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Roar Guru
Joined April 2015
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Footy: The Doggies won the 2016 Premiership!! Soccer: From Ronaldo to Ronaldinho to Messi and seemingly back to another Ronaldo. Full circle!
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Bruce McAvaney cops a lot of flak these days, but he and Dennis Cometti are the last remnants of the older, superior commentators who actually trained as such and know how to give a situation its poetic grace.
It was mid-2017 – that strange jumbled year when no one really wanted to win the premiership – when Chris Scott decided to play a hobbled Patrick Dangerfield up front against Alastair ‘System’ Clarkson’s Hawthorn.
I have a rule with sports books: if the print is big and double-spaced, it means there’s not much content and the author doesn’t have so much to say.
I’m 38 and my vanity has convinced me I can recognise patterns over the years of watching footy.
Sometimes being the best is more of a feeling. A ‘vibe’, as they say. Usually it relates to being top of the ladder for a while. Maybe in our heads it can be like boxing: once you beat the man, you are the man.
Sometimes being the best is more of a feeling, a ‘vibe’ as they say. Usually it relates to being top of the ladder for a while. Maybe in our heads it can be like boxing: once you beat the man, you are the man.
I play indoor football, and I don’t have the greatest sports psychology in the world.
Collingwood lost the preliminary final to Greater Western Sydney by just four points, after a furious comeback – coming 51 weeks after losing the 2018 grand final to West Coast by five points.
Let’s face it, GWS were on a hiding to nothing.
This year, we have had a completely featureless Super Bowl and now a completely featureless Champions League final. The stark scorelines were New England 13 LA Rams 3, and Liverpool 2 Tottenham nil.
The 2018 season is the second time in a decade that, when the vibe of Australian Rules Football has wandered into a defensive vogue, West Coast has stepped in, based their play on pace and superior ball use, won the premiership and restored equilibrium.
I meant to write this one the day Germany were eliminated, but real life called. Today Mesut Ozil has published a long piece of writing on his Twitter account about no longer being emotionally able to play for Germany.
There is something not quite right about France’s World Cup win.
Four matches into Germany 2006, Brazil had won 11 consecutive World Cup matches, had reached the previous three World Cup finals, and won two.
Is France a Latin country? Sort of. Their language is. Their culture is 50-50. They are Latin enough for me to christen this most difficult quarter of the draw ‘The Latin Quarter’. Yes, yes, I’ll get my coat.
There is a saying in South America particularly used in Peru: “We played like never before and lost like always.”
It is human nature to lament the passing of time, to feel more centred in the experiences of our formative years rather than what is going on in the world when we are older.
Martin Flanagan’s essay about the 1970 Carlton-Collingwood grand final, simply titled ‘1970′, is the best piece I’ve ever read about football.
You look like you’ve done your homework with this article, but you can’t start as low as 6th (or lower, assuming) and make a splash in the finals, it’s just too low. They managed it last year because the best teams were Richmond, Geelong and West Coast and GWS avoided them all until the GF.
The decade is riven with teams who looked good but started too low – Geelong 2012, Sydney 2017, West Coast 2019. You play one bad quarter and you’re toast.
Yes there was an exception, but I think The Miracle defies analysis.
Why the Giants are the AFL's most dangerous team
Agreed. I’ve always thought how crazy it is that dudes paid six figures to do nothing else but kick a ball can’t at least do it on both sides of the body.
Thoughts and observations: Gold Coast vs Essendon
You’re kidding yourself if you think Port are for real. The Brisbane loss was classic Port. Today likely shows them up again. If they win today, well, then I’m wrong. But they won’t.
Super round of footy could redefine the finals race
I assume he still has it as a pure coach, but I’m damn sick of what he says these days. 2020 is like the year Clarkson jumped the shark.
Just say it: Clarko was out of line
I rewatched this game recently, it was excellent for three quarters. One matchup was Burgoyne vs Akermanis, it doesn’t get better than that.
I decided that, while other games have what-ifs, the way this game shaped up with Lynch getting injured Brisbane were absolutely never winning it. They had only one functional forward in Bradshaw and no run. Meanwhile Black was annulled like you said. They only stayed in it for three quarters because of their experience.
A shame the commentators were the vanilla Channel 10 ones. Bruce would have hyped up the four-peat/historical angles and made the game seem more once in a generation, because it was.
Looking back at the 2004 AFL grand final
Oh you can write them off I assure you. Last year it took them a good 15 rounds to get into stride (and it’s not a given that would even happen this year). No one has a spare 15 rounds to fart around this year.
Poor efforts, weak defending dooming dysfunctional Dogs
Quite the opposite, Beveridge tried too hard to keep the team on edge after the premiership rather than just let them do their thing.
Poor efforts, weak defending dooming dysfunctional Dogs
Strongly disagree, to say the younger players (ie almost all of them) were not responsible for the premiership is blatantly false. They won because every single player delivered and because their midfield got the ball a lot more than the opposition. The midfield core were all 20-24 in 2016. The player most responsible for the win IMO was Macrae, just turned 22.
M Boyd, Picken, Dickson and Morris provided solidity and experience but they were not the number one factor in them winning. To say Stringer was a key factor is pushing it to a comical degree if you look up his stats.
The Western Bulldogs have everything to lose in 2020
Strongly disagree. Premiership was mostly won by the team’s uniform consistency and by the midfield getting the ball heaps more than the opposition, that midfield core were all 20-24 years old in 2016.
MBoyd, Morris and Picken and Dickson provided good leadership and solidity but you cannot say the young players were not responsible for the win. At minimum, saying Stringer played a major part is really pushing it.
The Western Bulldogs have everything to lose in 2020
Collingwood is the most storied club in VFL/AFL history but the author’s questions are legitimate. Why did they lose all those grand finals? What needs to be done to improve? If you want to keep improving you cannot assume anything about yourself, certainly no one can afford the complacency of calling themselves the greatest anything if they actually have plans to keep striving.
The 15 most irritating Collingwood moments of all time: Part 3
Martin Flanagan’s 100-page work ‘1970’ is mostly about Collingwood and these sorts of issues. I did a poor man’s review of this once, his essay is more about Carlton-Collingwood than Melb-Coll but the issues are the same.
The 50s Demons are basically lost in time/pre-TV, but I found them interesting as a subject to a degree. The book ‘The Red Fox’ about Norm Smith covers this era. It’s too frickin long to be interesting and barely touches the Collingwood side of things, but I found this an interesting reversal, since the 64 Grand Final is always told from the Collingwood side now. The book describes the tension of the whole day of the 64 GF from Melbourne’s perspective and says Melbourne players were weeping with relief in the dressing room at having won it, which is a change of perspective in how that game is usually reported.
The 15 most irritating Collingwood moments of all time: Part 2
I liked that North team a lot, their consistency come finals time the whole decade was almost legendary. One thing I read was that North was the only major premier of the decade who were not an elite defence, almost a throwback team in a way, although of course they had their strengths and strategies.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 1
West Coast 2018 turned out to be about 10-15 centimetres (Sheed ball to goalpost) better than Collingwood in the end, not exactly clear cut 😉
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
Interesting about the percentages, I have heard that one before.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 1
I can’t just ignore that a team won a premiership, and it does mean they are the best team for at least a month. But I haven’t elaborated on these eg Dogs 16.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
For the record, I reckon Collingwood was the best team in 92, just about, but the top 6 finals system screwed them.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
“Undisputed” in the title is a mistake, but it’s interesting that just about everyone has been able to be it at some stage.
I privately (or maybe not so privately now) consider that Geelong team as better than three-peat Hawthorn, but their opposition was harder. Hard to really know, Geelong and Hawthorn played some great games but their peaks didn’t exactly correspond.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
I suppose technically I could have included “Start 2005” for West Coast.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
West Coast didn’t convince me towards the end of 05. They had a loss against Geelong that was really, really weak, I couldn’t call them definitely the best team after that.
They got unlucky at the end of 07 but ultimately didn’t win a final and you can’t say anyone approached Geelong that year in a larger sense.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
St Kilda also lost to Geelong and Adelaide in 97.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
I’ll admit Dogs 97 is an extremely selective argument. They were terrible during July and I just completely ignored that.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 2
Haha, well I couldn’t just completely ignore teams winning premierships, that’s just far too hipster even for me. 😁 You’ll notice I didn’t talk about those situations at length though.
When was your team the undisputed best in the AFL? Part 1
Back the the Future almanac only goes up to 2015 😁
Six talking points from AFL Rounds 15 and 16