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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The Monday means test after the events of round 12. We're at the halfway mark of the home and away season. Adam Simpson, hello. Morning, Gerard. What's the measuring stick of a good season? Straight to Simo says. And let's park the Collingwood supporters who think it's been a flat year. If you park your loyalty to a side, what constitutes a good year from an AFL point of view?
Or why are you happy to watch the football? I think we're having a better year than last year. It feels that way. And I was thinking, what actually constitutes a good season? So the finals contention, I think that's the first one. And the...
Chapter 2: What insights does Adam Simpson share about measuring a good AFL season?
The top 10's now made it a bit easier to be more energised with the bottom half of the eight. Yes, that's confected to open that up.
I think so.
Chapter 3: How do Collingwood supporters perceive their team's performance this year?
But it's clearly working for dramatic effect. Yep. So you're telling me I'm a chance sort of stuff going on. So that's great. I think the drama's been... Usually always big, but now it's Carlton and Essendon are the coaches, Brisbane storyline, Freo winning 11 in a row, Sydney sort of rise with the style of play. So I think the storylines have been pretty juicy.
No massive controversy off field, mainly football controversy, which I like. You need your stars. I think the good players are all playing. Most of them, maybe there's a couple out there. Darcy's not playing, but the A-graders, you know, the Bontempelli, Dacos, Heaney, Smith. I even think, I mean, Watson's now a star, isn't he? Yes. And Harley Reid's a star. Yes. So the stars are playing.
The style of play looks good. There's higher scoring. The game's reasonably attractive to watch. Yeah.
Chapter 4: What factors contribute to a successful season in the AFL?
I always rather a close game than an attractive game, but the game's a bit closer. And I think that the Thursday nights are better this year, except for maybe last week. But for the most part, the Thursday night games have been better. Is that a fair call? Yep. So I think we're heading towards a pretty good season. Yep. Take away who you support.
And then what's not working from the measuring stick approach? I think that we've all spoken about the fixture in general needs to be tidied up. We're about to start the double up games in round 13. Yeah. Yeah. That's great. And it's great coming off a bye. So you have your week and a half off and then you play a team off five day break. I mean, Brisbane have got Gold Coast this week.
Anyway, so the fixture needs to be addressed. The ARC, I'm not sure if you know about the ARC, Jared, but that probably needs to be looked at to a certain degree. I think parts of the umpiring, maybe more how they explain themselves, the PR department needs a bit of a review.
Chapter 5: What are the current storylines affecting teams like Carlton and Essendon?
And then just the injuries in general for, in particular, bottom sides that can't get off the fairest wheel of injuries. You get two back, you lose two sort of thing. So overall, I think, I mean, what else is out there? What constitutes a good year from a football point of view outside your team? I'd add special events, which we've had.
The Pendlebury record breaker and the King's birthday game is going to be really something next Monday. And to filter in with your idea around regime change, the idea that the rise and fall of teams. And this year has those markers, the early rise of Melbourne, the fall of Brisbane. So those are the two additionals. But it's a much better season on the boil than last year.
And then we'll wait to see what it delivers us to. Yeah. We don't want three teams that can win it. That's what we don't. By the end of the year, these three or four teams are by a mile in front of everyone else. The finals just work the way the finals work. We don't really want that. There is a risk of that this season, I suspect. The top end might be clear of the rest.
But the mix that we've got going on, Simo says, is a really good season. Yeah. Well, unless you barricade for a few teams. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you obviously don't barrack for Essendon. Very little to enjoy from where I sit. But Mark, the spectacle around Essendon. So really, Richmond's the only team that's not living any sort of cycle. Essendon are living a cycle. Yeah.
Whether you want to be or not, you are a spectacle. Already sacked a coach, in the grip of injury again, and the Hurd scenario, which is unfolding. So you're in the grip of something. It's not desirable, but you're absolutely in the grip of something.
I'd like to know where the Saints are at. What's their cycle? I'm not quite sure what the cycle is. It's a different one. They're in here somewhere. Yeah.
All right. The big issue, Simo, is always going to be the game at the Gabba, which you're on duty for Fox 4. Yeah. how clearly would it tell us that Brisbane are in trouble and how definitive would it be that Fremantle is our pace setter? I think it gave us both of those answers. It did. Going into the game, I was thinking, this is not going to define either club's season.
Like Brisbane coming off a five or six day break playing Fremantle, they weren't ready for Fremantle in my eyes. No matter how fired up they were going to be, to come from where they'd been playing to matching the best in the competition was, And them losing, I'm not surprised. And I don't think it's a write-off for the year, but I'm starting to doubt.
And then for Fremantle, if they had a loss against Brisbane, I still wouldn't have jumped off that train either. So in the end, it was first versus eighth. And that's what it looked like. Brisbane's deficiencies down back... So the efficiency of which Fremantle took them apart was pretty significant. The three talls, I think they kicked nine or ten goals between them.
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Chapter 6: How do injuries affect team dynamics and performance in the AFL?
So is Fremantle's markers the markers of a premiership team? For me, yes. Now, whether they're ready to lose a prelim or make it all the way, that's going to come down to a little bit of luck and form and confidence. The coach needs to get his press conferences a little bit more vibrant. If that's his biggest weakness, though, his ability to just not... He doesn't ride the wave, does he? No.
When he's down, he's not that far down. When he's up, he's definitely not that far up. So I think he's just set everything up really well for the system. They're not surprised by their form anymore. There's no, oh, geez, where's this come from? So that's turned into expectations, which is a great spot to be in. And Brisbane.
So what does come next for Chris Fagan? I don't know.
Who's won back-to-back and going for a three-peat? And we spoke about this before. And you hit a rut. Well, they lost three in a row now? Yep. So is it the bullet? I think he's backing his boys in. I think he's going to go down with the ship if it is to go down. It's probably not going to go down though, is it? It's going to be a reload at the end of the year and they'll
maybe enjoy a longer offseason. But right here and right now, I don't think the bullet, I think he fired a bullet three-quarter time. He got a bit of a response, which is positive. He's got players out of form, but I don't think he's going to drop them. So maybe it's a rest. So no one really knows what's in Chris's mind right now, all the players.
They got the Suns this week who are coming off a bye. So do they get to their bye? And they have a crack at this wildcard situation. And they can still get on a run. I rode off the Giants a little bit a month ago and they have a look at them. So this particular part of the year, I'm not quite sure what he's going to do. I'd probably look at the style.
Do we need to do something differently with our entries? Let's go a bit deeper. Let's just lock it in, play some dirty footy and not try and win the game from the back half with our ball movement. Maybe there's a few little tweaks there, but I'm not sure if he's built that way, folks. I don't think he dives into that. Our system stands up. We're just going to play better.
I think that's how he's feeling. Are they gassed? They look gassed, yeah, but there's still 12 weeks to go. So if you're gassed now, what are you going to be in ā five or six weeks. So I think there's, I don't know, I've never run a marathon, but there must be somewhere in the marathon where you just conserve a little bit and take a few steps back and then you go again.
So what does that look like for Brisbane? Only he would know that and the players. And their best players are not playing very well. No. So you are hostage to your best. There's a whole lot of teams. You are hostage to your best players like never before, I think. I agree with that. He's got a lot of best players. I think his best players is part of it. There's also his backline.
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Chapter 7: How has Fremantle's performance impacted the competition this season?
Now, back to Waitley.
This is for you, Simo. A good AFL year is like the old Batman TV show. So you had me at hello right there. You'd enjoy... You'd enjoy it when unusual villains like Egghead and King Tut were shown. But it was really when the traditional villains were in focus that the show captured the imagination.
Having the Blues, Dons back in focus and Collingwood remaining delusional but winning annoyingly enough is like when the Joker, Penguin and Catwoman are prowling and makes a good season. It keeps you interested no matter what your own team is doing. Holy snap judgment, Simo.
Yeah.
Flash and Lizzie, the underdog at the dog park. That's very good, Flash. That's very good. 0-4-3-3-9-8-11-16 is the 40 Wings temper text. The difference is temper. The best bits, the curiosity, so that's all going to revolve around Carlton. What they got right, Adam Kingsley, this is Mark 2.
this is what we do the misread melbourne away from the mcg pressure index preliminary final integrity it's all ahead of us as we work through the round 12 edition of the means test with adam simpson next
This is Waitly.
We'll work our way through the categories of the Monday Means Test. Adam Simpson is here to dissect all that's happening. You are central to some conversation, at least, Simmo, with those who have their views on your presence on the Carlton selection panel for the coach. Yeah, and the Essendon stuff. I suppose if you have to talk about me, Gerard,
Um, I'm not, I'm not really not interested in coaching at the moment in the, in the short to medium and possibly longterm. I, um, if I have made that clear, that's, that's where I sit at the moment. So I was never going to be putting my hand up for, for a position. for Essendon.
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Chapter 8: What challenges is Brisbane facing as the season progresses?
He came off the bench. Captain fantastic. That's why they rested him so long. To send him back on with two minutes left to be the hero. He's going to kick around the corner to kick the goal. To kick the Blues back in front. Their captain.
Iconic.
From Kaplan, fantastic Patrick Cripps.
It was the best bit. It'll stand as one of the best bits of the season. Yeah. Sleeping giant, aren't they? They are a sleeping giant. And Cripps, well done to him. And whatever's happened in the last month in terms of the turnaround of form, the way I describe it, I don't think too much has changed with the direction of the style of play.
So this is a really interesting case study because the way you coach, it's a freedom within a discipline. Here's the discipline. Within this... Do what you want. Play how you need to play. But we'd like to do this, this, and this. But around that, just be yourself. Express yourself. Don't be afraid to make mistakes.
So the freedom of which the players are playing now, so they've gone from uncontested marks 13th to 1st. Long kicks, 9th to 8th. They don't kick it long as much anymore. D50 to inside 50, they've gone from 13th to second. And the kicks inside 50, they've gone from 6th to second from a retention point of view. None of that is plant.
That is just the players, for whatever reason, taking a different approach mentally when they go into a game. And now Josh has got them in a position where they're playing with that freedom within the discipline. So you can have the same style of play and it looks completely different based on the player's attitude, which is...
disappointing if you're Vossy and you go, oh, come on, boy, I had that all set up. And I think he totally gets why there's probably a change in some of the players' attitude because they feel like there's been a weight lifted for them as well. So that's just the nature of the beast.
And yeah, for them to have a win on the weekend against a quality side in Geelong, I don't think Geelong played poorly, by the way. No one's saying that, are they? Nope. And they've still got their DNA based around contest and clearance. And I think they fall back on that when needed most. Patrick Cripps, Jacob Wiedering said with us on Crunch Time, he spoke about the psychological barrier. Yeah.
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