Last Exit To Brunton Avenue

It feels like I'm the last person to have come to this conclusion, but I've officially lost any sight of the proverbial light being at the end of the proverbial tunnel. Not just for the near future either. Any hope that the uncharacteristic rampage against GWS would finally herald a new era has been wiped away, and the suggestion that I'm supposed to find positives out of the last two weeks indicates to me that we're such tremendous garbage that I'm supposed to stand up and clap like a seal whenever we avoid a 100 point loss against a real side.

Hello to everyone who has been firmly in that camp for a year, sorry for stupidly being mildly optimistic but now I know exactly what you're on about. We've spent a fortune on our football department only to still having everything on field stuffed up, the players are generally not good enough to be in an AFL side and whatever the coaches are doing they can't wring anything out of this list other than a few token quarters here and there. There's a feeling in the air, and it's the feeling of the club being completely rotten.

I'd say that despite the ups and downs, downs and more downs over the last few years that I've been reasonable in my criticism. Isaac Weetra and Tom Gillies may wish to disagree, but considering how much we've had to pay for the privilege of sitting through since 2007 I've held onto the childlike "everything will be ok" sense of innocence long enough. There was always somebody you could sack to make things better. Strangely enough having players, coaches and administrators rotating through the slaughterhouse hasn't had the desired effect, now I'm not even sure that can help us. I'd like to say I give up, but that's not going to happen.

It's reached the point where footy's not even making me miserable anymore. That's like how people stop shivering just before they die of hypothermia. Not even seeing 'effort' is good enough anymore - all the signs are misleading, we're terrible from top to bottom and at the moment are worse on-field than the dying days of Fitzroy - who could always blame their $25 footy department and constant uncertainty about the club going tits up. All this AND the prospect of public humiliation and a major crisis when we hand Gold Coast their first ever win at the MCG next week. I can't wait that long, let's just play it tomorrow afternoon and get the horror over with.

'Effort' was certainly there against Carlton (though we did lose the tackle count comfortably despite having a hundred less disposals, so work that out) but effort will only get you so far. It might be the tie-breaker between two teams on a similar level, but at the moment there's only one other team on our level - and while 'effort' (but more their total collapse) did help us to beat them we're still going backwards in comparison.

If you're keen on draft picks this should be the continuation of a golden era for you, personally I'm sick to death of the bloody things and wish we could go back to picking between #10 and #20 where there's significantly less chance stuffing up a dead certainty (well, unless you pick Lucas Cook over Jack Darling. Or unless you eventually turn pick 11 into Casey's own Cam Pedersen). If we make it to the end of the year and have people telling us we should be going out to lose games to get pick 2 instead of 3 or 1 instead of 2 I will politely invite them to cram it in their arse. I've had enough of being kicked to death by everyone, I don't give a shit about tactical rorting of the system anymore because we'll just cock it up anyway.

Whatever caused us to explode and fall to earth in a million pieces after 186 this stat is so damning of everybody involved with the club that it's almost enough to make you shed a tear. Read that and weep - one win and 27 losses against 'real' clubs since that day. We've gone from being able to beat interstate teams, Essendon and Richmond at the G, Port in Darwin, and Brisbane at the Gabba if we're lucky to only being competitive against sides full of kids who will pull in front of us before long. Even then three out of five victories against GWS and Gold Coast have been more slog than quality.

So get stuffed if you want me to find positives out of the last fortnight. I'll admit there have been brief moments where we've looked like a real football club, but that's not good enough. Every club has that at some point - even GWS and Gold Coast in their first seasons. They will prosper eventually but how could they not? Even if half their top draft picks are duds they'll still be fine. Whereas we went to the ends of the earth to get half as many picks and haven't got one solitary star out of it. We've had some good players sure, some of them have even continued to be half decent for more than a few weeks at a time.

On paper everyone we get seems to have something going for them (although I will grant there are questions regarding D. Rodan) so why does everything that goes in the MFC door come out twisted and battered to the point of uselessness? Questions have got to be asked of everyone - which naturally includes the coach, but should in no way start and stop at him.

There might be some road to being a proper finals contender again within the next couple of years, but I'm stuffed if I can see it. If we kept Frawley, Sylvia and Watts and they all played at their best (in Sylvia's case I won't expect it every week) - if Trengove was resurrected, if Clark could stop getting injured every ten minutes, if Viney and Toumpas don't stack it on the first corner like so many others we could be ok. If, if, if, if and if. Basically if everything went right we'd be half decent. Well that's something to build a future on, why don't we dismiss the coach and hire a motivational speaker instead?

Getting a touch would be a start. Before this week the league average for total disposals this year was 175 and we've had 1544 - which is about 40 less a week. This is in a side that's had the fifth most hitouts in the competition (mind you also the second least clearances) and the most contested marks. So our ruckmen can get the taps, but fat chance they go to anybody and then good luck having any meaningful link-up play around the ground before somebody either stuffs it up or hoofs it out of bounds. That is if they're not handballing it to a flat-footed teammate with two opposition players standing a metre behind him. Apparently if we kick to a contest enough we'll take marks, but it's not 1984 you can't win by blindly whacking the ball downfield at every opportunity. You have to have some sort of run - and it would be absolutely magnificent (take note R. Bail and D. Nicholson) if said run could also be coupled with the ability to hit a target by foot.

Every week I turn up and sit there thinking "how did this happen when we drafted so many midfielders?" Going through our litany of draft disasters is about as cliched and boring as using the term 'Moneyball' in articles about AFL list management but it's not needed because you know the story as well as I do. Forget about everything that has happened off-field in the last few years - how did we manage to go through all this shit and STILL wind up with players who can't get ball in hand? All that heartbreak and toying with our emotions and we've never unearthed one actual star. Trengove was on the way, now he plays like a 70-year-old.

For all those reasons and more Mark Neeld has been loaded into the New Balance Coaching Cannon again, with the fuse set for about 8pm next Sunday night. Fair enough too, we haven't advanced in the last year so fair enough you'd be under the pump. My faith in holding off until the end of the season is holding on by a shred, but I know that he won't be there in 2014. At least we'll always have this to remember him by.

Good luck to whoever wants to take this smouldering train wreck over. Popular wisdom is that whatever was wrong with us post-186 he has made it worse, but I say when a plane is plummeting to earth out of control then no pilot's going to be able to stop it. Think it will solve anything immediately? I don't. It doesn't matter if Leigh Brown, Neil Craig, Jade Rawlings or me are coaching next Sunday afternoon, it'll be pretty much the same side without adequate time to come up with a new and exciting game plan which will restore us to our rightful place as a mid-table possessions team.

Obviously everyone will play their guts out for a new coach for about five minutes, and given that it's Gold Coast who are just in our league (i.e they're almost completely in front of us, but we're just holding on) they might even have a win but it's all papering over the gaping cracks which have been there since 2011 (assuming that you, as I do, treat 2010 as an absolute golden age of footy).

Then come August we put the feelers out for somebody to take over and it's back to square one again. Which is ok, I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that no matter how much I wanted this to work and for Neeld to escape from the slaughterhouse with the opportunity to stick two fingers up at everybody that it's not going to happen - at least not quickly enough to prevent his assassination.

But pack away your fantasies about 'big name' coaches, we'll just end up with another untried assistant who will be charged with doing the rebuild of a rebuild of a rebuild. I'm sick of hearing about how we should be going out and throwing a billion dollars at Paul Roos or Alastair Clarkson - yes we should, but we're paying out a CEO (sacked due to 'the people'), paying off a tanking fine (following a strategy overwhelmingly endorsed by 'the people') and are about to be paying the last year of a contract to a coach (who 'the people' are desperate to get rid of). Sadly Clarko didn't take our bait at the end of 2011, but unless you're going to give him half of the Bentleigh Club now good luck being able to afford him at the end of this year. Also good luck convincing Paul Roos to ditch his cushy job frothing over Adam Goodes in the Fox Footy commentary box - why would you ruin a legacy hitching yourself to us?

So over to YOU Generic Assistant Coach 27b. May your Toumpas and Viney be bountiful, may you and the recruiting staff use pick 1, 2 or 3 to land us the superstar that we so richly deserve and may you find a way to heal whatever evil spirits afflict Jack Trengove's entire body. May you also talk Frawley and Watts off the ledge and convince them to stay and be a part of the fourth rebuild, as exciting as that must sound for talented players.

Whether or not the board would fling Neeld out this week even if we did lose to Gold Coast is debatable. Under the nuclear pressure from media and supporters they might have to, but they may as well follow if that's the case. One thing I will say is that if his job rests on winning this game (and why should it be any different to the GWS match?) then I'm not sure why they even bother waiting until next week to get rid of him except to save their own blushes. Either he goes through to the end of the year and 'we' lump it or they should make the move now. Otherwise we just continue to be a "will we/won't we" sideshow to help fill a few minutes here and there on SEN.


Putrid performances by Brisbane and Footscray might have taken some of the heat off, but in the end nobody in the Victorian media cares what happens to Michael Voss and McCartney won't be in the same deep shit for at least another year because everybody knew that the Bulldogs were right at the bottom last year - whereas we're fielding a team largely similar to the one that was supposedly the next big thing a couple of years ago. The heat is still firmly on, and I doubt we've got another blistering 12 goal quarter in us if he needs saving again. What a humiliating situation to find ourselves in again. Haven't we done this all before? At least we got good times out of Balme and Daniher, and the brief promise of good times from Bailey. Under Neeld we've had nothing but epic misery, and while I'm not sure he's at fault he'll wear it when we look back in the future.

I've preached calm and stability, but if he was to go right now the most damning thing about this era would be the way that Nathan Jones is the only senior player to have improved during his reign. I'm not counting Howe because he barely played under Bailey, or Sylvia because he operates in his own universe - but Frawley, McKenzie, Jamar, Trengove and Watts (three weeks of glory aside) have all gone backwards since the start of 2012. Blease, McDonald and Nicholson had bursts where they looked good and then fell back to earth before long but of course they did, they're talented players. Who's harnessing the talent? For all the supposed advances in preparation and training that we've put in since the alleged Camp Bailey era whatever's broken has created a beast far uglier than the pre-186 sides. How stupid do you feel now about whinging every second week about how badly we had it during 2011? It was no 2010, but 186 aside that was a great year compared to the weekly discovery of new ways to hit rock bottom that we're suffering now.

To be entirely honest I've got the point where I don't care one way or another what they do. Sack him, keep him, play him on a half-back flank, do what you like. I refuse to get excited about anything anymore, I'll go every week where possible but it seems more and more like a chore. There's still a buzz on game day, which usually lasts until five minutes into the first quarter, and that's what drives me to keep going instead of sitting on my couch smashing remotes but the whole thing has become more of a joke than a tragedy. I'm not upset for long after games now, I just come on here and belt the keyboard lightly to get some of the frustrations out before getting on with my life. I want to go back to an era where footy would ruin my working week if we lost, because it wasn't expected.

One of the perception problems this lot has got is that we simply don't do honourable losses anymore. That's what annoys a lot of people, and rightly so. Look at the other teams in our league - Gold Coast sadly might confirm their promotion next week, but they beat St Kilda, almost beat Brisbane and stuck with Fremantle longer than they had any right to. Footscray have been shithouse but on either side of some awful defeats they flogged Brisbane and put in a creditable performance against unbeaten Geelong. GWS were ok against Sydney and Essendon.

We beat GWS (just) and were ok in the broadest sense of the word against Brisbane. That's it. Putrid against Port, beyond putrid against Essendon, still putrid against West Coast but not as much as the week before and just plain shithouse against Carlton.

I've accepted the fact that we might never beat any of Carlton, Collingwood, Footscray, Geelong, Hawthorn, North Melbourne, St Kilda ever again but since the start of last year the nearest we've come to 'losing a close one' was against the Saints when we went down by 18... then didn't score in the last quarter. Fluke of the millennium against Essendon and a few wins against expansion teams aside we've not got within three goals in a year and a quarter. Why do they think everyone's out for their heads? Noble aims about being the hardest team to play against are one thing, but it's not a Hollywood movie - you've actually got to do something to get the fancyboys and powderpuffs to comply. He made the mistake of waiting a year to bring his own people in and it's totally necked him - he should have killed EVERYONE at the end of 2011 and started again. Now, too late the irreparable damage is done.

Considering how far expectations have fallen, and how we did have some legitimate excuses today (e.g the lack of a forward line) I shouldn't be as upset as I am, but there was something about it that extinguished the pilot light of hope for good. Of course we weren't going to win, but did it have to be another ten goal loss? When we briefly got a run on in the second quarter couldn't we have bravely kept the damage against a finals contender down to four or five goals? That would have been something to take positives out of, not a five goal loss to a Brisbane side who are almost as shit as we are. There have been precious few games over the last couple of years when we've won respect from anyone, so it's no wonder that we're treated as a joke club now.

We've been blessed with this amazing draw that has us playing 12 of the first 14 at the MCG and we're not even using it to push teams even remotely near the limit. The fact that this was our 'best' loss of the year at our home ground so far is comical. We're so deepressed that we don't even expect to win against fringe top eight sides like the Blues anymore, but we just want to see one game where they're given a scare. How we all howled when the same team accused us of 'bruise free footy' a few years back. And how they were right then and still are now. If you're anywhere from 1st to 14th on the ladder we're a bye. Who's going to stand up and do something about this?

Admittedly had we fielded any sort of forward option we might have gotten off to a better start, because not for the first time this year we came out and looked like a proper footy team for the first five minutes. That's certainly a good thing, and far better than the dross we usually serve up in the same time frame during third quarters, but the idea that it means something was totally discredited the night we did it against Essendon then turned in the third worst performance in club history across the other 95 minutes. You can lose honourably, but you have to put in something approaching a four quarter performance to do it. Even three quarters would be nice. Funnily enough we 'won' a quarter today, which is almost worth celebrating until you realise it came because of a double goal and not actual encouraging play on our behalf.

I can (sort of) see the dilemma they had in selecting who was going to play forward. With all of Clark, Jamar (break open in case of emergency) and Watts completely unavailable they were left with the choice of Pedersen or Sellar as a full-forward. Tapscott is (angry) spare parts. Howe's an option, but even though he had a shite day you can't waste what he brings to the team playing up the ground on the off chance that he might get on the end of a few rare inside 50's. And now options are running thin. Fitzpatrick will have to get another chance at some point, but like Spencer, Tom Couch and Juice Newton before them he's trapped in the twilight zone between AFL and VFL, never to break through the glass ceiling.

There was Dawes of course. If I was being mean I'd suggest that he could have played this week but they knew we'd lose anyway and wanted some of the rust off in a 'winnable' game. Otherwise I can accept a conservative approach, but wouldn't he be as likely to re-injure himself playing a full VFL game as an AFL one?

The forward set-up is where it all got too odd for me. Fair enough Sellar is all but gone, and Pedersen hasn't been much better but considering who was out wouldn't this have been a fair time to give Pedo a full game up front as a focal point? It might not have worked, but relying on Max Gawn (as magnificent as he is most of the time) to be your full-forward for the entire day is nigh on suicidal. Then to not pick any obvious crumbers or proven goalkickers to play at his feet is doubly baffling. Sam Blease kicked 19 goals last year and has spent all this year in and out of the side because he can't play the midfield role they want. Today he was sitting in the stands as the ball was aimlessly pounded inside 50 only to bounce back again five seconds later. Carlton hardly have a world class backline, he could have caused some damage - but instead he's flicking through the record and trying to communicate with his home planet.

Then they pick Dean Kent to debut as a forward and start him as the sub. This is the kind of stuff that causes me crippling doubt no matter how much I want to convince myself that the people in charge know what they're doing. It's a shame it had to happen under the circumstances it did, but I'm glad he got to play most of the game. He didn't do much but he did kick a nice goal and deserves another go. Ironic he's from Clackline, because that's where I feel the club pokes me most weeks.

For all the people who have suddenly 'remembered' how much they loved Dean Bailey and how we should never have sacked him this game must have been a real blast from the past. How many times did a player get the ball and look up to see nobody in front of them inside 50? I swear there was one bit where Sylvia was 3/4 of the way into dropping the ball onto his boot to roost it hopefully forward before he realised nobody was there. Even if you're not going to play with a forward line at least get somebody down there so you can kick it to them while they're desperately outnumbered Baileyball style.

Funnily enough we didn't do too badly out of the middle despite getting well beaten in the hitouts. It seemed that most of the goals that killed us in the first quarter came from turnovers, which came from a combination of our own ineptitude and insane pressure from Carlton players. Somebody should have told them that you only need to put moderate pressure on us and we'll fold, save the real butch stuff for a real opposition. We tried similar but from the moment they got the first goal c/o some funky off the ground pass by Waite half our team decided that they'd probably had enough for the day.

One rare and surprising winner was Dunn doing one of his infrequent tagging demolition jobs on J**d, which was good news for us in trying to avoid a triple digit loss but bad news for Dunn himself as he will presumably be used in that role regularly now - a move which worked for about three weeks in 2008 before he went back to the endless Brad Miller-esque cycle of going forward, then back, then forward again, then as sub a million times, then back again. No doubt in the world we'll try to repeat the dose next week and Ablett will have 57 touches on him.

Other than that we were just vomitous. Charity double goals from free kicks aside they had our measure in every aspect of the game. I'll be brutally honest here and say that I tuned out for most of today because I got so bored waiting for us to get our hands on the ball. When we did it was usually crap, but at least watching the King of Sizzle punt a ball 20 rows back out of sheer panic is interesting. Pretty much the only other highlight of the whole day was Luke Tapscott's bump, he's been trying to hit somebody for two weeks and finally managed it. The umpire shat himself and reported him, but he'll get off. Nothing wrong with it at all, and even though I'm still confused as to what he's supposed to be doing in the team I'm happy to keep him now just because he's intent on being an arsehole to opposition players - I just hope he's ready to be invited to inspect the scoreboard by pretty much every opponent until the end of the year.

The defence was decidedly average again. Frawley wasn't too bad (playing for a big contract elsewhere) and McDonald has completely lost the plot since pocketing the Demonbracket title earlier in the year but thank god for Colin Garland. He had his rocky moments earlier in the year, and he's passed the stage where he's even going to develop a second facial expression, but has come good in the last couple of weeks. I did enjoy their three small forwards making an absolute mockery of the fact that we had none (unless you count Rohan Bail and I most certainly do not) - do you not think Blease could have done something at least similar instead of sitting in the stands hoping somebody was going to blow their hammy in the warmup?

The problems with the defence being beaten in the air and on the ground by pretty much everyone are nothing new (have not kept a non-expansion team under 100 points since Port Adelaide in Darwin last year, and since 186 we've only managed it four times, while conceding the century on 22 occasions) but maybe if we could move the ball out with any fluency it wouldn't be so much of an issue? There's always these odd moments of magic where the opposition forget what they're doing for a second and we rampage down the ground untouched, usually to cock it up in the forward line, but if somebody could get a hold of the Champion Data "Squeeze" stats (which show unimpeded movement from one end of the ground to the other without the opposition touching it) I guarantee you we're bottom of the FOR and AGAINST tables. Everything is a grim struggle, up to and including watching it all.

We might have made a better game of it if we'd taken advantage of our brief period of domination in the second quarter - but perhaps if we hadn't got ourselves five goals down in the first place it wouldn't have mattered? We didn't even have to wait until the start of the third quarter to throw the game away this time (though we did do that as well) because after that first five minutes where we could have gotten off to a decent start but either cocked up chances or didn't have anyone to kick to we rolled over and died like everyone expected us to. This is not a side built for confounding expectations. Brief bursts once the game is shot is about as good as you're going to get against anybody half decent.

All this against the backdrop of poor Jack Grimes destroying his collarbone/shoulder in such spectacular fashion that he had to be cut out of his jumper due to the pain. He'd got through a whole year without getting hurt, surely you had to know it was around the corner somewhere. It's one thing to be a Daniel Menzel/David Schwarz style figure and keep wrecking the same part of your body but at least that can be rationalised, this guy has now hurt his back, smashed his foot and now wrecked his collarbone/shoulder. Stuff the on-field impact, we know we're buggered anyway, I just feel terrible for the guy personally. I'll even forgive him for getting us off to a shithouse start by kicking out on the full in the first couple of minutes. Just another reason to hurl abuse at the footballing gods for allowing us to get ourselves into this state.

Going into the last quarter there was plenty of time, just like the West Coast game, to turn our brief flashes of competitive football into a 100 point loss. Thankfully we got two of the first three goals to at least take that off the agenda. If you thought that we were set for a repeat of the St Kilda game last year when we made it 'respectable' after starting the last quarter 50 points behind you were wrong, because if there's something we do well it's rolling and dying. So we did. Rinse and repeat, week after week and yes you are right I have lost the will to live.


In the last few minutes the experience of being a Melbourne supporter was perfectly encapsulated by putting my hand out and copping a murky spray of green bird shit all over it. So now I've got Bird Flu to go alongside Melbourne Supporter Depression Syndrome. Which is nice. The last time that happened to me, also in the Ponsford Stand and also on my hand, was Round 21, 1993 - when it didn't mean so much because a) I was not entirely deepressed yet, and b) we were 13 goals up at the time. Now it's just another #fistedforever moment to put in the memory bank.

2013 Allen Jakovich Medal
5 - Lynden Dunn
4 - Colin Garland
3 - Colin Sylvia
2 - Matt Jones
1 - Luke Tapscott

Apologies to Evans, Frawley and Jones.

Leaderboard

15 - Nathan Jones
11 - Matt Jones (LEADER: Jeff Hilton Rising Star Award), Colin Sylvia
9 - Shannon Byrnes
7 - Jack Viney
6 - Michael Evans
5 - Lynden Dunn, Colin Garland (CO-LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year) Jack Grimes (CO-LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
4 - Jeremy Howe
2 - Rohan Bail, Aaron Davey, Max Gawn (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year), Mark Jamar (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)
1 - Mitch Clark, James Frawley, Jordie McKenzie, Luke Tapscott

Crowd Watch
How many Carlton fans were dropped on their heads as children? If my team had been shit for a prolonged period (hold on a minute...) and were all of a sudden at the point where we'd not only landed a legendary coach but were also swatting away rubbish teams with the greatest of ease I'd probably sit there and enjoy the serenity of success rather than crying about every free kick under the sun when 50 points in front.

The highlight was Betts getting done for a push in the back featuring not only two hands resting (which is a shit rule) but two hands pushing (which is a perfectly normal rule). The mutants were still bleating 45 seconds later when Kent was kicking a goal at the other end despite a replay proving beyond any conclusive doubt that there was a push. These people shouldn't be allowed to vote.

Other than that my highlight was seeing Todd Viney giving a guided tour of the MCG to Maia Westrupp and his parents. No doubt they got them over here this week, because if they'd tried to demonstrate how great a club we are in front of two men and a dog next Sunday he'd have gone straight back to New Zealand pissing himself laughing at us. Apparently he's 18, but he looks about 14. Don't hold your breath on seeing him out there anytime soon - even Cale Morton could eat him for breakfast at the moment.

MFC Facebook Comment of the Week


Either everybody has given up or the moderators have had to go insane, because the amount of comments are disappointingly low on all the posts from today. I'd love to do a special report on all the people who said TrengRove but we'd be here all day.

Sadly none of the real top shelf, keyboard mashing nutbags have turned up. But when you can't find any top shelf identities from your own club there's anyways time for other legends of the internet to step in with special comments.



Like everyone else I've had more than a handful of run-ins with old mate Sooz over the years. Halfway through his first engagement as coach in the NAB Cup I posted this frightening but sarcastic vision of the future and got a spray for being a terrible individual who was trying to get the coach dismissed during his first match. Threats were duly issued, I remained unbanned by Twitter and in the end Neeld really is going to get sacked.

To be honest like most other things involving this club I'm almost over this feature. It's just a cheap excuse to keep promoting the HELLO MELBOURNE! jingle as sung by Sandy Roberts and Lou Richards.

Next Week

Our top ten lowest crowds at the MCG since 1987 range from 10,307 (vs Brisbane, Round 18 1987) to 15,494 (vs Fremantle, Round 20 1996) and if a 4.40pm game against Gold Coast on Mother's Day when we're utterly wank on field isn't enough to qualify for that list - if not push for the #1 spot then I'll be jaw droppingly shocked. Even the 5000 vultures who showed up just to watch the coach get sacked when we played GWS will opt to stay home and watch this fiasco on TV.

After winning a surprise victory against Judd I await the inevitable Dunn vs Ablett matchup and the even more inevitable 57 touches for GAJ. With any luck it'll be one of those games where his teammates spend so much time looking for him that they forget to be any good themselves, but don't count on it. I have the feeling we're going down and that by the final siren there will be lucky to be 5000 people in the ground.

Dawes comes in to try and provide some sort of aerial target, Blease likewise but to add speed and ability to put ball between the middle posts (unlike, say, Bail). Magner finally gets his chance courtesy of Grimes' injury, and no doubt the feelgood factor will last even less time than the Tom Couch one did last year but at least he can be rewarded for good VFL form.

As for the outs we surely can't play Trengove after the last couple of weeks. I don't give a rats that he's the last captain standing, because he's barely doing that. Jones can stand in and you won't be able to tell the difference. Send Jack to a health farm or something, preferably one of those where Buddhist monks beat the piss out you with sticks for theraputic reasons. As for McKenzie I've been a longtime fan but he's woefully out of form at the moment.

IN: Blease, Dawes, Magner
OUT: Grimes (inj), McKenzie, Trengove

Hopefully if he's going down because of this game Neeld kills somebody first. Shame nobody will be there to do see it. I'll claim to have been looking down at the time.

Next Year
More than a quarter of the season has now elapsed, and I've started to have my suspicions about who isn't going to be there no matter who the coach is. At the moment I've got 13 out, with some surviving based on their contract status only (yes, The Spencil IS contracted until the end of next season). If you think our average games experience is bad now, wait until this lot go.

FREE AGENT
Sylvia (Will fancy one last roll of the dice at a non-spaz club who can carry him being on and off like a tap)

TRADE:
Frawley (Hawthorn's first pick if we're lucky. Will 100% leave)
Watts (Whatever we can get to avoid losing him for nowt in the PSD, no way he'll want to stay).

DELIST
Couch, Davis, Fitzpatrick, Gillies (may survive as cover if we lose Frawley), Jetta, Macdonald, Sellar, Taggert

RETIRED:
Davey, Rodan

And that's without the random trades that come from nowhere. If you can make a case for any of the delistees surviving the firing squad I'd be happy to hear it. Obviously the top three would be more than welcome to stay (I'm still suss on Sylvia mind you). God knows how we're going to pay our salary cap minimum next year without them - Mitch Clisby might end up on a mil. That could be the only chance we've got of landing some belting free agent, but can you see anybody choosing us over any other club after they've seen what's happened to Clark and Dawes?

Was it worth it?
To indulge the childlike sense of pre-match excitement yes. From about 3.25pm to the point where I walked back in the front door via being sprayed with avian faeces it was a complete bloody waste of time with barely one highlight to recommend it. I will be back next week.

Final thoughts
The Doomsday Clock is back, and I don't doubt that there will be a lot of people not so secretly hoping we lose next week in order to trigger 'the move'. It's perverse but I sort of see where you're coming from - if Neeld can get through this game nobody will expect to win any of the next four (Richmond, Fremantle, Collingwood, Hawthorn) so barring any more 150 point fiascos he'll make mid-June intact and the next Russian Roulette match will be on June 29 against Footscray.

I can't believe I'm reduced to thinking like this six rounds in. Somebody save me from my addiction to this shithouse club.

Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?

Tomorrow morning at 9am I'm going to walk in the front door of the Melbourne FC Truth and Reconciliation Commission, solemnly declare that I was well and truly duped by last week's fourth quarter and ask to be excused for my sins.

"They're not all kids! What about Phil Davis, Rhys Palmer and Stephen Gilham" I said, unconvincingly willing myself to believe that those three could have any more influence on a team that's no bloody good (at least they have a reason) than Gillies, Pedersen and Rodan.

No, I was duped. Or more accurately I duped myself based solely on the evidence of one quarter of landslide football against a side that - yes you are correct Patrick Smith as much as it pains me to say it - IS like the Diamond Valley Under 9's at the moment.

Congratulations to all of you who flat out refused to believe that any good came out of last week other than putting us above Fitzroy 1964 (0-18) in the all-time league table of shithouse seasons (even if we haven't quite reached their 59.7 percentage yet). When everyone craps on about the Spirit of '64 as if it's got any relevance to today's club I'm not sure that's what they're referring to.

For fools like I who thought "no Clark, no worries" and dreamed of ending Sunday night by pulling away from the foot of the table and getting somebody else's coached sacked mid-season for once (which would make a change for our players) at least we got one quarter of something approaching AFL standard football. All of which got us five goals for (yay), five goals against (boo) and a false sense of hope that we might get a couple of good quarters in a row.

Considering our forward line had band-aids stuck all over it, with resting ruckmen and defenders all over the place it was never going to suit us to get into some sort of free-wheeling, high scoring exhibition match. Which would have been fine if we'd managed to avoid letting the Lions win every clearance, rebound from one end of the ground to the other with the greatest of ease AND have three free players inside 50 every time no matter how long we'd had to get back there and do whatever it is our defence is supposed to do these days.

For those reading in the future, possibly looking for clues as to why I eventually go postal, it should be pointed out that Brisbane are not all that good themselves. We can't even use the hackneyed excuse about being a young team this time considering they had a side full of teenagers and the most inexperienced player we had was Dean Terlich who looks about 39. Time to just admit we're shit, put ten players in the lifeboat (guaranteed seats for Clark, Grimes, Hogan, Howe, Jones, Trengove (just) and Viney. The rest can fight it out amongst themselves, but I'm going to assume Gawn would win the Battle Royale and I'd be happy to have him on board) and run the HMAS Melbourne FC onto the rocks for the insurance money before reappearing under a new name in 2014.

The sense of having been taken for a ride would have been bad enough if it had been at the MCG and I'd have been able to see it all unfolding terribly in front of my own eyes, but to have to watch that sort of slop on television is the best ad the AFL could ever do for putting your hand in your pocket and paying for a ticket/membership. Though maybe don't buy the one that guarantees you a Grand Final ticket when your team is perennially shit.

It must happen to everybody that you sit through most of the season watching games you don't really care about, abusing Dwayne Russell for making up stupid catchphrases, abusing other commentators for using his bloody catchphrases and remembering when Dennis Cometti seemed half natural doing 'off the cuff gags' during the game but then when your team comes around (and especially when you're always bloody losing) it becomes abundantly clear that these people are total buffoons who must have blagged their way into the job by winning a raffle.

Mind you I can see how fans of 'big clubs' might not feel like this, you just know that while he did his best to keep things upvibe and professional Bruce McAvaney was glancing at his watch every five minutes from the first bounce onwards waiting for next Friday night when he can call a game between sides that anyone other than a handful of fools gives a rats about.

In a way I don't blame Bruce or Cometti and his teleprompter of comedy statements for giving our game nothing. Would you? Surely they'd be sitting there going "how the hell did we end up with this game on free to air?", and realising that about as many people are watching it as a Super Rugby match would treat it accordingly, doing their best impression of the Melbourne Football Club just plodding along until it was all over then hitting the nightclubs as soon as possible. After all Bruce had been roped into doing this game after being in Perth on Friday night so given the circumstances he should almost get an honourable mention in the votes for not just chucking a sickie and leaving Tim Watson to call the match.

It seems rude to complain about TV coverage now that we're living in the admittedly glorious 'watch every game live' era, but it's strictly for games not involving the Dees for me thanks. It's not that radio is all that better, but I'm almost at the point of doing that mute + radio gimmick that I've been mocking all these years. Anything would be better than more Dwayne, more Tony Shaw and god help us hopefully never again more bloody Leigh Matthews.

"Lethal" has taken Malcolm Blight's role as the "elder statesman" of the commentary circuit who is wheeled out every few weeks to sit around and give us wisdom of their glory era by talking to themselves, possibly not even knowing that they're on the air. At least when Paul Roos does a Sydney game and can barely restrain himself from whopping off under the desk he appears to have all of his mental faculties about him. Matthews, on the other hand, is only slightly more with it than I'd expect Kevin Sheedy to be when he's providing this sort of role for GWS games in a couple of years (maybe even next week, it's not like he's actually coaching this year).

Today's Lethal highlight was Blease being flattened after kicking and the 30 seconds of moral outrage about how there's no way it was a late hit and how it was a rubbish decision (coming from somebody who spent half his career crippling Melbourne players) before the replay showed that oh he actually got elbowed in the head and a quick retraction followed a'la Caroline Wilson. Then in classic Channel 7 fashion they missed the goal being kicked while showing the replay. Fox Footy's product is so superior to Seven's that it's almost hard to believe they actually sign cheques for Dwayne and Tony Shaw. Trade them to Seven and we'll be in a Pay TV glory era.

Sadly I've not got the thousands of dollars required to follow this travel circus of mediocrity around the country so at least six more times this year (including the two MCG games I'll be interstate for and the match at Carrara which I'm intending to go to if depression doesn't get me first) I'll have to suck it up and cop watching it on TV. At least next time I'll be going in with such low expectations/white hot hatred of football, that they could probably have Lady Gaga and Pol Pot on commentary and it wouldn't be able to ruin my day any more. If anybody from Foxtel is reading I'd be happy to have a go on the red button channel a'la Eddie, but don't expect me to call any opposition players.

Let's be frank though, if we were a half decent team would I give a shit? Probably not, but we've won 24% of matches in the last seven years and somebody else other than players and coaches has to share the anger and frustration eventually. Next thing I'll be sitting in the middle of opposition cheer squads just to give me some victims to unload my self-loathing on.

It's getting hard to come up with ways to put this, considering the same thing has been said in almost 76% of reports since 2007 (excluding the two draws), but we are still shit and not getting any better. Thrillsville. And for every minor win we have like unearthing Michael Evans from the wilderness we've got ten other players either treading water or going backwards at a million miles an hour. I very much like Michael Evans, don't get me wrong - but is he going to lift the club out of the mire single handedly? No he is not.


Now that Port has managed to break free from the gas chamber and head for surprise salvation a'la Melbourne 1998 and Brisbane has snuck ahead with their supposed free win against GWS yet to come we're left in a neck and neck race to the bottom with Gold Coast (look better than us), Footscray (look better than us) and the Giants (looked better than us for three quarters). Our status as the worst 'real' team in the competition is almost assured for a second successive year and we're no longer safe from winning line honours either.

On one hand I'd like to say draft picks can get stuffed, I'm sick of everything being about draft picks and why don't we just play properly for once but sadly we are - and even more sadly if we were to end up with Pick 4 at the end of this year it would not only be quite a tasty pick to ruin some poor kid's life with but would also mean that we actually managed to finish above three sides on the ladder - and at the moment I'd probably take that.

At least today the first quarter provided some highlights. When Moloney wasn't rampaging out of the centre and their forwards weren't taking the piss out of our defenders (Garland excused, the rest straight onto the Hertz Rentacar Psych Couch) we at least got to see another monster mark and goal by Gawn as he continues to promote himself as our biggest cult figure in years. It was also the first time we'd kicked five goals in a first quarter against a team better than us since Freo at Docklands last year so that was something, but it didn't last then and it didn't last today. You can't go around playing one quarter every week and expect to get anywhere, and how the players let this happen again and again is a mystery to me.

We actually looked half decent whenever we got the ball, but the problem was that firstly we were hardly getting it and when Brisbane had it they looked even better, slashing through us like the famous knife through red and blue butter.

If it's any consolation our tackling was good all day, but of course a team who aren't all that much better than we are will get themselves into situations where they're going to get tackled. There was a lot of headless chicken work going on over the other side as well, on the occasions when they weren't all running free with five men forward of the ball queuing up to go inside 50 and score. Not to mention the times when an opposition player is at half-forward, or out in the boundary line inside 50 kicking from a free kick or a mark and somebody always, ALWAYS gets free for a pass. Roll on a big week of our famous zone defence being the talk of the town. I'm not even sure what a zone defence is supposed to do, but by the looks of it neither are any of our players.

With Brisbane sensibly tagging Nathan Jones to buggery in the knowledge that he's the only weapon we've got of course we got smashed out of the middle. Jamar did a couple of old school novelty perfect taps to our lot (and some Psychic Friends Connection reunion specials straight to Beamer), but he also did plenty that hit the deck and were scraped up by Brisbane players without any of our players in the same area code as them. Not surprisingly, with the Stefan Martin Experience dropped after having done absolutely bugger all so far in his Brisbane career, it was left to Moloney to do the traditional Brent Grgic/Jeff Farmer/Brian Wilson style demolition of us after leaving.

No wonder he did too, was there any danger of trying to put pressure on him in the first half? By the time McKenzie got moved to him in the second half we were already going down the gurgler and much of the damage had been done. For two weeks we (e.g I) have been crying about how we couldn't tag anyone because we didn't have any taggers and then we bring one in - who bless him is relatively limited in doing anything else, and we accept that - and let a side's best midfielder run around unmolested.

Given this I suppose we're going to have to hear all about how stupid we are for "letting him go" etc.. etc.. after he butchered us all day under no actual pressure from anybody. Big whoop, he tonked a rubbish midfield - good luck to him, but it's like what he used to do for us when we had a promising midfield, not the faultiest of all units on offer despite having drafted 7000 'saviours' in the last five years.

Speaking of midfielders can we send Jack Trengove to a (properly accredited and non dodgy) specialist for somebody to work out what's gone wrong with him over the last couple of years? The poor bastard is trying his heart out but can't get near it. To his credit at least he was tackling everything that moves in the first quarter when he couldn't get a touch but for whatever reason he's running around like a shadow on what he was like in his first couple of seasons. If he needs to be rested or give up the captaincy (if that has any bearing on anything, which I'm not sure it does) then do it. We're not playing for 2013 anymore, and if Neeld's trying to save himself - as any of us would - he needs players out there who can do the job. He does always show flashes of brilliance though, how good was the kick to Howe on the lead in the second quarter? Related - how good was Howe's lead? Shame he chose it as the time to blow his perfect goalkicking record for the season, because it was everything kicking to a forward lead should be.

Assuming that you counted breaking even in the first quarter as a 'good' one then the bad news for anybody who thought that we might get two in a row was that we, err, didn't. Not that anybody was kicking goals anywhere, but that was mainly because even though we were going around with a silver platter offering them up Brisbane were too stupid to take them. They kicked points, we gave it back to them, they kicked another point, we tried to bomb the kick-in to Jamar, they kicked another point etc.. etc..

Even when we had the good fortune to win what must have been one of the worst free kicks of all time when Moloney "shepherded" Sylvia (in fact Sylvia was trying to do some sweet UFC style submission move on his head a'la Neville Jetta last week), Col - who I'm pleased to report otherwise showed up and looked interested again, probably with his agent training a sniper rifle on him from the stands - managed to handball it straight into Moloney's hands and stuff it all up.  It was good to see MFC players finally linking up under Neeld, it's just a shame that it didn't happen until one of them left the club.

It took 10 minutes of silver service before finally Shannon Byrnes, who I thought was otherwise (spoiler alert) our best of an ordinary bunch, botched a handball and gifted them a goal. Then, just when you thought the inevitable massacre was about to break out we kicked two in a row and took the lead back. Work that out considering we were being belted across the ground, but just because we were being belted everywhere it mattered did it mean that it had to go that way for the rest of the day?

How many times has a team had to hold on for dear life for a half before getting on top and winning? It's a weird game, weird things happen (see the fourth quarter last week) so why couldn't we do it? We weren't playing Geelong there - and I don't give a toss if it was 27 degrees in Brisbane because even if we hadn't been on this magical mystery tour to Darwin in the pre-season a proper side would get the job done instead of running around like an over 40's team. Fitness be stuffed, they run around like they've all got multiple injuries in the first quarter much less the last.

Six points down, from six more scoring shots and Brisbane should have put us away but they didn't and we were given a free life. With Watts going forward at the start of the third quarter I started to fantasise that he'd go down there and boot a bag to drag us over the line and prove why he should never be allowed across the centre of the ground ever again. Sadly, even though he went down there and did a good job (more importantly looked like he was interested) we still managed to do our traditional roll over and die at the start of the third quarter and totally stuff it up. No point having a quality forward if the ball never goes down there.

I respect that we're not capable of being good enough for long enough in games, or to play four decent quarters every week but why does it always have to happen to us in the third quarter? What do they say to them in the rooms? It's not even just the first five minutes anymore, it's the whole quarter. Three goals in the first seven minutes (and it should have been four) before Tapscott fluked one to keep us in it. Then of course after busting our arse to get a goal, as lucky as it was, we turn around and let them have two at the other end with stuff all pressure. Balls to everything.

Yet somehow we almost got back into it in the last quarter. If Bail had kicked an absolute sitter (or passed to Davey a mile free right in front of goal) we'd have been back to 12 points. Next thing you know they're down the other end kicking goals and even Brisbane's version of Juice Newton, Aaron Cornelius, is kicking goals.

Game over, not good enough, players looking like they can't be bothered. At one point Ashley McGrath, who had spent the entire game being mocked by the commentators for being a bit porky, 'ran' through our midfield like he was Gary Ablett and despite Pedersen being somewhere in the general vicinity he managed to set up a goal in slow motion under no pressure. That piece of 'play' (at 5km/h) said everything about the long queue of mediocre players hoping to reinvigorate their careers by belting us throughout the year. We are to the league what GWS were to us, and that's so sad.

With the finish line in sight and most of the team now sorely lacking interest the only person who fired up in the last few minutes was Davey when he pounced on Zorko at the end and probably got himself a reprimand/suspension by jumper punching him repeatedly. Good, I say. As much as I'd like to start Davey instead of sitting him on a plastic chair for three quarters it was good to see somebody fire up for their teammate when most of our players would have just taken the free goal and walked off.

So, put the Coaching Doomsday Clock on again. If Carlton flog us again next week, as they very well might if we play like we did today, then 4.40pm on the following Sunday 12 May against Gold Coast will be GWS Pt. 2, with Neeld teetering on the edge of the cliff and ready to be lobbed off if we lose.

I still don't think that sacking a coach now is going to achieve anything, and I look forward to writing this once more next week before it's no longer relevant due to the coach being axed, but my faith was shaken today. Why pick McKenzie and not use him to tag? Why pick Rodan to start and leave him on all day? Why keep Davey on the bench/plastic seats until we're five goals down instead of throwing him into the mix during the third when we were still in the game? Why take Blease off (unless injured) and leave Pedersen on field after we'd sent Watts forward. I don't know what he's supposed to do in the team, but we're not playing GWS every week.

I don't care if Clark and Dawes are coming back next week, and I welcome both of them in the side, if I see Watts walking alongside Frawley, Garland and the King of Sizzle (who is clearly suffering a curse after winning Demonbracket) towards the backline on Sunday I'm out for this football department. They can all go down there and if we can ever get the ball in that direction they can all play a role. It makes it hard to hide Jamar or Gawn when they're not playing in the centre but I don't give a toss, park them on the bench if you have to. What happens if Watts somehow catches fire up front and wants to stay with Clark, Dawes and Hogan around is anybody's guess but if we're going to lose him then like Sylvia let's get a few good performances out of it first.

2013 Allen Jakovich Medal votes
Nobody was really any good, so please scale your outrage about the following on that basis.

5 - Shannon Byrnes
4 - Colin Sylvia
3 - Michael Evans
2 - Rohan Bail
1 - Colin Garland

Apologies to Howe, Gawn, M. Jones and Watts (second half).

Leaderboard
15 - Nathan Jones
9 - Shannon Byrnes, Matt Jones (LEADER: Jeff Hilton Rising Star Award)
8 - Colin Sylvia
7 - Jack Viney
6 - Michael Evans

5 - Jack Grimes (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)

4 - Jeremy Howe

2 - Rohan Bail, Aaron Davey, Max Gawn (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year), Mark Jamar (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)

1 - Mitch Clark, James Frawley, Colin Garland, Jordie McKenzie

Facebook Comment of the Week

Cancelled due to CBF, but have a video from last year that's come back into relevance after our players were all caught out on the ground grinning broadly and having the time of the life with the opposition at the end of the match. Also features the SME's lovely hair, which is only now being challenged by the magnificent locks of Michael Evans.

Next Week
Dunn was apparently dominant for Casey but is he going to be there next year? I'd much rather try Strauss now, because we're getting to the point where we have to make a decision on him soon instead of waiting for something to happen by magic one day. Whatever's going to happen with him won't come as a result of beating up on VFL players every week.

As for the outs I was happy with Tapscott's bumping and willingness to get killed for the team but just like Pedersen I'm not entirely sure what his role in the team is supposed to be. Whatever it is he does it better than Pedo, but if I'm sending Watts forward he is not required.

In other selection news Rodan probably needs to put his hand up, go "this isn't working" and concentrate on working with the kids in the VFL. Not that he will, but we need to do it for him because he's not adding enough to make playing him every week worthwhile - especially in the starting lineup rather than as sub. Shannon Byrnes has proven his worth the last couple of weeks, Rodan is yet to do anything to justify his spot.

IN: Clark, Dawes, Strauss, Viney
OUT: Pedersen, Rodan, Tapscott (omit), Trengove (rest)

Final Thoughts
My patience for football is starting to rapidly evaporate, so it's a good thing that I've got three matches left before fleeing Victoria for the Hawthorn and Collingwood games as well as the bye. Still looking for somebody to write the reports for these two games (you don't have to write one for the bye). I've got an offer from a Collingwood fan to do Queen's Birthday, and I'm quite into this gimmick but definitely first preference to any MFC fans who are keen.

You can do it however you like, either wail thousands of words of impassioned pleas, a video of yourself screaming WHY ME!? or just post a photo of the Goatse man along with some votes but as long as you do the votes sensibly it's up to you. Email, tweet, send a comment etc.. etc.. if interested.

Stat My Bitch Up

Players to hold a career winning record in games for the MFC during "the dark ages", and the rounds in which they had it. Wins from before 2007 count towards their career record.

Rohan Bail

Round 18 2010 to Round 21 2010

Round 4 2011 to Round 5 2011

Round 7 2011 to Round 8 2011

Clint Bartram

Round 1 2007 to Round 5 2008

 

Matthew Bate

Round 1 2007 to Round 6 2007

Daniel Bell

Round 1 2007 to Round 7 2007

Jace Bode

Round 19 2007 to Round 20 2007

Cameron Bruce

Round 1 2007 to Round 5 2007

Simon Buckley

Round 14 2007 to Round 15 2007

Aaron Davey

Round 1 2007 to Round 3 2008

Lynden Dunn

Round 5 2007 to Round 8 2007

James Frawley

Round 11 2007 to Round 12 2007

Round 14 2007 to Round 15 2007

Max Gawn

Round 11 2011 to Round 12 2011

Round 13 2011 to Round 20 2011

Round 4 2013 to ?

Brad Green

Round 1 2007 to Round 9 2007

Round 10 2007 to Round 13 2007

Ben Holland

R1 2007 - retirement (final record 34-1-31)

Jeremy Howe

Round 11 2011 to Round 12 2011

Round 13 2011 to Round 19 2011

Travis Johnstone

Round 1 2007 to Round 5 2007

Joel Macdonald

Round 19 2010 to Round 20 2010

Stefan Martin

Round 14 2008 to Round 15 2008

Tom McDonald

Round 23 2011 to Round 24 2011

Brock McLean

Round 1 2007 to Round 2 2008

Brent Moloney

Round 1 2007 to Round 2 2007

Daniel Nicholson

Round 13 2011 to Round 19 2011

Byron Pickett

R5 2007 - retirement (final record 15-1-13)

Jared Rivers

Round 2 2007 to Round 5 2008

Russell Robertson

Round 1 2007 to Round 9 2007

Round 10 2007 to Round 13 2007

Round 14 2007 to Round 15 2007

Tom Scully

Round 4 2010 to Round 5 2010

Colin Sylvia

Round 4 2007 - Round 6 2007

Luke Tapscott

Round 4 2011 to Round 5 2011

Round 6 2011 to Round 7 2011

Jack Trengove

Round 4 2010 to Round 5 2010

Paul Wheatley

Round 2 2007 to Round 1 2008

Matthew Whelan

Round 1 2007 to Round 4 2007

Jeff White

Round 1 2007 to Round 2007

S&MFC

Have you ever found yourself more baffled by a victory ever? Not just slightly confused but actually unable to come to grips with what you've just seen. There was nothing confusing about the Freo comeback in '08 - we were just half shit and half divine - and for all the surprise "how did that happen?" victories over the years (Essendon 2012 comes immediately to mind despite being forever tainted by a fortnight ago) nothing is going to match what happened today for a long time, if ever.

It's unlikely that circumstances will allow it, firstly the shock value of losing to Gold Coast is already diminishing, and in a couple of years it will be the same with GWS. But for now the idea of losing to them anywhere - much less on your home ground - is enough to make grown men cry and/or get the sack. Ask Matthew Primus, who until he ran into them last year had actually improved his side from the year before and the next thing he was signing on down at Alberton Centrelink.

We've got Rounds 7, 19 and 20 to get through yet before we can confidently retain our "at least we've never lost to..." status, but at least the pressure valve has been released a little bit now. Next get the entire world to presumptively write obituaries for the coach before the match after a shite run of results, include a wildcard midweek 'drug' scandal, then find a way to twice blow good chances to put your opposition away before going into the last quarter three goals behind.

Difficult enough to engineer all that, but at about 3.40pm, with Herald Sun sponsored mobile death squads pulling up to the MCG carpark to take advantage of the "free entry in the fourth quarter" policy, if you'd told me that I was about to watch Michael Evans and Jeremy Howe be the face of the greatest quarter EVER played by the Melbourne Football Club in any game from 1858 onwards I'd have treated you to some of this:



And you would have deserved it, because if Mark Neeld is (as everyone would have you believe) a condemned man, then when the three quarter time siren went with GWS 19 points in front and with momentum he was strapped into the electric chair and about to cop it full blast. Then this improbable record breaking quarter comes along and he gets a stay of execution with a retrial starting next Sunday. Football is stupid.

No doubt when we're 19 goals down to the rapidly plummeting Brisbane (why did I get sucked in by pre-season form and almost put them in the eight?) the original verdict will stand and he'll be walking The Green Mile again, but until that happens (or until later in this post) let's concentrate on the fantastic, absurd turn of events which today saved a coach from almost certain death.

Considering we opened the game conceding two goals to The Big Setant first up after a year out with a stuffed knee we weren't actually all that bad early on. It was certainly better than last year's first 15 minutes when they kicked three in a row and we all adjusted our Mexican wrestling masks nervously as it looked like a gigantic shambles was on the cards. We eventually recovered that deficit to rack up a big (by our standards) win, but what 2012's Carnival of Hate lacked compared to the modern day Carnival of Self-Hate was well over the top celebrations from an insane Irishman.

Good luck to him too, if your career is hanging on like a thread and then you do your knee you should celebrate a successful comeback by throwing wild haymakers in the air and dancing up and down on the spot. It would certainly be rude of a Melbourne fan to abuse him for it after Brad Green's similar antics in an equally pointless match against Gold Coast late last year. As soccer fans say whenever somebody gets busted for souveniring chairs, passion is not a crime.

It was certainly Setant Time in the first quarter as he made the King of Sizzle look a bit foolish early on, but in the grand scheme of things have you ever seen a worse five goal performance? You may as well play for yourself when you're in the position he is (employed 95% for comedy value) but that was something special. McDonald didn't have a great day, or even a good one, but the difference between the two when the ball hit the ground was criminal (except when it hit the ground and gifted him goals with a novelty bounce), and that's why Tom will play 150 games and TBS will be lucky to make it to a 100. The KoS will be back bigger and better, Setant will probably not kick another goal for the rest of the year but will be able to take his seat at the table with Beau Wilkes and Kent Kingsley at the Royal Society of Forwards Who Only Play Well Against Melbourne.

When I say "we weren't all that bad" that's in the context of a game which was poor to an almost satanic standard. A good side would have cleaned us up in spectacular fashion, but such is life for a bottom four team - if you don't take advantage of the other teams in the same leaky boat then you deserve everything you get. Later on they'd be the ones taking advantage of us, but all's well that ends well eventually.

Once we'd put Setanta back in his box (temporarily at least) it looked like the natural order was about to restored. Byrnes and Pedersen were showing signs of why we recruited them and Maximum Gawn was furthering his status as a monster fan favourite and cult figure by playing like Jamar circa 2009-2010. Imagine a ruckman who actually wants to get the ball around the ground? THIS HAPPENED. Also is there anything more thrilling than one of Jeremy Howe's screamers actually leading to a goal? Vote 1 his grab today after the Giants botched the kick-in for Mark of the Year because for once it wasn't when we were 50+ points down, didn't end in us turning the ball over five seconds later and (eventually) took place during a win.

Underrated highlight of the first quarter was Clark's run down the wing, unnecessarily bouncing the ball about six times when two or three would have sufficed. Considering he's looked like he's hardly been able to get out of more of a light jog for the last couple of weeks it was heartening to see him bolting at full stretch, but I'm hoping that wasn't the forerunner to whatever foot injury he ended up with later in the game. Sadly, but happily at the same time, instead of trying to kick a Franklin style goal of the year he gifted Pedersen's first goal at the top of the square. Assuming his injury isn't lethal this is why he's so important - Mitch has hardly gotten out of 1st gear so far this season and he's already kicked seven goals. Big whoop in the grand scheme but for us anybody on target for 40 is a crucial part of the plan - now he's also got Howe and Byrnes heading in that direction too, which is nice.

Sadly everything has to be put through the shit team filter against sides down at our end of the ladder, where you ask yourself "would we have done this against a real side?" (this is usually what the fans of opposition clubs are asking when they play us), and I'm pleased to report that yes for once we might have. The tackling was good, we were ok in the middle of the ground AND we were racking up scoring shots too. Ok, the last one probably doesn't pass the STF but take if wherever you can get it and run for your life. Pedersen faded out after quarter time, but Byrnes was great - if he can put in performances like that against real teams and add that to what he's been hired to do off-field (i.e. teach the secrets of success from Geelong) then he'll be the most valuable of the four recycled players, and we might get a useful second year out of him on-field.

Unfortunately for fans of blood feuds and vendettas we were also letting $cully run riot. That's how well we're going, letting him play his first half decent game in years. He even kicked it to his own teammates most of the time, which isn't much change from when he used to play for us and would kick it towards anybody who wasn't wearing red and blue. Unlike the original Carnival when he copped hell from the crowd AND didn't get a kick it did get a bit silly when everyone was booing him as he was belting us. It's much more fun to shout proper abuse instead, but in the end he's still going home to a gigantic Uncle Scrooge style bank vault so 1-0 to him and I look forward to his second value for money game of the year against us on Saturday 3 August.

We were, uncharacteristically, the better side in the first quarter and could have built up enough of a quarter time lead to be relatively safe if Clark hadn't given away a free for jostling behind the goal as Matt Jones was about to take a shot on goal. If MJ never kicks another goal he'll probably curse Mitch until the day he dies, but I was at the exact other end of the ground and haven't seen the replay so not sure if there was anything in it. There probably wasn't, and they probably get told to piss off all the niggle in GWS games in case it scares "the parents" of West Sydney out of letting their kids play AFL. "The parents" are probably not even watching because they're more interested in Rugby League matches where everyone beats the suitcase out of each other.

The Clark incident created the cliched two goal turnaround - assuming Jones would have kicked straight - as the Giants went straight back down the other end and that man Setant kicked another. It was a blow, but we were still on top. Witness for instance their kick-ins, which were in a state of disarray because for once we had pressure on. You do not have to wait for a GWS to come along before putting pressure on an opposition side kicking in, this can be done against anybody.

To be honest I put so much into the last quarter that the middle two are a bit of a blur to me, but I do distinctly recall them battering us in the first few minutes of the second but not being able to kick a goal before Byrnes got two in a row to give us some breathing space. At the time I remember thinking that we were all over the top of them after his second goal, but looking back it seems that I've pushed the four goalscoring opportunities they had (for 0.3) before then out of mind. So should it really be all that much of a surprise that almost immediately after the second Byrnes goal they then put on a burst and took the lead? So, one of them was a dodgy video review (one of many) but we looked wobbly again. Thank god then for the ex-Geelong man who somehow managed to squeeze a fluke goal, his third, through from the boundary courtesy of Jamar and Giles knocking each other out of its way and the defender trying to rush the ball over the line and fresh airing it. Take it however you can get it.

By this point we were back to just playing 'ok'. When we did that at West Coast it ended up with them being applauded off the crowd despite being 10 points behind, but when we did it against GWS everyone was still filling up Molotov Cocktails, ready for the mass outbreak of civil disorder in the event of a defeat. We were still lucky that the Giants were playing like the motley collection of children and rejects from elsewhere (hold on..) that they are and keeping us in it. Luckily we still had one of our famous third quarters to come.

The good news is that this week the queue for the Progressive Insurance Psych Couch will be significantly shorter, but the downside is that at the front of the queue there will be two marquee names. Any danger either of Frawley or Watts is going to be with us next year? They both look totally disinterested on field, and not just because they've been bullied by Luke Darcy into shaving their beards off. At one point in the third quarter there was a loose ball right on the GWS 50m line and in the midst of all the chaos Chip just stopped for a second with his back turned and stood there. It was like one of those shots by war photographers when bullets are flying everywhere and some poor, haunted civilian just freaks out and stands there in the middle of the battle. Forget sticking tree bark into Lynden Dunn, give Chip a hot one full of Xanax and sit him down for "a chat" with a qualified mental health care professional.

As for Watts could it be that he just doesn't give a shit? We can't seem to win with top picks, either we go for the laconic (Watts, Johnstone) and they never live up to potential or we picked a brutally serious, Soviet style player ($cully) and he knifes us. Hopefully either Trengove turns out to be the best of them all because he's normal or Smilin' Jimmy Toumpas kicks in the door for jolly players everywhere.

It's fine to be laconic sometimes, but not when you're playing in the backline. If the ball comes to him his kicking and decision making is a cut above almost everyone else on our list but if it doesn't then he'll be right with a light jog in its general direction. In an ideal world he wouldn't be like that, and he'd just happily do whatever he's told but it's not an ideal world and other than two games last year when he was a world beating defender - until we got excited and played him on Jonathan Brown in Brisbane - there's nothing to suggest that it's where he's going to play his best footy. Once he came back from injury in the last few games of 2012 he didn't do anything remotely interesting, and his finest work in the pre-season was pushing forward and kicked goals.

Yes, he was the king of intercept marks in 2012 but so what? If he and Rivers swapped I'm sure Riv would have done exactly the same. Either get him back up front, play him on the ball or just give up on him and watch him walk out the door and into a better team at the end of the year. We're not going to make the finals, so they've got to make it their mission to rebuild him by the end of the year. I want to see him doing random blind turns around nobody and kicking goals again. If he doesn't want to be out there at all he should at least put his hand up and say so, but if he just hates playing down back then stop trying to smash the square peg into the round hole. See also sending Blease forward again so he can follow his natural instinct and wreak havoc kicking goals instead of having to go within 10km of an opponent.

Then again they both looked as happy as Larry when singing the song at the end, so who am I to judge what's going on in their heads. If either of you are reading this (and if so, why? Do you not have a FIFA tournament of some type on?) I ask you to give us a sign that you care in the form of your signature on a new contact and some acts of near suicidal desperation next week. Look at Rohan Bail for inspiration, there's a guy who wouldn't get a game at another club if we ditched him and who's one concussion away from having his entire career wiped out and he's still diving on footballs with reckless abandon. You are both better than this.

There was some slight nervousness at half time, but deep down you knew we were the better team whether we wanted to show it or not. It took us 15 minutes of the third quarter to level the scores, but yet again just when it looked like we were about to break their back (and make them humble) the Giants rebounded to finish off the quarter with three goals and dark mutterings began to sweep the ground again.

The last came after Neville Jetta booked himself a fortnight minimum off by poleaxing Whitfield (continuing the MFC tradition of trying to ruin top draft picks) and while I was absolutely cursing him for giving away the downfield free/goal at that point (after originally abusing Jamar in a case of mistaken identity before the replay showed he had nothing to do with it) thank god somebody finally decided to belt someone. I'd have preferred if he'd set himself the ultimate challenge of trying to clock Josh Kennedy last week (would have bounced off), but if we have to bully some 18 year old to make ourselves feel better then so be it.

After being not very good at all in the first half Jetta was quite good in the second. Probably got excited and decided to thump somebody, and that's the sort of player I can support. He even managed to get on the highlight reel for performing a suplex that Taz would have been proud of. I've noticed that if opposition players run into him he's a gun tackler, but on the run they usually just go around him. Can't see him being there for 200 games - or next year at this rate - but handy enough in the interim while we sort ourselves out this year.

He was especially good in the last quarter, but mind you, who wasn't? Even I might have gotten a kick in the avalanche that was to come, but for the moment after his cheapshot heroism we were three goals down and impromptu lynch mobs were forming everywhere. We'd gotten ourselves into some sort of hole. Not even just the bog-standard MFC style landfill full of used Atari cartridges, but a real Viet Cong style man-trap with additional spikes for maximum carnage. The natives were restless, the neutrals were biting their fingernails, the media were trying not to flop it out and start having an Uncle Doug in full view of the entire press contingent at the prospect of getting him after a long campaign like they did with Terry Wallace.

Even I, foolishly (and at times unconvincingly) in the "don't sack anybody yet" camp, was starting to see which way the winds were blowing and that it was almost certain that they'd have tossed him out in the street if we'd been rolled. I don't believe in the Sports News First conspiracy theory that we'd already lined up T. Viney 'just in case' (mainly due to the fact that the guy who writes it has got a rumour file strike rate of about 12% - link presented as a source only, no need to click it and give them ad revenue) - and if we had then chalk up another reason why we're a spaz of a club - but I'm sure they would have caved in to 'everyone' telling them to do it just to try and avoid having the fourth receptionist this year put in a compo claim for mental distress from nutbars calling in and abusing her. Not to mention whoever has to moderate the Facebook page and the ASADA troubling cocktail of anti-depressants they must be on.

Considering the start to the season we've had and the new revelations during the week about us allegedly lying our arses off about players being injected with monkey glands in a Coles carpark it would have been easy enough for the players to roll over and die there and then. They had gotten themselves into enough trouble that even a slight win in the last quarter wouldn't have saved them, and we'd have been going for the golden sombrero of coaches sacked midway through the season.

Most of the players who are any good would get a game somewhere else, so if they're not playing for pride what do they care? And thank god that for once pride won out long enough to shatter the Giants' fragile spirit and allow us to eventually beat the shit out of them. When Byrnes got ripped off out of his fourth goal in the first minute (admittedly after costing himself the hassle free goal by stumbling over 25 different attempts to soccer it through) it felt like everything was going to conspire against us. This on top of that goal late in third quarter when KoS McDonald had a bouncing ball covered only for it to take a bastard bounce straight over his head and into Setant's arms for a goal. Then there was some, err, questionable umpiring but we would say that wouldn't we? I'm interested to sit down for the replay and watch the 2000 cutaway shots to Neeld in the coaches box to see what his expressions are like when all of this is going on.

For the next few minutes we teetered on the edge of disaster, one GWS goal away from a four goal deficit with a crowd rapidly turning (especially on Watts, who went from supportive cheers to low murmurs as the day went on) and ready to start kicking seats into plastic shards. Then Nathan Jones took over. Beautiful Nathan Jones, the only player to have actually significantly improved under Neeld.

He wasn't getting as many clearances as he had in the other weeks (was apparently the league leader before today. Work that out), but he was one of the few we had who could claim a four quarter effort then went absolutely off his tits in the last. You don't need a title to lead, and he's practically the third captain at the moment. His goal opened the floodgates, before Maximum kicked his first from the square to fire the crowd up. It was a popular goal too, almost killing the goal umpire as payback for her complicity in the Shannon Byrnes rort and seemingly smashing a GWS fan wearing a comedy wig straight in the head, which serves him right on both fronts. Would have better if it had been one of those dickheads dressed as monks, but you can't win them all. Maximum didn't apologise for his path of destruction, and for that we love him.

There was one slight bit of nervousness after we levelled the scores, when it once again looked like we were going to run away with it and then let them get the lead back again but from there on it was a procession - led by the aforementioned combination of Evans and Howe who booted seven for the quarter between them. It was all quite ridiculous. With 13 minutes to go we had still been losing. Cue a landslide, and cue GWS playing like we do when somebody puts the heat on. How are we in the same boat as teams like this?

All this without Clark who had disappeared with an injury that for the second time against the Giants at the MCG threatens to take all the fun out of it. I swear he's not been fit for one minute this year, so winnable game next week or not if he needs the rest give it to him. Not entirely sure who'll play up front in that case (Pedo? Sellar? Jamar? Hogan in a blonde wig with Troy Davis' number on?) but having him for 16/17 other games this year is more important than running him into the ground.

Howe is always a consistent performer, one of the few who can put his hand up every week even when we're shit, but I've been thrilled by Evans' performances over the last couple of weeks. There were eyebrows raised when he got promoted off the rookie list despite missing all of last season, but on the strength of last week and today you can see why they were keen to have him available. He looks like somebody from the crowd who has blagged their way onto the field in a Melbourne jumper, but unlike most of our other players who plays like he belongs, and if he's going to kick goals too - including some CRUMB - so much the better. Happy to have recognised his potential two years ago when I gave him 4 votes on debut behind some bloke called Gysberts who has since disappeared.

The rampage got to the point where even Colin Sylvia was bursting through the middle, knocking off teenagers like Jack Darling on school camp. I'm definitely applying the STF on that piece of play, because no real team would have allowed it and if he could do it against anyone he would more than once a year but his last two weeks have given me some hope that we'll at least get a great season out of him before he dicks us and goes elsewhere.

In the end the mood swung around from mass distress to Carnivale, with every goal ratcheting up the good times metre but while it was nice - and I was loving the goals don't worry about that I was hardly in the mood to celebrate. I'm glad for the players, coaches and everyone else properly involved but we're not out of the woods yet. For now there's no blood on the players' hands (which would mark a third lot for Davey, Dunn, Jamar and Sylvia who must spend a lot of time washing theirs Lady Macbeth style) but after the (subdued) elation of victory wears off they're going to have to look at why were we in that hole in the first place when the Giants weren't actually playing all that well themselves.

They were quick, and were taking advantage of us to get loose players all over the shop but their general kicking and disposal was shite and that's what kept us on the same level long enough to wear them down before clocking them in party time. Strangest part of today was how Jack Viney had held his own against grown men in shit sides for three weeks, then when we get a fair and balanced matchup against kids he goes missing. Never mind, one so young cannot be expected to be on top every week. I expect that once we get to the Facebook Comment of the Week I'll find at least one person suggesting that he was 'tanking' in order to try and get his dad the senior coaching job. I did like how he initially refused go to the middle of the circle for the club song, and had to be reluctantly forced in a'la the Speaker of the House.

Speaking of the coach, the Trial By Seemingly Everyone Except Me is adjourned for another week, but no doubt there's another belt of it on the way soon unless something dramatic happens. Beating Brisbane would be a good start, if we can get past Moloney's inevitable 47 possession game and the SME kicking six. Their losing margins haven't been quite as drastic as ours, and their win over a new club was a lot more heart stopping, but they're under the pump too. Imagine if Moloney has a shocker next week and Voss gets sacked, then Neeld cops it in the neck later in the year - Beamer could be the first man ever to contribute to two coaches being sacked in one year.

They're flat as a tack, but there'll be nothing more that'll get them going again than beating us. Do we get the rampaging elephant version of the MFC? Probably not, but I'll take the first half of the West Coast game variety again if they're offering - just for four quarters this time. Suddenly we're not the ones under all the pressure, time to stick the knife into somebody else for once.

Coaching Corner
Like it not Neeld is going nowhere this week and hopefully we can have some rest from a thousand articles about how bad we are and how he's a terrible guy for doing whatever. Speaking of, we've all got our historical issues with Matthew Lloyd, and he does often come out with some tremendous bollocks, but this article about how bad we are does make some sense - at least compared to Luke Darcy's anti-beard crusade and Damien Barrett performing frottage on a cardboard cut-out of Kevin Sheedy as he tries to extend yesterday's hero's coaching career into a 12th decade.

When he resists the temptation to write the exact same article as everybody else has for the last six months ("OMG, shit drafting. Should have picked Nic Nat/Dustin Martin/Jack Darling/Jaxon Crabb etc.. Thanks for the newsflash arseholes) he makes sense in saying the board - who are on shifting sands themselves - have to either back him or sack the coach. Last week I said that there was nothing to be gained from sacking him, and I still believe that, but I do take the point that the board either have to properly support him (and not just with glib statements) or we're just going to be a sideshow after every loss.

There's no need for a random extension of contract or anything, we've got him until the end of next year and with a record like he has there shouldn't be any worry about Ross Lyon-esque midnight phone calls. The board can say under no circumstances will they remove him before the end of the season and at least give him and his team the chance to have some clear air until the end of the year. If we're still ratshit then and they've got no faith in it turning around then they can make the move, we can wheel the next victim in and go back to square one. If we've improved and go backwards in 2014 they can still give him the arse, and if we improve and keep improving then I'll be as surprised as anybody. If there are players who come out and say "I will only stay if you get rid of the coach" then trade them as soon as you possibly can even if you are going to change coach.

Also assuming that the likes of Leigh Matthews and Paul Roos are quite happy in the media, Clarkson doesn't fancy swapping quality for horsemeat and Kevin Sheedy is finally wheeled into "Past Glories Retirement Village" (where like today he can stand around talking to himself because nobody's given him a headset) can somebody provide a primer as to who the potential candidates are in the event of a replacement being required at the end of the year. Who are the key assistants and why should be even remotely interested in going back to square one with any of them?

During the week I saw somebody claim that "nobody would want to coach us at the moment", which is absolute bollocks because bad football clubs are like prostitutes - there's always a man out there somewhere who thinks he can save them (and who will presumably wind up broken and bankrupt both morally and financially). Ok, you may not convince Chris Scott to walk out on Kardinia Park but there's 17 other teams chock full of assistants, most of whom would be champing at the bit for a crack. Sure, you might not get a 'big' name, but Ken Hinkley was hardly Port's first choice and all of a sudden he's being hailed as a messiah. If all else fails there's always this guy.

Still, for the moment I'm going to stay in the (online at least) minority and stand by the man. Mistakes have been made, and ok Rodan/Pedersen/Byrnes should probably be stepping aside for the youth of tomorrow eventually but if anybody can locate these supposed killer replacements please contact the Melbourne Football Club courtesy of AAMI Park.

2013 Allen Jakovich Medal Votes

5 - Nathan Jones
4 - Shannon Byrnes
3 - Michael Evans
2 - Max Gawn
1 - Jack Grimes

Apologies to Bail, Davey (pro rata), Garland, Howe, M. Jones, Pedersen, Sylvia and Terlich.

Leaderboard
It's beginning to look a lot like 2012 at the top. Grimes still doggedly avoiding the Seecamp DQ, and welcome for the votes for the very first time to S. Byrnes of Geelong.

15 - Nathan Jones
9 - Matt Jones (LEADER: Jeff Hilton Rising Star Award)
7 - Jack Viney

5 - Jack Grimes (LEADER: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)

4 - Shannon Byrnes, Jeremy Howe, Colin Sylvia

3 - Michael Evans

2 - Aaron Davey, Max Gawn (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year), Mark Jamar (JOINT LEADER: Jim Stynes Medal for Ruckman of the Year)

1 - Mitch Clark, James Frawley, Jordie McKenzie

Crowd Watch
Just over 20,000 apparently, and I see that inventing fictional crowd numbers for GWS games now extends to their away matches as well. That said there's no doubt there were a lot of neutrals there who took advantage of decent weather to come along and see an execution, and to them I say thanks for paying to get in (although you probably got a free ticket) now you can jam it in your arse.

Considering the crowd it was almost obscene how many GWS fans were there. Who did these people barrack for two years ago? They can't all be natives of Sydney's west who have just discovered the game and decided to travel to the MCG. If you're actually from the area I'll pay it reluctantly, but there seems to be more than a handful of adults in Melbourne who have done a total about face and selected a new team. How can anybody over the age of 13 do this with a straight face? Do you know somebody like this, can you please ask them what the hell they are doing?

Not to mention anybody who lets their kids follow them or Gold Coast. Ok it's practically child abuse to force them to go for Melbourne, but if your kid walks in and says "I HATE THE DEMONS" (and why wouldn't they?) before declaring they want to go for one of these plastic franchise teams it's your duty to steer them away. If they can't be steered back to the red and blue then at least get them to follow a real team, then refuse to ever take them to a game except when their new team plays us and even then they have to sit there and STFU for four quarters. Further advice on child rearing is available by sending a stamped, self-addressed envelope to Demonblog Towers.

But while we're at it thanks to the various turncoats and street performers who helped boost the crowd numbers a bit. It's fair to say that not many of them made it to the top deck of the Ponsford which was very sparse populated, but apologies to the people in front of me who were inadvertently on the end of a massive anti-Scully spray featuring most of the big gun obscenities after he gave away that downfield free kick in the last quarter. Also apologies to the MCC for battering the bejesus out of the seat in front of me in Q32 whenever we kicked a goal in the last quarter, I was so excited relieved and just couldn't hide it.

Meanwhile how bitter and twisted would the AFL and (secretly) the MCC be that they have to put games like this on at the MCG when they could be making millions more without us. Imagine if they could rig it so that on any given week there were two/three games there that involved Carlton, Collingwood, Richmond or Essendon as the home team? I know it's 'our' ground and all but we need to watch our back with all this boutique stadium talk going around, because if we're not careful we'll be strongarmed into playing at Punt Road Mk. 2 instead of the MCG so that everyone except us can make an extra buck.

Sure the MCC Members would crack the sads for about 20 minutes until they got reciprocal rights at the new ground and a letter from the MCC saying "you're free to hand in your membership if you're not happy, we have 500 million others on the waiting list", but I've noticed in our club constitution that while there's a clause about the members having to approve any mergers there's nothing in there about relocation or changing home ground. I'm sure there'll be bigger fish to fry, but I think we should rectify that at the next AGM. Make it so that any move to relocate more than four home games a year to a ground other than the MCG has to be approved by the members. The AFL will still get their way if they want, and they'll bully us into it in the end but at least we can go down with a fight and put our disdain on record. Think about it and I'll see you at next year's AGM for the big vote.

Facebook Comment of the Week


This week, we have premature evacuation, bizarre third party comments and why tanking is the right thing to do as long as there's no draft picks on the table.




Enjoy seeing your hard work in print - next week I'm going to take advantage of the fact that everyone will be at home watching by switching to the MFC Tweet of the Week, highlighting the best things sent to @melbournefc during the game. This is highly dangerous as no doubt either you or somebody you know will get a run and I'll cop even more hell than that time I bagged Black Caviar.


Next Week
When we were lined up against Port in the opening round it was a disaster because the resulting wild scenes from the loss dynamited any confidence the team might have had left BUT now we've got a team who are in our league while we're coming off a confidence boosting quarter. If we go back to being turnips then resume the executions, but it's a good chance to start again and - god forbid - undeservedly get somewhere near the top eight.

For the first time in about three years I managed to be at enough of a loose end on Saturday to justify going to watch Casey play. It didn't hurt that I wanted to go to Windy Hill at least once, even if it is a hollowed out shell of what it used to be and several times a game of bowls next door was interrupted by a footy bouncing onto their green. They did, however, have a proper food caravan which is a step up from the primary school canteen at Casey Fields.

The good news is that the Scorpions had a win, but don't get too excited because it was an Essendon C team with barely a game of AFL experience amongst them other than from Matthew Bate, who looks like he's lost half his body weight (send canned food for him C/O Essendon Post Office) and didn't appear to get a touch until late in the 2nd quarter.

I have no idea who their ruckmen were or what EDFL team they played for last week but they allowed the unheralded combination of Jake Spencer and Jack Fitzpatrick to look like Dean Cox II and Dean Cox III. Unfortunately for both of them Jamar looked reasonably good today, and Gawn has absolutely sewn up his spot in the team so they'll both be playing for nothing until one of them is injured. It was still bizarre to see the Spencil so dominant. He was also not bad with his disposals when he had time (i.e from mark/free kick) but he's still an absolute disaster in traffic.

At least Fitz could have an argument (not a very convincing one) for a spot in the forward line if we get desperate, but at the risk of having rotten fruit lobbed at me I'd like to suggest that if Clark can't play and we don't have any other forwards that we park Jamar down there for four quarters and play a Spencil/Gawn ruck duo. It's not pretty, it might not be effective, but at least it's some kind of target without having to rely on Howe to stand on heads just to get a shot at goal. Fitzpatrick lost me a bit when he took a mark 30 metres out on no angle and did that bullshit kick around the corner thing.

'Essendon' were a lot like Melbourne were against real Essendon, they were terrible from centre clearances, conceded a rush of goals in the third quarter which killed the contest (at least they kept it to one quarter), had one good forward target who they couldn't get it to enough and a backline who battled manfully but were eventually overwhelmed by sheer weight of numbers. Was nice to be on the 'other' side for once even if it was only the VFL.

All the MFC players put in at least 'good' performances (and how could you not in an 80 something point win?), and excluding those who can't play like Magner, Couch and Hogan (who I command you to DROOL over. His marking and pack crashing will bring tears to your eyes in a good way even if his set shot run-up is even worse than Dunn's) the better players were Spencer, McKenzie and Rodan. Jordie is a certainty, and as for the other two the first is not required with Gawn/Jamar in the team (assuming my selection theories are not of interest to the match committee) and the third has hit a massive dead end in the seniors, but to be fair to him he has only played one full game. Still, we know what our lot is for this season now so we may as well stick to playing one or the other of he and Byrnes and giving the other spot to a 'kid'.

Taggert was probably the next best, playing up forward for a couple of goals and some good defensive pressure, and all of Clisby, Kent, Strauss and Tynan had their moments but other than Jordie nobody stood out as a player who will actually impact what's drastically wrong with us on-field. Strauss was probably the best of the defenders coming off half-back, and he'll get his opportunities eventually but nothing to get over excited about yet (in his fourth season). Magner might help plug the gap in the middle but he can't. Troy Davis was ok too, but with respect to the man himself who looks like a lovely gent I'm still confused as to why we kept him at the end of last year.

Then there's Blease and Nicholson, who both had their moments but neither could claim to have played anywhere near four solid quarters. The amount of times Blease collects the ball, beats an opponent with pace and proceeds to kick it straight down the throat of one of their players is ridiculous. I'd pack away this obsession about turning everybody into a midfielder and put him back inside 50 where he did the most damage last year.

So, assuming Clark can't play and Jetta won't be allowed to play I'll opt for...

IN: McKenzie, Blease (maybe Taggert for novelty?)
OUT: Clark (inj), Jetta (susp)

If Clark makes a miracle recovery I'll just take a straight McKenzie for Jetta. Toumpas didn't play yesterday, and that hardly did wonders for Watts' confidence so I'd like to see him playing VFL before he gets a recall to the 1's. Watts and Blease to both go forward and Davey to replace Jetta in the starting lineup.

Was it worth it?

To have been there for history (in a good way for once) makes it worthwhile overall, but I still feel like we've just papered over the cracks for a week. I'm over the moon that the monkey is off the back of the players a bit, and hope they can treat next week like Round 1.

Final Thoughts
Melbourne Football Club, get well soon.

Live from Demonblog Towers