Round 11 West v Port

If we win this and other results go to plan we'd be a game out of the five. AFL Port play interstate on Saturday so should take an extra or two with them.
May is out. Patton has completed State U18 duties and I'd bring him straight in. He'd even be worth a look up forward with his height and ball reading ability, if you wanted to put Sinderberry in defence to cover May. Corbett needs a spell but I can't see a ready replacement unless you play Minchella up forward.

Ins, Patton, Sinderberry,Thackeray
Out, May,Bock,Kennedy

Jonas, Burgoyne, Visentini and I think Narkle are travelling to Melbourne this afternoon. Assuming none of them fly back tomorrow to play, Port will field 13 AFL listed players. Could be worse.

We tried hard, but we were simply not good enough.
56 inside 50’s to 33 tells the story.
We simply don’t have enough inside 50’s to win regularly and we give up far too many inside 50’s to the opposition.

We rely on to few every week and players like Nicholls our Recruit from the AFL has been disappointing.

We need to be signing better players if we are to move up the ladder

What happening with Jono Beech??

We are now second to bottom with a 3/8 win/loss record for the year but, strangely enough we are playing some pretty good, consistent footy. Against Port at Alberton we came across a team made up of mainly AFL listed players on their home turf but we competed with them all day and kept coming at them to the end with only a ten point deficit. We just seem to lack the polish and the skill to do the key things at the right moment: the big mark, the important tackle, the footy smarts – all of which come with experience. Most teams have several ex AFL players but we are sadly lacking in this area.
We missed Bramich when he hurt his shoulder. Ellem isn’t really a ruckman but still played one of his better games. Mattingly our best over 4 Qs then the usual suspects, Ryan x 2, Park, Meline, Morrish. A welcome return to form from Josh Gore. A good captains game from Johnson.

We should have won this. We gave up way too many scores from stoppages in our defensive 50 and from clumsy tackles. And some poor shots at goal (Ellem x2, Maguire x 2 and Mulady) failed to cap off some very good passages of play.
I thought Mattingly was our best, Josh Ryan was outstanding, Park again was very influential and his goal was brilliant, and Kobe Ryan was good again. Bramich was doing well until injured, and it might be time for him to have some surgery I suspect and get himself right for next year. Ned Stevens went into ruck when Bramich came off and was very effective, so it was a surprise (and I think a mistake) not to ruck him at all in the last quarter (if I'm right in saying that.)
In a way it's kind of nice to be disappointed by this loss because it suggests it's not expected like it has been for so long. We're playing some really good footy despite some glaring weaknesses in our playing stocks, which is a tribute to the coach. You can at least now actually see that we could be very competitive with the plugging of a few holes. Even with Beech, Brand, Frost and a fit Bramich yesterday I think we would have won.
May presumably comes back in next week, and there would be pressure on Kennedy, Bock and Nicholls ( 5 disposals, 0 kicks to half time) to hold their spots.