AUS FOOTBALL Brisbane Lions - AFL 2024 Premiers

[_wwong]

We do have a young kid named Morris coming through, a bit early for him in all honesty but this season is gone, get some games into him. Gives the kids some games now, see what they have.

The issue is, Fagan won't do this. He'll just drop Tunstill for Lyon again which does nothing for anyone.

Didn’t we also sign a young forward from the hawks that can apparently take a good mark?

 

[Bucking Beads]

The Lions are cooked. They had their shot and missed out. They’ll be irrelevant next year because they won’t be competitive

 

[Sproj]

The Lions are cooked. They had their shot and missed out. They’ll be irrelevant next year because they won’t be competitive

I would be surprised if that is true.

Many people are forgetting how many key injuries we have right now on top of not playing well.

Neale is playing on one leg, Cluggs seems to have one foot out the door and McKenna is just back from about 3 months of on and off again hamstring injuries.

On top of that, we have lost Coleman, WAshcroft, Bailey, Doedee and Robertson to long term injuries.

Factor in we will get LAshcroft and Marshall as a minimum in the draft, two of the highest rated kids in the country, things don't look that bad for next season.

The issue is that our game plan has become stale and Fagan doesn't seem to know how to play any other way. He also doesn't ever drop his underperforming favourites and some of the squad just never get a look in no matter how they go in the twos.

 

[Sproj]

Didn’t we also sign a young forward from the hawks that can apparently take a good mark?

He's just back from injury. Injuries are killing the team right now on top of a lack of confidence. We haven't had to deal with injuries like this for ages and it is taking its toll.

 

[Bucking Beads]

I would be surprised if that is true.

Many people are forgetting how many key injuries we have right now on top of not playing well.

Neale is playing on one leg, Cluggs seems to have one foot out the door and McKenna is just back from about 3 months of on and off again hamstring injuries.

On top of that, we have lost Coleman, WAshcroft, Bailey, Doedee and Robertson to long term injuries.

Factor in we will get LAshcroft and Marshall as a minimum in the draft, two of the highest rated kids in the country, things don't look that bad for next season.

The issue is that our game plan has become stale and Fagan doesn't seem to know how to play any other way. He also doesn't ever drop his underperforming favourites and some of the squad just never get a look in no matter how they go in the twos.

They’ve all but given up out on the park. 1 major injury and the team doesn’t want to run or even have a crack! A very slow team where speed is absolutely a must

 

[Sproj]

They’ve all but given up out on the park. 1 major injury and the team doesn’t want to run or even have a crack! A very slow team where speed is absolutely a must

But again, look at the players out. Bailey and Coleman add speed. WAshcroft is a ball winner and without him, it is down purely to Neale and he is carrying a significant injury. In the team currently we have Wilmott, Lohmann, Cameron, Fletcher and McKenna who are all speedy.

We also have speedy players in the twos, namely Sharp, Robertson (injured), Madden and Prior who never get a run. We are also adding a couple of speedy types through father-son in the draft.

Our team is fine, we just made a GF and are not full of too many guys who are over 30. We are just banged up, coming in off a GF heartbreak and unfit due to a significantly disrupted preseason. We have also had an extremely tough start to the year with so many top 4-8 teams. The draw starts to open up significantly now.

Even so, we are the only team in the last 5 years to play all final series, so a down year is not necessarily a bad thing. A number of teams that had down years have come back and won the thing including Collingwood, Melbourne and Geelong. We aren't even going as bad as two of the preliminary finalists last year at this point in the season in terms of GWS and Carlton.

Everyone thought after the exodus of players over the last few years and making the GF that GWS were on their way down...they just touched us up, made the PF last year and are currently the premiership favourites. So there are a number of reasons to think 2025 could be an exciting year. The questions are just whether:

1. Is Fagan the man to make the hard calls on some players and get the team to that extra step?
2. How much list change do we need?

We don't need wholesale change but we do need some tweaks. If we do end up losing Cluggs and Berry this year, I posit that this may not actually be a bad thing in the long run.

 

[Bucking Beads]

But again, look at the players out. Bailey and Coleman add speed. WAshcroft is a ball winner and without him, it is down purely to Neale and he is carrying a significant injury. In the team currently we have Wilmott, Lohmann, Cameron, Fletcher and McKenna who are all speedy.

We also have speedy players in the twos, namely Sharp, Robertson (injured), Madden and Prior who never get a run. We are also adding a couple of speedy types through father-son in the draft.

Our team is fine, we just made a GF and are not full of too many guys who are over 30. We are just banged up, coming in off a GF heartbreak and unfit due to a significantly disrupted preseason. We have also had an extremely tough start to the year with so many top 4-8 teams. The draw starts to open up significantly now.

Even so, we are the only team in the last 5 years to play all final series, so a down year is not necessarily a bad thing. A number of teams that had down years have come back and won the thing including Collingwood, Melbourne and Geelong. We aren't even going as bad as two of the preliminary finalists last year at this point in the season in terms of GWS and Carlton.

Everyone thought after the exodus of players over the last few years and making the GF that GWS were on their way down...they just touched us up, made the PF last year and are currently the premiership favourites. So there are a number of reasons to think 2025 could be an exciting year. The questions are just whether:

1. Is Fagan the man to make the hard calls on some players and get the team to that extra step?
2. How much list change do we need?

We don't need wholesale change but we do need some tweaks. If we do end up losing Cluggs and Berry this year, I posit that this may not actually be a bad thing in the long run.

Mate players out doesn’t mean the rest of them stop playing.

GWS were missing there 3 best players last night and won by 10 goals.

 

[Sproj]

Mate players out doesn’t mean the rest of them stop playing.

GWS were missing there 3 best players last night and won by 10 goals.

Did you read anything else I wrote?

 

[Bucking Beads]

Did you read anything else I wrote?

I stopped reading when you said our team is fine. They’re obviously not fine. There has to be some off field stuff creating issues. It’s ok to disagree. Maybe it’s my copping mechanism by being really negative about them.

 

[Sproj]

I stopped reading when you said our team is fine. They’re obviously not fine. There has to be some off field stuff creating issues. It’s ok to disagree. Maybe it’s my copping mechanism by being really negative about them.

Well then clearly no point continuing this discussion.

 

[Bucking Beads]

Lions will be flat out making the finals from here. It’s very obvious that they’re having issues. It would take the biggest turnaround imaginable for them to even make the 8 let alone compete in finals

 

[_wwong]

there’s definitely an injury curse in Brisbane. Starcevich does a calf in warm up, McCarthy looks to have done a knee in the first 10 minutes and answorth knocked out not long after.

 

[_wwong]

Now Gardner with a knee too.

 

[Bucking Beads]

2x ACL and a knocked out player in the space of 15 minutes. The curse of Brisbane

 

[Sproj]

We are down to one on the bench, this will be a monumental if we can somehow hold on when we inevitably run out of legs with no reserves left basically.

 

[Sproj]

Thank you for missing!

 

[Bucking Beads]

We are down to one on the bench, this will be a monumental if we can somehow hold on when we inevitably run out of legs with no reserves left basically.

Still got 2 on the bench

 

[Sproj]

If we can hold this lead to three quarter time, I'll start feeling confident.