brain off and accept that both sides had fatal flaws. Unlike most of our games it may have even had some attraction for neutrals, even if the appeal was more of the slapstick "thank god this isn't us" variety. For about five seconds it looked like we might be on our way, despite North having plenty of opportunities we got two goals from close range. The closest of range for the first one, with Pickett disposing of his opponent and waltzing into an open goal. Turned out that was about as far out as he was comfortable with in this game, going on to miss a couple of sitters and generally not doing much. They can't all be classic performances.

We were held back early by North dominating stoppages and generally playing keepings off (actual analysis from their perspective here), but they weren't good enough to do anything with the majority of possession. Might have been different if Nick Larkey was out there, but the late withdrawal of Steven May was covered by Tom McDonald walking back into the side like Hulk Hogan entering Madison Square Garden and saving us on several occasions. In light of Melksham having an all-time career renaissance they'd be insane to rush him out the door at the end of this year, but I can understand if he wanted to have one or two seasons elsewhere at either end of the ground instead of touring dogshit covered suburban grounds in the VFL. 

The McSizzle comeback story was helped by North picking a shitload of tall defenders to take on a forward line where the key position players haven't fired a shot in 12 months. Given that May wasn't there, his replacement hadn't played seniors in two months, Lever has been ropey, and we're the #1 side in the competition for letting players have one-off great career games, they should've sent whichever backmen had the least career goals into attack and let him run riot. At first, this didn't seem necessary, Paul Curtis continuing his hammering of us from Round 2, before Boomer Harvey Jr. signed up for the Kingsley shortlist by kicking four goals after barely playing a game in three years.

I usually trust the votes from the coaches as a better professional indication of the best players than me deciding everything on the vibe, but it's a mystery to me how they both had Petracca best on ground when he spent the first three quarters shanking kicks all over the place. Either that or the bit where he burnt JVR to a crisp inside 50 and instead made Langford try to bring back the spirit of that Hawthorn game where he was pulling down contested marks like a madman. No fault on the effort but you've got to do something when you get it. On the other hand Salem got nil when I thought this was his best game for years, so either that award has gone midfielder-only too, or I know dick. Pretty sure it's the latter.   

The lead felt a bit flimsy (not as much as last week mind you), so I wasn't all that surprised when North were suddenly in front. It was all a bit Round 2, we seemed the better team but couldn't get far enough ahead to shake them off, leaving open the prospect of another epic last quarter implosion. Speaking of playing the hits, we did a DemonTime special to end the quarter, horrifically blowing what should have been a safe exit from defence, and turning it into a shot on goal for North. When they got another one minute into the second quarter I was mentally preparing for fans to enter carnage mode. 

Appropriately, this was my once a year trip to the Redlegs seats, and while the regulars were pretty calm I could sense they were ready to blow up if things didn't get better. It wasn't your storm the race and abuse the players type audience, but they were definitely ready to sook up in the workplace, on talkback, and across the internet. I was a bit unmoved by the prospect of losing by a reasonable margin. Another white flag waving disaster would be different, but I was just sitting there thinking this was all very much on brand for Melbourne 2025. And as we've struggled to beat North in recent years even when good (plus one random thumping that makes no sense now), another loss here would be no surprise. None of us would like it, but you'd hardly bust out the spraypaint or dump chicken hearts on the steps at this stage of the season.

The turnaround - which had the gentle turning circle of an ocean liner - started in the most unexpected circumstances. After twice kicking out on the full from the right forward pocket, Jefferson tried his luck from the left side and converted. Then what was heading towards the best game Fritsch has played in over 12 months continued with him setting up Langdon for a snap and the game looked to be back on our terms. They certainly weren't being allowed to happily punt the ball around amongst themselves anymore, though we were still doing our best for blooper compilation videos with wacky turnovers.

Just when you thought we might go on with it, there was a few minutes of the bonkers goalkicking you've come to associate with this season. Unlike some other weeks they had the decent excuse of a crosswind, which makes it even more ridiculous that by the end of the game we were potting set shots like they were training drills. Where was that at [insert every venue we've played at, but especially Alice Springs]?

It still looked to be going our way when Chandler kicked his first, before we spent the rest of the first half on the back foot looking vulnerable to complete structual collapse at any moment. But thanks to playing a team very much in our weight division, they couldn't take advantage. There were set shots that missed, set shots that fell short, and snaps to a wide open goalsquare that went wide. Meanwhile, with Melksham off the ground with what looked at first like a blown shoulder/elbow (but turned out to be a minor inconvenience), our forward line was invisible again.

The second half was a lot more watchable, and not just because we won reasonably easily. I'd had enough of listening to people talking nonsense around me so fled for the only available level 4 safety in the Olympic Stand. The transfer via the ground floor of the Southern Stand was where I discovered the absurd crowd crush. The queues for food took up about 80% of the available space, forcing people moving in both directions to squeeze past each other against the fence behind the seats. It was dangerous as fuck, and anyone who had to get kids through there should be seething. One day somebody will shout fire or cause a commotion in a situation like this and people will die. Feel free to send the MCC a complaint and see if you have better luck getting a response than either time I've written in to the cowards.

Once I had the traditional several rows of free space, my attitude to attending games at half shut stadiums improved. Before it got better on-field, we had to survive a few minutes of pressure. It got better from the unexpected source of a Gawn free kick. When the free was paid Xerri implored the umpire to watch a replay on the big screen as if that ever works, and they didn't shown one anyway. It was threatening to rain and the scoreboard operators were obviously trying to find that cringy window wiper animation. Xerri would be involved in another incident later that didn't get a replay, and in that case he was probably happy not to see it.

Maximum lined up free from a distance that freed him from the pressure of a normal set shot and he delivered one of his classic intercontinental ballistic missile roosts that flies through post high from 60 metres. It felt like North had done all they could and were ready to lie down, we just had to put them away before they got a second wind. Their mini-revival started with the popular method of winning a free kick by diving headfirst into a tackle while pretending you really wanted to get the ball.

Melksham responded, before Lever and Turner had a "you first, no you first" disaster at the other end. They nearly got another after we gave a player all the time in the world to pick his spot before he hit the post, then they dropped a mark unopposed in the square. Then, after doing bugger all for 2.5 quarters, Zuurhar went from last in the phonebook to first in goalkicking with his third goal of the term. That cut the margin to three points, and within a few minutes we'd gone from the verge of running away with this to playing spooked again.

It took a bit of luck to get us going again. We'd just stuffed up a chance when multiple players got in the way of Jefferson's lead, but from the bounce Chandler snatched the ball off a pack for a neat snap. After a few weeks where he didn't have much influence, this was a good time for Chandler to play well before they did something silly like dropping him for Spargo. Then we got even luckier when a North defender was pinched for deliberate in the dying seconds. Not that he didn't do it, but bad luck finding the one umpire in 10 who'd pay the free under those circumstances. There's no way the same thing would happen late in a thrilling last quarter, or at any ground where the penalised team had a majority of fans but it worked for us here so happy days. 

Those goals gave us a 16 point lead, but I still wasn't convinced it would be enough. We looked vulnerable in defence, and couldn't rely on the forward line to end it. I could imagine a quarter of the teams punting it back and forth to each other in the middle of the ground, and us falling over the line by a single digit margin after three goals were kicked in total. Instead, it ended like the West Coast game, where both teams chucked defence out the window and churned out a total score far beyond what the contest deserved.

Enter Melksham, continuing the greatest career revival since John Howard, for two goals in a row. Both were lovely, low, slicing set shots that beat the windy conditions. It made him the first Melbourne player to kick four goals three weeks in a row since prime David Neitz, which is both a great achievement for him and an indictment on 20 years of our forward lines. Then Tholstrup kicked a very nice one from close range to theoretically seal it. It's good that he had this positive moment, because he pretty much did nothing else and somehow became the only Melbourne played fined for wrestling despite multiple grapples during the last quarter.

There was a bit of 'surely not' when North got two goals in a row, but there was no realistic way of us crumbling from here. Doesn't mean I wasn't still shitscared of it happening at the time. Any half chance of something stupid happening was finally rubbed out by Petracca's goal, and all that was left was to get through to the the final siren and go home happy. 

Tom Sparrow wishes it had been that simple, because he ended the game being carted off in a neckbrace after being knocked out cold in a collision with Xerri's swinging fist. I was watching when it happened but must've blinked at just the moment of impact because when the crowd went "oooh" and Gawn took off to retaliate I had absolutely no bloody idea what was going on. It was quite a hit because he was out before hitting the ground, and for obvious reasons it took several minutes to make sure he was alright and get Sparrow off the ground.

After other famous incidents where one of our players was clobbered into oblivion, I don't blame the players for flying the flag and going for Xerri but realistically it was an accident. Less of the alleged 'football action' than the Maynard incident, more just recklessly hanging a ruckman sized clenched hand in traffic where anyone could be running. Lucky he didn't collect an umpire in the week the AFL pretended to crack down contact with officials or they'd have given him 30 weeks, but three seemed a fair result for the combination of action and outcome.

Somehow not a single Melbourne player was fined for the afters, though it would be funny if Oliver got fined despite his fake commitment to the fake fight, as he grabbed a partner for some swing dancing and was clearly going through the motions in the hope of not having to write a cheque.

And, err, that was it. The prospect of a serious injury took a bit of joy from the last few minutes, but once Sparrow was confirmed to be in decent shape I was happy to focus on the enjoyment of gathering premiership points and trying to pretend this result meant anything for our future.    

Next Week
We won't beat good teams playing like this, so thank god we're playing Carlton next. I'm not assuming victory because it would be pure Melbourne to kick 5.26 and lose to a side who look like they all want to curl up in a ball and die, but it's an opportunity for two in a row.

I didn't know the Casey game was on (let alone on TV) until half time and missed the quarter when they beat the piss out of Werribee. By the second half it was just half a side of AFL listed players going around semi-professionals like traffic cones and (surprise, surprise) lacking forward power to win by a huge margin. 

There was certainly nothing to throw selection into chaos, as if we're not just going to be ultra-conservative losers for the rest of the year anyway. Maybe they scratched the itch was first gamers in Round 1? I'd forgotten Henderson existed until he made the squad here, and it's sad that nobody important cares enough about these things to ask how he ended up playing that game after a pre-season campaign consisting of one practice match for another club. I assume his two touches in this VFL game were down to playing limited time then being packed away in case he was required on Sunday. I'm happy for him to hang around as depth next year, but nothing in the first five games of the year suggested he's the answer to any question. 

It's too late for four club Campbell now, so in the interest of not tormenting Gawn's body it's time to give Will Verrall a crack. He might have rucked on Saturday against somebody who's taken the game up in the last week for all I know, but everyone except our selectors is aware that it's time to start playing randoms. 

A few weeks after I moved him to the recycling bin (immediately before getting a new contract) Kentfield took a couple of contested marks that made you think he could cope with the shitbox delivery into our forward line, then I looked at the stats and he only had three marks total for the game. Now that Jefferson has had a positive performance he may have missed the boat, but there's something to work on for next year. He could get a token run as part of any late season throwing of magnets - see also Adams, Brown, Laurie etc... Not Billings, because with respect it won't help with future development or protect anyone important from snapping in two.

And I've got NFI why they picked Windsor here only to make him the sub, but there's no point not playing him for the rest of the year. Also from the NFI file, how team balance would work with my proposed changes but it's not like they're going to happen anyway so it won't be an issue.

IN: May, Verrall
OUT: Sparrow (inj), Tholstrup (omit)
LUCKY: Lindsay, Windsor
UNLUCKY: Campbell, Laurie, Petty

2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Christian Salem
4 - Jake Melksham
3 - Tom McDonald
2 - Bayley Fritsch
1 - Harvey Langford

Apologies to Chandler, Gawn, Petracca (for effort over execution) and Viney

Leaderboard
Six games left, 30 points on offer, pretty much everyone eliminated. Gawn would need to fall down a well and Pickett play out of his skin to win it from here, but for now there's hope for everyone all the way to the Melksham miracle. In the minors, Langford is already the moral winner of the still unnamed Rising Star Award but is still vulnerable to being swept away by a single BOG from Lindsay.

46 - Max Gawn (WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
29 - Kysaiah Pickett
24 - Jake Melksham
20 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
17 - Christian Petracca
--- Abandon all hope ye beyond here ---
15 - Daniel Turner
14 - Clayton Oliver
13 - Steven May
11 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Tom McDonald
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon
8 - Christian Salem
7 - Xavier Lindsay, Jack Viney
4 - Bayley Fritsch, Tom Sparrow
2 - Jake Lever, Harrison Petty, Trent Rivers
1 - Harry Sharp

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
With apologies to any of Melksham's set shots, or the Tholstrup curler in the last quarter, Chandler's snap in the third was both important and aesthetically pleasing so it wins the weekly nomination. Pickett vs Port still leads overall.

Final thoughts
Imagine how excited you'd be if this was a cup quarter final?

More to be pitied than despised

Midway through the first quarter on Sunday we got the perfect moment to sum up our season. An Adelaide player leisurely rushed a behind under no pressure, and unlike a particular incident in 2021 the umpire had enough courage to pay deliberate against them at that end of the ground. So the point from the original rushed behind disappeared, then the free kick went across the face of goal and out on the full, leaving us with one less than if it hadn't been given at all.

Surprisingly, things got better from there. After delivering an on-brand 1.6 in the first quarter, we went relatively ballistic for a few minutes in the second, banged through five goals in a row and led by 25 points. I appreciated this outburst of interesting, league standard attacking football but didn't have the slightest faith in it lasting. Then we spent the next 10 minutes pinned in defence, trying to find a way out via dinky kicks and uncontested marks, only to find out that Adelaide had all the escape routes bolted shut. 

Once they swizzed what we were up to it was effectively over. We hung around like an unflushable nugget well into the last quarter, but other than those few joyful moments it was all difficult slog and you could see Christian Petracca trying to remember about which folder he'd saved the draft "I'm not enjoying my football, I need a fresh start" press release in. 

Like most of this year's losses, it wasn't bad enough for flashbacks to the war crimes of the Neeld era, but the best bits didn't stretch long enough to take us close to winning. We're a more average side than a 5-11 record suggests, but whether it's structural, coaching, lack of killer instinct, or something else, this may be the worst side I've seen at taking advantage of opportunities. It's been the same story all season, the door was wide open and we walked into a wall.

I'd like to avoid thrashings for as long as possible, but these 40% performances don't offer hope for the future or a chance to blow your stack. Unless something really weird (good or bad) happens in the next few weeks, name a more tedious season. Scoring has pulled away from our modern rock bottoms of 2013-2015, but even if those years were practically unwatchable there was the comfort that surely it couldn't get any worse/surely it was getting better. Now I've come to terms with the fact that we're going to die but can't bring myself to ring Exit International and get it over with. Instead we can slide sadly to doom over the next couple of years, then miss out on a shitload of draft picks when/if Tasmania turn up. 

So that's something to look forward to between now and 2030. And if that doesn't float your boat, there's the AFL's latest "giz headlines" brainwave of some bullshit mid-season tournament which is supposed to make you feel better about your team being crap. You'd want to make sure that tournament structure is so loose that there can never be a dead rubber, because if you only get 13,000 for GWS in Round 18, games involving already eliminated sides (I'm assuming this rubbish would be a round robin, because otherwise what do you with the teams who get knocked out?) will struggle to draw four figures. I bet it's just the softener to make people think more positively about a Wildcard Round. Well done to the jurors in that bloody never-ending mushroom case for rushing to make a decision after realising this stupid idea should be starved of media attention.

On the Erin Patterson scale of delicious to deadly, this game was only rated about a 6 for 'excess consumption may have laxative effect'. Nobody seriously expected to win, and other than a few minutes of cheap thrills we never looked like it. I've seen this game so many times this year that it's hard to get upset. The comeback in the Brisbane game is such an outlier that it should be located somewhere near Hawaii, otherwise we've been ok for most of the year (fourth quarter against North, three of eight total quarters against Gold Coast aside) but only great for about an hour combined.

You'd get an idea of how this went by re-reading the Essendon, Geelong, or Port reviews, but there were a few unique moments in our first loss to Adelaide for four years. None of those started with the opposition swiping a crap handball in the middle of the ground and landing the ball with a key forward. This usually accurate goalkicker missed, so when we found Petracca at the other end I thought he might embrace the 'opposite day' spirit but alas no. He did help set up Rivers for our first goal with a big old fend, but the bigger assist came from Crows defenders who botched multiple exits from defence.

We should switch to an all-roost attacking method, because it was the only successful effort from seven scoring shots for the quarter. There's something to be said for almost reaching parity by the end of the game, unfortunately not something that comes with premiership points.

After recently being tormented by key forwards from the otherwise piss boring Port Adelaide at the same venue just a few weeks ago, I was on high alert for any or all of Walker/the other ones to have a field day at our expense. They all did a reasonable amount of damage, and the killer blow was struck from another angle, but we held up well against several attacks in the opening minutes. May was tremendous at the start, Turner pulled down 16 marks for the day, and while Lever looks a bit shot this season he's still an important part of the setup. Just slow the speed of the ball arriving down there to something less than 100km/h and he'll be fine.

By the time Lever was hobbling around with a sore ankle I thought it was time to call this season for him and bring McSizzle back, but this won't happen because just when we can't be accused of tanking for draft picks (first round ones anyway) the idea of resting players has been abolished. Good thing he played here because it gave Crows fans the chance to continue the worst past-player feud in the league. I'm all about long-term bitterness against people who have left in contentious circumstances, but once they've won a flag it looks a bit silly. 

In this case, Lever has been with us for two cycles of up and down while Adelaide hasn't played another final but you've got two months to enjoy that moral highground because they're going up and we most certainly are not. Of the nine remaining teams who are any hope of winning this thing, my rankings are #1 GWS or Gold Coast so I don't have to hear about it, #3 Freo for Luke Jackson and not having to hear about it, #4 Adelaide for Alex Neal-Bullen and not having to hear about it, #5 Footscray for James Harmes and the rest can go piss up a rope.

This is about where the usual insanity began inside 50. Pickett took a mark, and I've got no issue with him playing on if that's what works but not via a horribly rushed snap that missed the lot. It was arguably worse than the one against St. Kilda because that may have fallen into the lap of a player in the square but at least it was accurate. And this time we didn't allow the other side to respond with a goal straight away. That happened after the next miss, after which they proceeded directly to the forward 50 for the day's first of several Rankine Wankin' moments.

We weren't doing anything particularly offensive, but the difference between the forward lines was shown by Melksham and Viney running into each other shortly before Adelaide found a key forward in acres of space. This was almost taken back immediately via one of our irregular centre clearance wins, only for Melksham to a lovely lead, have somebody kick to said lead, then spray the shot from right in front. 

Surely neutrals don't watch us play, we're not consistently shambolic and slapstick enough to be ironic viewing. Even the deliberate/OOF incident was a brief, disastrous moment that only we'll remember for years to come. It's also the second time in his short career that Matthew Jefferson has had a free in the right forward pocket and missed everything, which is odd. He doesn't appear to be anywhere near it at the moment and has the physical presence of Cale Morton on hunger strike but there's something there when he gets the ball anywhere other than the pocket. I've noticed he seems to visibly crack the shits with himself whenever anything goes wrong. You'd like to think they're supporting him so he doesn't go into a confidence spiral but this is the same operation that's dropped van Rooyen three times in one year so I don't trust their record on welfare for young forwards. 

Jefferson's performances may not justify a game at the moment, but we're down to playing for self-respect and annoying Essendon, so unless you've got something else new to try what's the point booting him out? And don't say Kentfield, whose consecutive half-decent games in the VFL weren't as good as Fullarton's before he did nowt in a pair of wins.

Tholstrup is in the same boat where we probably should play him even if he hasn't been great, but the bad news for him is more people can play replace him. He's messy, but you can't fault the enthusiasm so hopefully after a pre-season he can get some consistency next year. Alternatively, become the new Bailey Laurie and plug away in the VFL all year for no reward.

It's one thing when a fifth gamer looks miserable, but when Petracca took a mark right at the end of the quarter the look on his face before he kicked it suggested he already knew it was going to miss. To be fair that's how we think about all his set shots and nobody seriously holds it against him, but it was another example of why I think he's about to reach for C:\Statements\Fresh Start.doc. Pickett is staying, and I really don't care if Oliver goes now (as long as it doesn't involve something silly like trading a good draft pick just to get his salary off the books), but Petracca is the canary in the coalmine as far I'm concerned. If he stays I'll have hope, however misplaced, that we might rebuild on the run and get out of this. If he goes then you know the arse if about to drop out of the joint.

Obviously Adelaide saw our players battling mental torment and decided to do their bit for the less stable, because they facilitated a seven point play for Pickett with another horrid kick out of defence, then did more self-harm by giving JVR a 50. The last time he converted a difficult set shot at this ground he ended up back in the VFL, but this was his best performance of the year. That's not saying much, but as a tribute to the absent Petty he looked very good up the ground and just needed somebody else to kick towards who could contest in the air. In this case the only option was Melksham, who did the best he could under the circumstances. It may have come to your attention sometime during the fourth quarter that Fritsch was also playing. 

Adelaide generally spent the first 10 minutes of the quarter standing around with you know what in you know where as we racked up a four goal lead but I didn't trust it for a second. Fox had the all-sensible commentary lineup of Hudson and Hill but their credibility went out the window by waffling on about how we always win with 100+ uncontested marks. Any examples from before mid-2024 don't count because this is effectively a different side.

The peak of party time was when Pickett pulled down a screamer close to goal and thought for a second about quickly snapping again before sanity prevailed and he went back to calmly kick the set shot. This prompted Adelaide's bench to hold up a sign of a boxing glove, which translated to 'stop letting them kick it between themselves like a training drill you clowns' because right after that they planted a human wall in the middle of the ground and locked the ball at their end of the ground for the rest of the quarter. Good times over, resume sadness, toil, and struggle.

Their first score in half a quarter was a goal, then Rankin got a second as it started to become clear that McVee was on deep shit playing against him. For want of any other options we left him to wither and die there while Rankin kicked five. You'd think he'd show more gratitude to the team that just blew contract prices for top small forwards who can play in the midfield through the roof.

Our sudden inability to get the ball over half way wasn't helped by Gawn hobbling off with some sort of leg complaint. This season is toast, the only reason to play him next week is to try and extract some revenge in the Heavyweight Title rematch against Tristan Xerri. Otherwise, 'manage' the poor bastard instead of running him into the ground for nothing. I've said it before, but things are getting more urgent now - they're about as (allegedly) negligent as the 2024 Petracca debacle if he's being played every week to make sure of a spot in the All-Australian team. He'll be in the squad, but if he reaches the final round half dead after playing every game for the season but isn't in the final team then they've botched this. 

Even if he does get another All-Australian, are we that starved for individual honours? He's already a legend, maybe on the way to the AFL Hall of Fame. I'd rather not wreck somebody who has had double knee injuries and various other issues over the years. Surely he's already played more games than any other 209cm player in history, and there's probably a good reason why so few talls have reached 300. He's got 60 to go and won't be boosting that with finals, can we not drive him into the ground prematurely? Also, a mental break might be nice. Give Viney or [god knows who our next in line is now] the turd-filled flaming paper bag for a week and refresh for the big job of saving us from disarray at the end of the year.

The locals got some revenge on Lever when he did a wildly overpowered handball that allowed the Crows to walk into a goal. A centre clearance would've be nice about now, but nobody at ground level could get near it and they weren't falling for the classic Gawn pluck 'n kick so we were basically stuffed. By the time Rankin had five it's lucky Dwayne Russell wasn't present because his exploding strides would've torn a hole in the Fox Footy studio roof.

It was still relatively close, but the famous 'Feels Like' margin was very much against us. Melksham continued his one man crusade to keep the forward line respectable, only to stand there and watch Neal-Bullen easily burn past Petracca in the middle of the ground. Set your time machine for 2018, tell somebody this was going to happen and they'll report you to the authorities. The bit they would believe is us battling to kick a goal then handing it back as soon as possible.

Say what you like about Lever 2025 but we did concede a mark and goal about 20 seconds after he went off. Maybe it was just the lack of a player rather than a specific player, but after writing Melksham off several times only for him to be holding our forward line together while on the verge of all his soft tissue exploding I'll wait for more evidence next year before trying to flog him to Richmond.

We got to the last change within the same range as where the Brisbane game was won from. Only with the players going through several more weeks of disappointment. We had to survive having another goal cancelled out at record speed, saved only by a last minute review showing the ball hitting the post. Considering "they review everything", it's suspect that this usually only happens after enough time for Channel 7 to get an ad in.

It got a bit interesting when Melksham turned up again for a goal from the boundary line. Since spraying shots left, right and centre in the first quarter we'd been surprisingly good on set shots since so you can pretty much guarantee a total of 6.31 next week. We were back to not being able to get through the middle of the ground, but Adelaide kept it sporting by not violently putting us away. After the first goal we managed to hold out for all of 30 seconds before giving away a mark inside 50. There was more Hollywood stupidity from the Crows with a failed pass, but soon enough it was back with the same player right in front and he got his goal in the end.

There was a bit of progress after our next goal, getting the ball inside 50 before it was swept down the other end for a shot. They failed to make the distance, but all it took was one mark on the exit and Adelaide players were able to work the ball around the 50 like a basketball drill before landing right on the top of a player who'd found a mismatch in front of goal. That's the sort of uncontested marking commentators should froth over, not the ones that come from back and forth, stat padding sideways kicks at half back that end up going nowhere.

The game was effectively over when we let a player goal from the square mid-tackle despite McVee wrapping himself around the post to try and touch it. And maybe he did. The goal umpire thought so, but the reviewer refused to believe him even though they may not have been looking at the moment the ball was actually touched. I couldn't muster up any outrage. Pulling back a 21 point lead in 10 minutes is not impossible but sure felt unlikely. If Pickett landed one from a Viney handoff it would be in "you never know" territory but we'd likely have just given it straight back anyway.

Pickett nearly brought the margin under two goals with three minuets left, but a defender who didn't even claim to touch it was given the benefit of the double by a review operator who worked so quickly that he must have had a legover lined up for 6pm AEST and didn't have time to waste. And that was it, not close enough to be upset, not far enough away to crack the shits.

This season has been draining but deep down I still love watching Melbourne, not matter how drainingly boring  they are. This game was always going to end in some degree of shambles but I still spent the whole weekend secretly counting down to 3.20pm Sunday to see what would happen and even though the result turned out as expected I'll still be thinking 'mons until we next turn up to bring the game into disrepute.

Next week
You've played the best, now play the rest. North on Sunday kicks off a month of testing ourselves against sides returning from years of misery, going headfirst towards years of misery (see you there), or just hanging around in the middle of the ladder like a bad smell. Better beat some of North, Carlton, St. Kilda, and West Coast, because the last three weeks of the season might involve vigorous rooting by premiership contenders.

In a tremendous piece of scheduling, our VFL game against a standalone side largely overlapped the senior match. No idea why it couldn't be played earlier and treated as a virtual curtain raiser, did Coburg catch public transport to Cranbourne? If so, it didn't do them any harm because they beat a wasteful (no, really?) Casey to take their spot in the top 10 (*spit*). I'd love to go ballistic on changes to the senior side but there doesn't appear to be much in the tank.  Not a great sign when the top possession getter is the backupiest ruckman of all time, unless we think about giving Gawn a week off from being run into the ground.

Assuming we don't rest anyone (and why would you, it happens so rarely) I'd go for the mega bombshell and drop Oliver because he's adding nothing at the moment. Laurie isn't a replacement but give the poor bastard a full game at least once this year and hope for the best. Petty and Howes are (presumably) back from suspension, and I suppose they're going to be picked but you'd want to be cautious about Petty after two head knocks in one season. Charlie Spargo is back from injury so no doubt they'll pick him in the face of the evidence that he adds bugger all, but I'm not having it. On stats alone Windsor didn't do much in the VFL but you may as well play him where he's intended to go in the future.

Now that van Rooyen has had a confidence boosting game, unless we react like the last one and drop him, I wouldn't mind one last go at seeing if my theory of McDonald offering him protection as a forward has any legs. But this won't happen, because while we're carrying a bunch of other carcasses to the end of the season the only person other than Gawn who was there in our absolute lowest years and went on to play a role in a flag has been chucked on the scrapheap.

Given our half-decent performances against much better teams in recent weeks, we're a good chance of beating North on paper. In reality, I predict another pisspoor shambles where you end up feeling cheated at ever thinking you might get some enjoyment out of the game.

IN: Howes, Laurie, Windsor
OUT: Oliver, Sharp (omit), Tholstrup (to sub)
LUCKY: Fritsch, Jefferson, Langdon
UNLUCKY: Campbell, McDonald

2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Jake Melksham
4 - Steven May
3 - Daniel Turner
2 - Kysaiah Pickett
1 - Trent Rivers

Apologies to Bowey, Gawn and Viney.

Leaderboard
The lead at the top is cut to less than four BOGs, which might make for an exciting finish if we had more than seven games left. Like our finals chances (now rated as .01) he remains a mathematical chance. For anyone below 11 votes, you have now been eliminated. I can confirm that Gawn will win the Stynes, because there's no chance anyone within 35 votes of him is going to average 10 hitouts a game and qualify. No change in the minors, where Turner and May still have out some hope of Seecamp glory, while Langford is holding out in the Stynes because nobody eligible is going to close to scoring votes.

46 - Max Gawn (WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
29 - Kysaiah Pickett
20 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Jake Melksham
17 - Christian Petracca
15 - Daniel Turner
14 - Clayton Oliver
13 - Steven May
--- Abandon all hope ye beyond here ---
10 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award)
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon
8 - Tom McDonald
7 - Xavier Lindsay, Jack Viney
4 - Tom Sparrow
3 - Christian Salem
2 - Bayley Fritsch, Jake Lever, Harrison Petty, Trent Rivers
1 - Harry Sharp

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
Melksham from the boundary line as part of our continued encouragement to kick accurate set shots. Pickett still leads overall.

Heritage Round
Sat down to watch the '64 Grand Final at last, and got approximately 11 seconds in before being dragged off to do something else. Never got back to it. Stay tuned for more excuses in the next few weeks.

Final thoughts
Now our only multiple game winning streaks are against West Coast, Fitzroy, and University. 

In the name of Good, go

The status of our season has already dropped to 'lowered expectations', but don't try and convince me that anything positive came out of this debacle other than not losing by 130 points. Melksham having 11 scoring shots was a novelty, but otherwise a side that had a week off to think about how things were going responded by being outscored 37-1 in the first quarter. Hooray for the fruitless late comeback against opponents in self-preservation mode, but you'd need religious fervour to think that anything points to our season getting better from here.

The players are as much to blame as anyone, but while I'll never go full Carlton fan at our only living premiership coach, it's time for a dignified departure. Anyone holding onto the dream of rolling the clock back to 2021-2023 is wasting their time. The club won't do it, so while sitting on the couch with a big fat payout might not be the best thing for Goodwin it's up to him to put himself out of misery. Do the right thing, call Brad Green, say "how much to pack it in now?" and take the rest of the year off. I was all-in on him pulling off the coaching comeback of the century, but it's just not going to happen is it? We're still not awful but it could happen at any time, get out while you can. 

Of course, none of this will happen so strap yourself in for a truly fugly end to the season. It's over to the players who can't decide between nearly beating Collingwood and looking like Fitzroy 1996 to try and escape this year with their dignity intact. I've abandoned all hope, and like how we treat young players at selection the Spitebury Plan has been dropped after one week. If we're not doing our bit it's silly to expect others to help. Gift Essendon a top pick and cross your fingers that they make it retrospectively funny by horrendously botching the selection.

Speaking of selection, I restrained myself from going feral when the teams came out on Thursday night. Partly from surprise that the game was on Saturday not Sunday as I'd prepared for, but also because they picked a couple of kids. Jefferson and Tholstrup went on to do stuff all (cut to Bailey Laurie contemplating quitting footy because he still can't get a game), but it was the right thing to do. I'll reset the feral clock until they get booted out after one week again, as if there's anything to lose by giving them a few games in a row.

The outs were a bit weird though. van Rooyen wasn't great against Port but he did kick a couple of goals so would you not try to get his confidence up with a couple of games in a row? Instead, he'll probably be passing one or both of Jefferson and Tholstrup on the Casey - Melbourne selection shuttle service and playing with the knowledge that he could be dumped back to the VFL at any time. He's had a bad year, but what have they done to help him? Tom McDonald may not be the future, but as if you wouldn't get some benefit playing him as protection/distraction for JVR. Instead, a developing player has to deal with shit forward entries like he's Carlton era Fev, spends part of the game in the ruck just because nobody else can do it, then gets the arse after kicking goals. Maybe he won't be as good as we thought, but good luck finding out either way after the way he's been Melbourned.

Lever was a more contentious omission, but even if he hasn't been much chop since returning from injury he also came back to find we were no longer playing to any of his strengths. What did they expect him to do when the ball teleports from one end of the ground to the other all day? Remember when teams would lose the will to live trying to work out where to kick into our forward line, then panicked, punted it madly inside 50 and let him chop it off? Now it arrives so quickly they're all left in no man's land. Drop him if you want to make a statement, but it's not addressing the main issue.

If it suits you to find explanations for this loss, there is the small matter of losing a defender and somebody who should be a defender to concussion before half time. Unfortunately, the damage had been done long before Howes and Petty departed. For once we were the side that played better with one less on the bench, and this may have been more of a factor if we weren't SIX BLOODY GOALS DOWN AT QUARTER TIME.

The first quarter here looked like the end of the North game, except they kicked straight and let us boot a couple of meaningless consolation goals. In that game we also had the flimsy excuse of players losing interest after three quarters, in this case we stank from the first minute. There was a good chance to set up a scoring shot early, but to nobody's surprise all our players were otherwise engaged while a defender floated in, said "I'll have that" and whisked the ball away. And the only time we went closer to scoring for the rest of the quarter was a hopeful shot touched on the line. 

It was not very good, and it would be kind to only say we were uncompetitive. Gold Coast kicked for goal as if stoned to the bejesus belt but this was a case where you can imagine the Suns they would've scored more even if the ball went back to the middle. They'd have been back in attack seconds later while our players stood around with their tongues hanging out as if they'd gone to Queensland on foot. As we got better with less players despite some of them cramping up so badly that it hurt to watch (and, you know, the bit about just having a week off) I guess their shocked reaction to the start was less about fatigure and more due to the ball being passed around them like they'd been drafted by the Washington Generals.

After half an hour of non-glove laying, patron saint of talking nonsense Dwayne Russell said Melbourne fans watching in their loungeroom (as opposed to Fox callers in their studio) would be "stunned". Not really, it was a bit more savage than expected but not hard to predict we'd fall apart eventually. I'm more stunned at keeping the final margin in double figures.

Playing Viney in the forward line at the start was a bomb but points for having a crack. The problem is that the real midfield was Oliver having half a crack, Petracca having a full crack but kicking like he was on crack, and not much else. Pickett was well held, Gawn couldn't do everything on his own this time, and the rest did a convincing impression of thin air. Langford even managed to get busted open running into an umpire's elbow at a ball up. It was whatever sits on the flatness scale below a plateful of piss and a shitcarter's hat.

Against the odds things got better after quarter time, which is better than losing by 4x36 but not much consolation in the grand scheme. Petty missed a set shot, then pulled out a snap out of his arse for a belated first goal but his reward for being our only half-likely forward was to crack his head on an opponent's hip and go off with concussion.

That left an already outmatched Jefferson trying to get a kick without any tall forward cover, no emergency second ruckman and christ this was looking grim. So grim that we didn't even get to sub Petty off because Howes was ahead of him in the concussion queue.

The only positive was that the Suns had temporarily stopped clubbing through bulk goals. With May diminishing under the weight of shit being flung at him I thought Alistair Lynch said "he just got a fisting", which would've been appropriate under the circumstances but was likely "fist in".

The next cab off the injury rank was Oliver, who did a Superman dive into an opponent's back, whacked his head on the way through and came up pissing blood like a wrestler who'd just gone his own forehead with a razor blade. Now that we've crossed the Rubicon for dropping beloved flag heroes, he can have a rest too because he's not adding much. By full time he'd have made a bigger contribution to the blood bank than our performance, left wrapped in more and more bandages until he looked like Leatherface from Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Not for the first time this year, it was Melksham to the rescue. I appreciate that, but we're a bit rooted for alternatives. He kicked three goals that didn't qualify for making it 'interesting' but occupied valuable time/territory that stopped the Suns from scoring.

There was also a rare accurate set shot from Gawn. I think we all thought the same thing when he lined up 40 metres out directly in front, but courtesy of a run-up that started aiming in the direction of Hawaii it went right through the middle. Then we got away with Viney doing a textbook dangerous tackle for a one-booted Pickett to stuff a kick straight down Melksham's throat and almost offensively, the margin was now just 23. 

That lasted a few minutes, until we kicked the ball to former MFC academy player/draft theftee Mac Andrew, and the next thing you know Max King was pulling down a mark over Gawn and May at a range even he couldn't miss from. Still, when Melksham got his third we remained in alleged range. 

It came just as the clock hit 1.30, do when Dwayne said we were "almost guaranteed to win the quarter" you knew Demontime hadn't made it to his list of fun facts. Should be #1 on the list because we still had to survive dual inside 50s, including one after Petracca had a kick smothered while bursting through the middle.

Jefferson looked like the least threatening forward physical presence since Tony Notte but credit for making the contest that allowed Pickett to snatch the first goal of the second half. That's roughly where the fun ended, especially after May kicked off a brawl by belting somebody around the head in a marking contest. With all the earlier umpire contact fines, this is going to put us in the box seat for our all-time most expensive season for players. Hopefully they get to deduct them from tax as a work expense because they haven't much other benefit.

Strangely, while players were doing expensive fake manly jostling, the person who'd been belted in the first place was allowed to pluck the ball off the ground and run into an open goal. He seemed to have one bounce in the 40 metres covered before kicking but they were obviously just going on the vibe of this otherwise farcical game.

Do you think there's any correlation between the pressure being off after the first quarter and a sudden outburst of decent set shots? Fritsch got involved, but can thank Melksham for assisting by wedging Andrew behind the goalpost. Our once vaunted midfield nearly gave it straight back, only for King to horrifically shank another set shot OOF. Never mind, they got it soon after via a 2-on-1 in the square, and despite the sploogiest fantasies of the lead commentator it was over even before the Suns got another 15 seconds later. Now we were back to trying to avoid losing by a sad margin.

All the game lacked was the guy who has never had a scoring shot in 200+ games to get forward for the laughs. It would likely come via a 50, as we continually failed to twig that there was a random crackdown on the good old protected area. Alas he never got the chance because we pretty much did all the attacking at the end.

With fat chance of a win, the last quarter was all about Melksham battling his own body to play a lone hand up front. At one point he got a free 20 metres out, tried to play on quickly and missed the snap. I thought maybe he didn't want this otherwise vile game remembered amongst his career best outings. 

After setting one up for Pickett he did get a fourth, making the umpire work excessively hard for a set shot from two metres out. And if he'd kicked a fifth not long after the margin would be back to 14 with enough time left for something funny to happen. The problem was he could barely kick 20 metres by now, so there wasn't much hope of carrying 50. He did not, and Gold Coast soon went the other way to make sure of it. Melk did get #5 despite being in obvious cramp distress, and his final total of 5.6 was the only memorable thing about this otherwise shizen game.

The final insult was Turner ending the game hobbling around like his foot was about to explode. He'd already been busted open by a boot after beaten on the lead, but didn't even get the courtesy of acknowledgement of his injury on commentary because they were busy waffling on about the rituals and customs of Swedish people. Hopefully like everyone else his body had just had enough and wanted it to be over. Either that or he's on the Mitch Clark plan and will only ever be briefly seen again.

So, this was a complete waste of an afternoon that could've been spent [insert pretending that I had something better to do]. Considering the awful start I appreciate them pulling up and not being violently disembowelled but that doesn't bode well for the remaining eight games.

Next week
This time it really is a Sunday game, allowing an extra day to recovery from Cramp 'O Rama 2025. We're going back to the Adelaide Oval, because that's worked really well for us twice already this year. There's a remote chance of doing better than the Essendon or Port slopfests, but as Adelaide's forward line will be forming an orderly queue to get on the end of pressure-free silver platter service the only hope of avoiding a massive score is them getting overexcited and crashing into each other several dozen times. We're going to lose, so hopefully our old friend the Anal-Bullet is best on ground.

We're already risk averse at selection (and don't have much in reserve anyway) so the two enforced changes from concussion will probably be enough to convince them we can't possibly make sweeping changes to the team. I'm assuming Viney gets suspended for his tackle, but Turner recovers, Melksham hasn't run himself into a managing, and May survives spoiling somebody's head off. Maybe they'll be out and we'll have to start picking any fit player. 

Casey lost to a previously rubbish Gold Coast reserves so do your own research on whether any of the performances warranted selection. Didn't watch a second of it, but considering who's out you'd be mad not to pick van Rooyen and one or both of Lever/McDonald. In a week where he got a new contract, Kentfield kicked three but surely the bar is not set so low that a one-off half decent performance gets you a game. And Billings had 30 something touches so I'll admit he's unlucky not to get a run but what's the point at this stage? Pick some newish players, pick some older players, hope Adelaide forget to turn up.

IN: Laurie, Lever, McDonald, van Rooyen, Windsor
OUT: Howes, Petty (inj), Viney (susp), Oliver, Sparrow (omit)
LUCKY: Jefferson, Lindsay, Salem, Sharp, Tholstrup
UNLUCKY: Billings, Campbell

2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Jake Melksham
4 - Kysaiah Pickett
3 - Jake Bowey
2 - Max Gawn
1 - Jack Viney

Apologies to Petracca and Turner.

Leaderboard
Pickett is slowly eating into Gawn's lead, but with only 40 votes left it's still unlikely that he'll overcome a 19 point gap from here. In the minors it's good news for Bowey's Seecamp-aign, but the Rising Star has hit a troubling slow down in the last few weeks.

46 - Max Gawn (PROVISIONAL WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
27 - Kysaiah Pickett
20 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
17 - Christian Petracca
15 - Jake Melksham
14 - Clayton Oliver
12 - Daniel Turner
10 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award)
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon, Steven May
8 - Tom McDonald
7 - Xavier Lindsay, Jack Viney
4 - Tom Sparrow
3 - Christian Salem
2 - Bayley Fritsch, Jake Lever, Harrison Petty
1 - Trent Rivers, Harry Sharp

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
I appreciate Petty's goal and hope he remembers it but it's not within 500km of Pickett's clubhouse lead.

Heritage Round
Never got around to doing the 1964 Grand Final watch and post. It will appear at random one day.

Final thoughts
I'm a bit over this season but unlike sensible people I can't stop watching so please give us something to make it either worthwhile or funny.

Silence closely resembles stupidity

Finally, after years of losing games in exactly the same fashion, I've been tipped over the edge by a perfectly ordinary defeat. Since mid-2021 I've largely taken finals thrillers, one point losses and near triple figure disasters with good grace and humility, but this of all games really tested last week's outrageous claim that I'm too old and placid to tip the couch over.

No need to go fully postal yet because there could be a lot worse on the horizon, but the big mistake was deluding myself into thinking we'd take care of a side that has lost three games by 70+ points this year. We responded to this challenge by not even scoring 70 and ending the game like a derelict car you're just trying to keep running until the trade-in goes through.

Like most of our losses it wasn't by a huge margin, and there were fleeting moments of playing like a team good enough to exit the finals in straight sets. In this case we also got a bonus 45 minutes of Kysaiah Pickett threatening to celebrate his winning the midweek mega jackpot by playing the greatest game in the history of the sport. In isolation, the performance wasn't all that bad, so why did this generic disappointment irk me so much? Possibly seeing the very obvious frustration of the players who have realised for the second time that they're over this woeful season, probably much more to do with conceding goals after the siren three times, slaughtering our momentum multiple times with multiple acts of petulance, and continuing to treat putting the ball through the middle posts as optional.

On that note (I initially wrote on that 'point', which looked sarcastic), kicking 9.14 looked like dead-eye accuracy compared to the insanity of the St Kilda game, but our attempts to kick goals continue to provide a family-friendly metaphor for conception - millions of attacks are launched, only a handful reach the target before dying. Still, with all the usual "if X happens, then Y doesn't follow" disclaimers, we're 27 goals behind parity and it's hard to see how that's going to get any better. We're on track for a record here, if you look at the 18 team era it's surprisingly rare for a team to kick fewer goals than behinds over a season. In 2022 and 2023, every team in the league did it, but can we bust into this group of wayward maniacs?  

• -45 Fremantle 2021 (-1 off the boot, the rest rushed)
• -41 Gold Coast 2018 (-8)
• -37 Essendon 2016 (+1)
• -37 Footscray 2017 (+20)
• -31 St Kilda 2018 (+8)

We can go for the overall figure or take our -3 off the boot and try to beat that putrid Suns side. Give it another couple of weeks, but this and the Spitebury Plan (more on that later) could be the last matters of any interest we're involved in this year.

Part of the frustration was our forwards being either five metres behind the ball or forced to contemplate trying for Mark of the Century over a nine man pack, while at the other end a guy who only had five kicks in a win last week was helping himself to 7.4. It was a handy demonstration of what it looks like when forwards get space, have the ball accurately delivered to them, they don't drop it, and the set shots more often than not end in goals. We're good enough to win a few more games this year (famous last words), but with the way they're set up and the ball is delivered you'd have brighter career prospects as an Iranian nuclear technician than playing in our forward line.

Lucky I gave up on a Mighty Ducks finish to the season after St Kilda (and please, Fox Sports, burn the tapes of the intro to that game), because otherwise I'd have busted my foot kicking inanimate objects over the last two weeks. At least losing to Collingwood was disappointment at nearly pulling off a Buster Douglas d. Mike Tyson upset, this was like watching two pissheads grapple in a pub carpark before one loses by repeatedly punching himself in the face.

After giving coach and friends the benefit of the doubt after our brief return from the dead, the spirit of late 2024 is back. I don't want to turn on our only living premiership coach but Jesus H Christ how long can we go on doing the same thing over and over again? I'd be shocked if he got the sack, but am convinced that in the years when lowly paid semi-pro coaches still managed factories during the week, Goodwin would choose manufacturing over his legacy for everything other than September 2021 go down the gurgler. 

I can never fully turn because the 2018 and 2021 finals are still 50% of my all-time favourite memories (and you can argue amongst yourself what proportion of this mess goes to down stubborn coaching, shithouse recruiting, or players failing to go on with it) but the window for seeming stable enough to lure half-decent recruits is closing. A few weeks ago it looked like we might finish high enough to make it look like the only way is up, now you're not joining us unless it's for slabs of our cold hard cash that probably don't exist anymore.

There might still be a second second coming. They could spend bye week doing emotional bonding (NB: best to avoid seaside pubs and French restaurants) and/or coming up with some exciting method of kicking goals that inspires a respectable finish but I'm not holding my breath. After some light stirring of the loins after the Sydney game I've psychologically crashed out again. An orderly, polite, hopefully no blackmail required coaching transition doesn't mean success, but even if we reach Round 24 playing like this the only reason people will turn up is to set themselves on fire in their seat.

Reputable analysts can look at the obvious stuff, I'm more interested in enthusiasts-only topics. For example, how do they boot Tholstrup entirely from the side after playing one of his best games to date? Not to mention how he showed an admirable passion for the cause which contrasted nicely to some teammates who look like they're being led to the gallows. Unless he joined in the King's Birthday final siren fun and told somebody senior to GAGF I don't get it. Punishment for going against team orders and kicking that set shot from 50 metres out instead of aiming it at the behind post? He didn't even get a run as the sub here and didn't play for Casey, so what's any of this done for his development? 

It's an even more offensive version of making Laurie play on suburban slop holes for three months before being given a chance, then dropping him after playing one quarter where his teammates didn't turn up. I'll cop picking an out of form van Rooyen over Jefferson because he can play second ruck, but how have we ended up in a situation where he's only the best man for the job because somebody who gets about four kicks a game is suspended? Our recruiting post-flag has been so bad that when Lindsay, Windsor and Langford are off my first thought is not "the poor ducks are young, they must be tired", it's "oh christ, they're being Melbourned".

My turning point may be post-bye selection. Last year I reluctantly went along with picking the same side week after week (NB: but not doing stupid things like making Turner the sub) when the season was obviously shot, but now that finals are a 'full sex with a supermodel' level of fantasy away I'll blow up if they don't demonstrate some interest in the future. I'll compromise by not trying to include Tom Campbell and Forward Sizzle, so if the name Billings is presented instead of Jefferson, Laurie, Tholstrup etc... I'm going to (reluctantly) become a hater.

I thought we might win after showing improved form last week, but was also confident in Port doing something stupid coming off an unexpected win. Now we'll never know how bad it needed to get before Ken Hinkley zipped his big puffy jacket up over the head and stopped watching.

There's always novelty in a Port home game because they've got community singing and the first few rows reserved for people best described as 'units', but this time the gimmick levels were turned up to 11 by them fielding a mid-season draftee with one leg in a compression stocking who we were reminded at regular intervals used to be an air conditioner salesman. Not since James Magner's previous career of building a freeway has a player's unusual work history had such a run. It was a win for fans of obscure 1970s political references, because just as George McGovern wraps things up at West Coast, here's G. Gordon Liddy to take over.

According to Dwayne, GGL is "known as The Leg Sleeve Guy", which is like somebody being known as "The Wheelchair Guy" or "The Hearing Aid Guy". It's also about as likely to be true as Kelli Underwood's unconvincing 2021 claim that "they call him Slick Fritsch". On this call he'd have been "Slick Fritz", because for all of Matt Hill's admirable qualities as a caller, he had the same impairment that always caused people to say 'Trengrove'. I thought somebody might have a word at half time, but it kept going as Fritz (also known in Victoria as Devon) had his most prominent game of the year. After years of their callers blathering on as if possessed by the devil, I'm not surprised at the lack of a producer with the authority to go "oi, you're saying it wrong".

It wasn't just a good week for Port players hoping to get a cheap Fujitsu split system, against all odds we got something in the middle of experienced players having a tiff and another limp defeat. It'll take a while before we find out if Pickett to the AFL's longest contract in exchange for a pile of cash resembling Mt. Everest was a bad idea, so for now let's just treat it as a good thing. In the context of world sport, $12.5 million for nine years isn't much, but it's obviously enough to cure homesickness. 

Now the trick is to go against 130 years of history and successfully keep him upright and exciting for another nine years. Not that we need him to being going full pelt until the final siren of 2034 to make it worthwhile, if we get six years of wild shit that no other Melbourne player will match in our lifetime then I'll be happy to take him on a lucrative three season retirement tour. I'm just going to enjoy the show until his career goes tits up, we start losing other key players due to lack of cap space, or he's forced into retirement after a 'football incident'. Hopefully he doesn't crumble under media-induced pressure to save the joint single-handedly when the veterans start disappearing and Tasmania (maybe) turn up to swipe the best draft picks. 

While we had some decent moments in the first half, the only ones worth committing to memory are those involving Pickett. By the time he'd kicked a third goal while playing more as a midfielder than a forward I was ready to devalue the currency so we could give him an even more impressive sounding $25 mil. I don't know about the second half or the next nine years, but this was definitely worth bulk cash.

Life should be so simple that you can just sacrifice the most electric small forward in the country to the cause of hoovering up centre clearances like a magnet attracting metal, but what you gain in the middle you lose forward. Even if he barely touched the ball in the second half, three goals, all rippers, is a good return at any time but we still need one of him in each third of the ground. Fritsch and Petty (not in this game though) have also done their best work all year pushing up the ground, which is fine except for the question of who's the final kick inside 50 going to? In a repeat of last week, the answer was 'take your pick of three defenders'.

For no good reason, before this game I rewatched the all-time classic Open Mike with Mark Jackson. When not tormenting an obviously stressed Mike Sheahan and calling various people "false alarmers" for unclear reasons, he made a sensible point that is as relevant now as it was in 1981. The job of big forwards is to mark the ball or bring it to ground for smaller forwards. I know intercept marking hadn't been invented yet, but there must be stat involving intercept marks per inside 50 which conclusively proves we're pound-for-pound the most haphazard attacking team of the modern era.

It's a problem that goes all the way back to Adam Oxley's famous Queen's Birthday Kingsley nomination, but defenders are forming an orderly queue to pad their stats when playing us. Harris Andrews must be distraught thinking about what Melksham did to him that day when he sees Howe, Ratugolea etc... pulling down easy marks and dispatching nearby opponents with the greatest of ease. At the other end, Lever's come back without the quality that made him so good and now just looks like any old blah defender. Even as a Sizzle fanatic I thought the angst over dropping him for Lever's return was over the top but if we were miraculously teleported into a Grand Final tomorrow I'd easily pick McDonald. 

I'm not writing Lever off, we've been through spells where other teams rumble him before and it's always turned out alright in the end. Still, there were holes in our defence here that you could steer a battleship through. And that's with Turner, May, and Howes all having decent games. The problem is that one-on-one defence doesn't mean dick when a forward can lead straight up the middle to a kick plonked right into his hands. You may recognise that move from the three or four times a year we successfully pull it off. It's a milestone in our development when I can hang shit on our key positions at both ends. Now watch us find the next great full forward then start conceding 130 points a game.

It was obvious from the start that we weren't going to take advantage of Port like all the good teams, but I was happy for van Rooyen to land a nice set shot from the boundary line, and for Melksham to set up Pickett via a great tap-on for his first goal. That was about as good as it got for Melk, who spent the rest of the game trying everything that worked so well against Brisbane to no avail. We were already showing signs of letting their only good forward do as he liked, but scores were still being kept to the levels that we need to win games these days. At least until Bowey tried to tempt May into another outburst when his kick-in fell short and cost a goal, and after conceding to a 'Miles' we let a 'Darcy' get the next one, and it was like being beaten by the cast of a Jane Austen novel.

Port's players may have posh names, but their fans are still the most likely to stand up and complain about umpiring decisions while nearly frothing at the mouth. They had a point when pinged for insufficient intent, even though one of our players got 99% of the way to the ball then slammed the brakes on and it let it go out of bounds. The usual 'throw shit at wall, see what sticks' forward entry made its way to van Rooyen for a second. He had to play on so it was rushed, but lucky there were no defenders (or teammates) between him and the line because it came off the boot awkwardly and would likely have crashed straight into anyone in the way. 

Good way to end the quarter though. That's what you might think if you'd never seen one of our #demontime masterclasses. Instead of comfortably playing out the quarter and breaking even, Gawn was done for an alleged dangerous tackle that ended up being completely ignored by the Match Review Panel. It was some distance out on the boundary line though, so as long as we didn't do something silly like concede a mark in the middle of a massive pack with two seconds left everything would still be ok. And you can guess what happened next.

Mitch Georgiadis was not a Kingsley kandidate, but looked like he was on the way to being the first player to kick 10 against us this century. He got the first of the quarter, and should have added another shortly after Judd McVee tried to get a couple of extra weeks off post-bye by jumping off the ground to bump an opponent in the head. Nice try, but Mr. Match Review wasn't falling for it, even though it was nearly identical to what scored Johnson two weeks off in Alice Springs. The difference was that the St Kilda player had to go off for a concussion test (FO to 'HIA'), but as he passed it I can't see how one got suspended and the other got off scot McVee.

Not long after, the usually reserved Judd McSpree played a part in what may have been the first three goal turnaround in league history. First, Petracca slaughtered a kick to Melksham that cost us a goal, and set up Port to go the other way, then McVee gave away a free kick in the aftermath for whacking somebody in the guts and we were officially on the brink of disarray. He must have compromising photos of league officials, because unlike Pickett in Alice Springs he got away with this as well. 

Meanwhile we've had half a dozen players fined this year for making contact with umpires that nobody saw, and Lindsay had to write a cheque for 'tripping' against Collingwood when he did nothing more severe than hold on for a second too long when his tackle slipped to the ankle. If you need proof that they're just making this shit up as they go, play the bumps and stomach punches side-by-side. Speaking of fines, for the second time this year an opposition player had to pay up after getting away with gratuitously legging one of ours in the square. It's like the good old days of Early Gawn when the umpires had a blind spot for the regular clawing of his face at bounces.

There was briefly a bit of oomph in the game after this, including Petracca nearly having a mark reversed for 'afters', and Petty doing the old fake headbutt towards Aliir to zero reaction. In the middle of all this Pickett had departed after he'd been left face down on the ground looking dead, bringing a screaming halt to a quarter where he'd played like several million bucks. His first goal of the term was an absolute ball-tearer, intercepting and checksiding it through from the boundary line, causing me to leap off the famous couch, slap the floor in excitement and yell "pay him more, pay him more" to the absolute bemusement of family members who barely know who he is, let alone about the big money contract.

He survived the concussion test, came back after half time and barely got another touch. Whether this was down to the collision or Port thinking "geez, this guy is good, maybe we should try to stop him" I don't know but if it was the latter then they were one step ahead of how we treated the guy who ended the half on four goals. To be fair, the last one was a bit shit considering it was May being penalised for putting his hand on the back of a player who was already jumping into a visibly over it Gawn.

This was one of those games where we got a lot more free kicks but still had some cause to whinge about umpiring under the 'it's where you pay them' clause but I'm yet to see a loss this year where we couldn't have overcome the umpiring to win anyway. Still didn't help that they got another goal after the siren, and even before this things had turned to drizzling piss before the three goal turnaround - including the ball bouncing off JVR's chest because he was so shocked that it reached him on the full.

With Port defenders pulling down intercept marks at world record pace, this week's Plan B envelope featured Turner going forward after half time. This made sense, but still didn't really contribute to the key metrics of kicking a winning score or stopping the other side doing the same. What I don't get is how one of their key defenders went off injured at three quarter time and we left both Turner and Petty forward, leaving our attack a congested mess, and further improving the chances of their key forward kicking seven. I freely admit to having NFI how footy tactics work so if there was a good reason for doing it this way please explain.

There was a bit of interest in this in the third quarter, we started with two goals in a row, Gawn went some way to fulfilling my plan for him to play forward and kick 0.14 with a pair of behinds, and our very good friend Mitch charitably sprayed a couple of set shots. It all came to a screaming halt when May was pinched for doing nothing more than winning a test of strength in a marking contest. We countered with another couple of dud set shots, and Oliver failing to make the distance with a snap from 20 metres before wouldn't you know it, Port got a goal after the siren.

Just to prove that the Brisbane comeback was an out of the box fluke, we rose to the challenge of winding back a 15 point lead by kicking one goal, well after the game had achieved junk time status. There were chances - of course there were - but it was back to the final quarters of earlier in the season when everyone looked like they CBF. By the looks of it they could BF a little more than the white flag extravaganza against St Kilda, but the forward line had been in the witness protection scheme since half time and never emerged.

One of the many things that gave me the shits about this game was going back to a Little League style 'team effort' performance where you can't even make yourself feel better by focusing positively on one or two standout performances. Spoiler - everyone in the votes this week is guilty of something. The 5-4-3-2-1 has to go somewhere, don't blame me I'm just following the royal and ancient rules of the competition. If they were held back every time we lacked standout players some years would have been won with single figure scores. We were flatter than your choice of a plateful of piss or a shit carter's hat, and I've run out of premiership related loyalty to players like Rivers and Sparrow, time to explore whatever limited options we've got.

Rivers can't have had much argument about getting the hook, except in comparison with all the forwards who were doing nowt at the same time. JVR's return was a good start by our recent standards, but he barely went near it after the two goals, and a week on from coming around to the idea of Petty as part of the forward line he was flailing here. Took a nice mark to get the final goal, but I'll assume the Port players were already thinking about chasing groupies at the post-match function because they didn't let him get near it when the game was on the line.

The only outstanding matter was for May to do something silly so we could get the "Gawn should yell at him LOL ROFL" content out of the way, and maybe that's what he was thinking about when giving away a pointless 50 to facilitate Georgiadis' 7th goal. Good luck with that, it's like when a team is pinged for deliberate and fans are still screaming for vengeance 17 boundary throw-ins later. He made a dick of himself last week, and we're still waiting for the rozzers to allege that he belted the suitcase out of a random citizen in the off-season, but fark me the way some ungrateful pricks are carrying on you'd think he'd desecrated war graves. He may not be the sort of person you'd be chums with him in real life, but unless you're old enough to remember when Norm Smith was coach, there goes the best and most successful defender of your lifetime so show a bit of respect.

Port had the ball at their end in the dying seconds, sadly not having another shot after the siren that would provide me content for years. It was as flat a finish as you'll get while barely losing the last quarter and avoiding a thrashing. I sympathise with players in the process of realising they're about to play 10 weeks of dead rubbers, but that might be as much of a problem if we'd rotate occasionally instead of picking young and (presumably) hungry players for one week then immediately dumping them. 

I don't think we're going to end the season stripped of dignity, handing over pick two, and with both Richmond and North passing us at speed, but a week after nearly rumbling the premiership favourites I'm back to wanting proof of life. Given the relatively thin margins in the losses it feels like somebody's going to write in and chastise me for being too negative (like after barely holding on to beat North last year, and how well have we gone since?) but it's reached the points where I'll take wins but want them to mean something for the future. Maybe it's time to start planning for a future where Viney and Oliver aren't in the same side? I know we got spooked into handing out long term contracts to all these people (what could possibly go wrong?) but even if we continue to pay them it doesn't mean they're obliged to play every week.

2025 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
5 - Max Gawn
4 - Kysaiah Pickett
3 - Daniel Turner
2 - Bayley Fritsch
1 - Steven May

Apologies to Bowey, Howes, McVee and Petracca, who only didn't deserve votes a little less than those who got them.

Leaderboard
The Gawn walkover continues, but forget what's happening right now, we're on the verge of a major milestone. On the all-time leaderboard he now has 392 votes, within one full game of Oliver on 395. Let balloons drop from the ceiling when he conclusively hits the lead, and what about a run-through banner when Max becomes the first man to crack 400 career votes. If you'd rather think about AFLW I've only just realised that the spreadsheet is missing a season and the leaderboard hasn't been updated since 2022, which goes to show how long I've been in decline for.

44 - Max Gawn (PROVISIONAL WINNER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
23 - Kysaiah Pickett
17 - Jake Bowey (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year), Christian Petracca
14 - Clayton Oliver
12 - Daniel Turner
10 - Harvey Langford (LEADER: Rising Star Award), Jake Melksham
9 - Kade Chandler, Ed Langdon, Steven May
8 - Tom McDonald
7 - Xavier Lindsay
6 - Jack Viney
4 - Tom Sparrow
3 - Christian Salem
2 - Bayley Fritsch, Jake Lever, Harrison Petty
1 - Trent Rivers, Harry Sharp

Aaron Davey Medal for Goal of the Year
Regardless of the final result, or the fact that he disappeared off the face of the planet after half-time, the Pickett goal from the boundary line was so exhilarating that I'm vaulting it over the top of Chandler vs West Coast and into the clubhouse lead. There's no truth to the rumours that an extra perk of the new contract is that he has to win this category every year.

Next week

Put your feet up. I watched Casey but the only key discoveries were a) ironically Baldi is a cueball, and b) guest player Kalani White has his dad's leaping DNA and in the spirit of our salary cap rorts when signing Jeff/the CFMEU ads at the ground, we should do whatever it takes to draft him.

The week after that

Gold Coast away in a chance to recapture something from when they pulverised us earlier in the year. Maybe they'll come up with something new in the break, but it's more likely we'll field the exact same lineup except for Lever and Pickett, play the exact same way, and lose by the exact same margin if lucky. Refer to earlier comments about my meltdown when we pick a side that implies they're either trying to keep the damage down for reputational reasons or have delusional visions that we can still get anything out of this season. 

There aren't many kids left, but for god's sake play them and I promise not to do my block until the margin reaches perverse levels. There's nothing for team balance in these suggestions but they'll work something out. Everyone's going to want Johnson to come straight back in off suspension because of his enormous meme potential but I'm not having it. Even if I'm ready to bet my liver against him playing 50 games, Jefferson must get another chance first. I don't want van Rooyen to have to play second ruck forever, but will cop it for another week. 

Other than my proposed inclusions, there's not much to be excited about from those who played at Casey this week. Jed Adams will definitely get a token game before the end of the year, Will Verrall seems to be getting closer, and for god's sake can Kynan Brown please be allowed to start an AFL game at least once in his career. Otherwise - blah. Mentha is miles off, Fullarton, Hore and Kentfield must already be browsing Seek, Woewodin has never gone on with it (possibly due to 13 of his 21 career games involving some type of substitution), I've got scant interest in Henderson and Culley and none at all in Billings. Some of these people will survive next year because you can't massacre all the depth players in one go but if you're looking for inspiration from the Seconds then [insert Lowered Expectations graphic here].

IN: Jefferson, Laurie, Tholstrup
OUT: Petty, Rivers, Sparrow (omit)
LUCKY: Lever, Lindsay, McVee not to be suspended, Oliver, Viney, Windsor
UNLUCKY: Johnson, Sharp, Verrall

The Spitebury Plan

Where we make helpful suggestions on how to reduce the value of the first round pick traded to Essendon. For this bumper first edition, have two rounds for the price of one.

Round 15

Fremantle d. Essendon
North d. Carlton (reverse if you think we're more chance of going down than up)

Sydney d. Port

Collingwood d. St Kilda

Gold Coast d. GWS

Richmond d. Footscray

Geelong/Brisbane irrelevant

Round 16

Port vs Carlton could go either way based on the previous week's results

Footscray d. Sydney

Hawthorn d. North

Collingwood d. West Coast

Adelaide d. Richmond

St Kilda d. Fremantle

Hope you have a spiteful time.

Heritage Round
I didn't mention the epic discovery of the second half of the 1964 Grand Final last week because a) the post was already Unibomber Manifesto length, and b) once I realised we had another week before the bye I wanted to save it for viewing during the break. 

There will be a review post in the next few days, and I'll be interested to fact-check my own book (available at no good retailers) to find out how much of it came from faulty memories from people who were there but had never seen the footage again. Lucky I didn't just assume the footage would be lost forever and go with a first draft that included alien landings and a pitch invasion by the Viet Cong.

Final thoughts
I've nearly reached the important post-premiership milestone of being miserable about footy again. It will never be the same level of misery, but I reckon in a couple of years we'll be scientifically testing people like me to see how close you can come to replicating the empty pre-flag feeling.