The 2024 season in review

[LaurieHolden]

Unpack, unwind, unload your thoughts on the Pies 2024 season.

[SLORT]

Seen lots of vitriol about our year from disappointed fans. Can't say I agree as if those 2 draws were wins we'd be right in it, with 14 wins vs the leader Sydney's 17. That is not far away at all considering I can't remember a worse season for injuries to key players at key moments. Yes, we were a bit off and we started slow. But we were always competitive (...except Hawks) and Fly's game plan has held up okay. Hopefully a Brownlow for Nick, a few tweaks to our list, and we'll be ripe for another crack next year.

[think positive]

Played a week early, (as did Brisbane) totally unfair, 3 games , 2 interstate in 12 days to start the season when we played the longest season. Both draws were umpire decisions, so so many injuries. And we missed by 1 game. No one would have wanted to face us in finals, even with no DeGoey or Checkers.

In saying that, how many games did we lose to poor conversion? Do we actually practice goal kicking, or only from the boundary! We missed so many less than 25 out, its mind boggling. Other teams do to and I never understand it!

Also, we mark and then instead of stopping, we handpass in traffic! damn dumb! Roost it down to our end!


I’m still surfing the wave ofthe last 2 seasons, this season, the gods, AFL and injury, were against us. The free kick count Friday seemed like an apology for a year of shit calls!

We are not the cats, with a captain lauded despite being responsible for the huge blight on the game that is ducking. We are not free kick hawks or the welfare dogs. We are not an interstate team that gets a leg up like the Barry Hall gut punch decision.

We damn earned it, and will earn the next one. This year taught me that it’s still us against them, backs to the wall.

I’ll be back in my seat round one, provided we aren’t playing in Timbuktu,

Off season, I’m sure there will be a few tears with departures, I hope the saints or Ginnie keep the heat off of us! What ever is going on re Wright, Kelly etc, I’m happy for it to remain in house. Don’t feed the trolls. Reset and go again.

Oh and yes I am biased and wear rose coloured glasses! But in my mind, we are the main act, the rest are just back up dancers! Bring it! Let’s go Pies!

And may the premier be anyone from a far away place! Cheers

[RudeBoy]

If your aunty had wheels she'd be a bike. We can all bemoan those draws and the avoidable loss to the Swans all we like, but the fact remains, we only finished on 52 points and outside the eight.

After being Premiers the previous year, this can only be judged a failure. Sure, we had injuries, but that's part of the game. What our injuries revealed was the lack of depth quality in our squad.

Our challenge next year is to find a way to considerably strengthen our squad, knowing that our ageing veterans are in a state of decline. We will need players like Allan, DeMattia, TJ, Parker, Dean and Smit to step up and really make an impact at senior level. Hopefully we can also improve our squad through trading/drafting. I'm confident we can be much better next year, but to do so we need to acknowledge how poor our 2024 performance was.

[Pies2016]

I’ll review it by the zones.

Average points for - 87 points
Average points against - 85 points

Forward of centre, even though we never played our two key planks together in 2024 and were continually decimated with other important cogs missing, we still managed a way to kick a score in most games we played. Given those circumstances, I give that area a pass and see no reason why we wouldn’t have the capacity to kick more goals in 2025.

Midfield and ruck. Any midfield discussion is very multi layered but in simple terms Cameron was brilliant and was also required to handle that load without Cox for a period. Given that we lost significant firepower in our midfield during the second half of the season, I thought we were still ok around the middle. DeGoey, Mitchell and Pendles all missed significant chunks in the second half of the season, yet we still managed to be competitive on most occasions in that area. The loss of DeGoey in particular, was huge.

Defence was quite simply, poor and not up to standard, made even worse by the fact we hardly suffered an injury back there ( other than the unfortunate retirement of the underrated Murphy ) Our midfield was further thrown out by the need to work behind the ball more in order to compensate for continually leaking goals. The domino effect is the disconnect between mids and forwards because the mids were required to work deeper in defence than ideally preferred ( bearing in mind, our experienced mids werent playing anyway )
The good news is there’s a reasonably simple fix at hand by reviewing both our backline strategies and the current personnel during the off season. One of our priority solutions should be the need to find a ready made defender or two ( at least one who is key position ) able to step into the starting defence from day one.
I’m reasonably buoyant about 2025 because the players who can make us better in most areas, missed a lot of footy in 2024. The challenge is to make the backline more accountable, both strategically and personnel wise.
As always, injuries remain the disclaimer in any of these conversations. Playing either the Eagles or Richmond twice would be a good leg up too.

Finally, let’s not forget the Cats won the flag in ‘22 with the oldest list in history ( at that point) They were decimated with injury in ‘23 and finished 12th. Fast forward another 12 months, they will now go into ‘24 finals with the double chance. Funny game, footy.

[SLORT]

Was just seeing some highlights of De Goey vs Giants last year where he had 13 clearances. I think that another positive of the year we've had was the continued progression of Nick Daicos. To go from half-back /quarterback role, to push up into midfield, and now having been forced into being our main clearance getter (167 total for the year, next best Crisp on 93) bodes well for our future. Worth noting that 2023 leaders were Mitchell 126, De Goey 119, Pendlebury 106, and Nick 88.

[inxs88]

I like to start with the players: '

1. Lipinski: great first half season, quiet after bye and solid finish with a top 7 Copeland Trophy finish likely
2. DeGoey: cliche year, when plays we win and he stars, he simply misses 6 games a year which perpetually kills his Copeland and All Australian chances. Rinse and repeat Part 10!
3. Quaynor: truly awful season plagued by fumbling, a cessation of intercept-marking and zero run and carry with a belated decision to be moved to the wing in last month.
4. Maynard: similar year to Lipinski with a poor patch post bye. Perennial top 7 in Copeland.
5. Elliott: see Degoey comments, ditto
6. Mitchell: never got it going and was done and dusted after Anzac Day. Make or break year next season with mid field time needing to be given to Allan.
7. Jaicos: underrated year by the commentariat and should place top 3 in B&F again. Moving back to replace Quaynor seemed to provide him with more possessions.
8. Schultz: enigmatic insofar having his moments but missed critical goals, handball skill errors and frankly played overweight. Needs to trade tummy flab for muscle and become elite. A lot invested into him.
9. Noble: great comeback year after the misery of 2023 and despite his one or two brain farts per game, should be proud of his efforts.
10. Pendles: the drop off never happened and probably raised his output a notch notwithstanding the limitations late in the season the bicep injury had.
11. McStay: simply great to see him back late in the season and hopefully we can have the "best of him" in 2025 with a 40+ goalkicking season.
12. Carmichael: sad and best wishes.
13. DeMattia: season curbed by a bad finger injury break but Reserves form in second half of season was encouraging and hopefully he is an extra Xmas present for 2025.
14. D Cameron: awesome and vindicates the Grundy trade (salary cap aside) a smart decision. Shall run Nick close in the Copeland with a top 3 podium all but guaranteed.
15. Kreuger: showed something between round 10-16 when we needed it however is inability to simply play may mean the club may have lost long-term faith in him.
16. Allan: the highlight of our last match. Bucks astutely said post-game playing him in the mid-field (not the Wing) as was done on debut, was a smart decision. Did he show Cripps like traits? I think he may have. Big pre-season with optimism he now knows he is up to it!
17. Frampton: 9 possession average as a defender doesn't cut it in modern footy particularly when you showed zero inclination or skill in shutting down Joe Daniher, Ben King etc.. Prioritize Dean and others such as Mark Keane potentially.
18. F Macrae: was provided opportunity after opportunity and blew it. Is contracted so we hold the cards if another club wants him. Any pick within 40 make the trade.
19. Jiath: raw like a baby giraffe as evidenced on debut. Big preseason.
20. Smit: mid-season draftee with huge upside and encouraging Reserves form particularly in hit outs.
21. Steene: the curse of the big man injuries again. I'd delist.
22. Steele: reinvested himself like Madonna used to do, in second half of year. Every game in 2025 shall be micro-managed given pressure to blood youth.
23. B Hill: 58 shots for goal (30 goals, 28 points) with plenty of assist's vs 2023 (33 goals, 14 points). Only averages 11 possessions a game so he needs to find a way to get more of the able in his hand and possibly being less self-less and take the shots.
24. Ryan: injury interrupted season and disappointing Reserves form. This top 30 pick has a contract till 2026, so time is in his side. Hangout with Steele and the Daicos brothers in pre-season as much as possible and give yourself the best chance to advance in 2025.
25. J Crisp: another likely top 5 Copeland finish with a consistent season achieved. Had highest goalkicking season with 14 and tackles average 5.5 as he found himself on-ball most of the year doing the grunt work.
26. McInnes: the club can't quite work at what he is given his shift down back in the Reserves late in the year. My bigger frustration is that he was a sub too many times and often the first omitted after a loss. Given he came to the club at 189cm and is now 194cm, patience and a two-year contract should be offered.
27. Bytel: one decent game played but enough of a sample size to suggest his disposal and vanilla traits are superfluous. Delist.
28. Murphy: shame. Best of luck. '
29. Richards: the fact that we didn't offer him a contract in July when he was hot and showing his true wares shall haunt us. Now, we have to match Port's 3-year contract or simply we may be too late, and he has already checked out. Was his lukewarm singing of the song post-match an indicator?
30. Moore: His last month's form was encouraging however 2024 was so far south of his best that it cost us games. For those arguing about missing Nathan Murphy, he ain't coming back! Play on your man Darcy when in doubt.
31. McCreery: might be the barometer of the side with his hamstring injury missed matches coinciding with our form slump. Love him to work on two things in pre-season: ball handling (mitigate fumbling tendencies) and endurance given some on-ball bursts AKA Jake Stringer in 2025 would be welcome as a point of difference.
32. WHE: Often maligned, credit to WHE for his multi-faceted and versatile year where he was the true Swiss Army Knife of the team kicking 17 goals, playing back, wing and forward.
33. Sullivan: early signs were good but plateaued badly as the season progressed. Similar to Bytel, think we saw enough to suggest he may not possess enough to make us better in 2025. Delist.
34. Eyre: another of our big men choices that was brought in under an injury cloud and when played, showed very little. 50-50 for 2025.
35. Nick Daicos: he might be the greatest Pie I've seen in 40 years. If he plays 20+ home & away matches for the next ten years, he should acquire ten All Australians. We are witnessing Gary Ablett season 7-15 greatness in his 3rd year.
36. Harrison: so sad that he did the knee late in the year as he looked like a best 23 prospect going forward. Work hard, sacirfice and commit to your recovery AKA Dan McStay like and comeback in July 2025.
37. Markov: poor year and was perplexed he got an extension before McInnes and Richards. '
38. Howe: kudos to Jeremy's exceptional year. His athleticism, dexterity and flexibility remain undiminished.
39. Begg: permanently injured list clogger. Delist
40. Johnson: played scared, coach lost faith and despite a contract next year, delist or trade for pick 135.
41. Mihocek: was too brave and suffered the law of averages wrath injury wise. Need McStay to stand up and take the pack contests next year to extend Brody's career.
43. Dean: after two missed years, it was good to see him get some game time. Has to be a better prospect than Frampton and with recent rookie list extensions to four years, shall likely get extended. Hasn't quite translated his 20+ possession, 10 + marking Reserves efforts into the Seniors. Does the club think he is better than Mark Keane?
44. Long: if I was to retain one of Bytel, Long or Sullivan, I'd keep Long for the point of difference he offers. Sense that shall likely to be.
45. Parker: Liked his last match very much against the Dees and with a full pre-season and more footy IQ training, may be a genuine bonus addition to our ranks.
46. Cox: 16 matches and 6 goals with the signs of wear and tear showing. Cannot kick more than 35 metres now and his rucking (see Swans game last quarter) was bordering on putrid and unprofessional with his horse kick like infringements. Despite a contract should consider hanging them up particularly with Alex Condon (Category B Rookie) joining us in 2025.

Just my observations however feedback welcome.

[piedys]

Okay, so let's just presume, hypothetically, thanks to the interference of cheating arsehat dog umpires, that we'd have made the eight, and into 8th spot...

We are off to the Gabbtoir to face Brisbane in a cut-throat EF [enjoy, Carlton...]; now are we really going to beat them three times in a season, minus JDG, Mitchell, Mihocek?
Would an honourable loss in week one deem this season a failure, considering the difficulty of our fixture and the injuries we have endured?

Or let's say we finish 6th or 7th perhaps, and have to face one of the two in-form rampant units in Whorethorn or Footscray, who in our current condition, even at the MCG, we'd still have absolutely no answer for.
Again, would an honourable loss deem this season a failure, considering the above?
What we know is, one of those two sides will be eliminating the other in week one, which sides finishing 4th-1st will be grateful for, as they are the two wild card sides striking red-hot form, while teams currently 4-1 are merely plateauing at present, off some very average late season form, and should be worried.

Depending on who actually goes on to contend the premiership in real time, it might be hard at the moment to gauge where we sit in the pecking order?
Are we indeed now only as good as 9th, where we sit at present, which is an 8 spot slide from last years triumph?
Have 8 sides actually passed us talent wise and strategically?
The odd thing is, I find the teams currently sitting 8th-5th are a MUCH more daunting prospect to topple than those sitting 4th-1st!

What we know is we have beaten final eight sides Brisbane twice, Carlton twice, Port Adelaide once, and Hawthorn in SA earlier in season.
That leaves losses to: GWS GIANTS [early, sloppy], Sydney [early, sloppy and lazy] plus the other SCG umpiring fiasco, Geelong [jumped us early] and Western Bulldogs [final term fade out].
So looking at that, it would be easy to presume we weren't that far off the pace; but is it that simple?

We also need to look at which teams outside the top eight defeated us: St Kilda [early, super lazy], Essendon [draw/disgustingly lazy], Gold Coast SUNS [hubris lazy], and then the infamous Fremantle draw, thanks to bald headed dog Nicholls.

Teams finishing in 14th-18th position accounted for 6 of our wins, as they should for a reigning premier, but some we only just snuck over the line, but they all count!

We disgraced ourselves a few times but were only really kicked off the park once, and the only time since 2020, with the Hawthorn debacle.

So if we were grading a term paper, would the above equate to a "D-" for failing to make the eight?
Would making the eight for an early exit still warrant a "D" or "D+"?

History shows us on average that two teams depart the final eight from the previous season's final series; unfortunately this year our number was up, along with Melbourne and St.Kilda from 2023, whilst carlton just hung on by default.
We know this is the most open premiership race for many seasons; had we finished top four I'd have rated us a chance to do some damage, but considering the cannon power of teams 8-5, another sloppy quarter or so might have proved absolutely disastrous against any one of them.
There will be at least 6 sides who will leave 2024 shattered they couldn't get the job done in September, and rue this lost opportunity; hey - not our problem you f#ckers!

But we can only control what we can control as they saying goes, but unless we get a big body or two in the DFA/UFA trade period to assist Nick Daicos, then we ARE going further south in 2025. I'd STRONGLY suggest we look at poaching Will Brodie, who can't land a gig at Freo in the middle; why I don't know...

[Millane42]

Not only did this season feel like 1991 - our premiership hangover from 1990 - our total points scored ‘for’ = 1991 !!

[SLORT]

...and your avatar's name...stop it. You're scaring the kiddies...

[piedys]

...and you're avatar's name...stop it. You're scaring the kiddies...

Dunno about the kiddies; but a certain team, no names - let's just say their initials are "Carlton", were SHIT SCARED of him...

But 1991, as we've discussed numerous times over the years on this forum, was a waste.
In reality, about 3 teams had better seasons than us - WCE, Handbaggers and Whorethorn.
We couldn't find a way to beat those sides until 1992; another even worse wasted year, which we have analysed before as well.

With the inclusion of Adelaide for 1991, the 15th side in what used to be a 12 team competition, the final five was changed to a six.
And guess where we finished? 7th! that putrid draw at Moorabbin cost us 5th spot [sound familiar!]

https://afltables.com/afl/seas/1991.html

[SLORT]

Dunno about the kiddies; but a certain team, no names - let's just say their initials are "Carlton", were SHIT SCARED of him...

I meant that Millane died in October of that year...hopefully we don't have a repeat of that event, ever.

[Jezza]

I split the season into four stages:

Part 1 = Opening Round to Round 2 (0 Wins, 3 Losses)

• Earliest start to a VFL/AFL season in history doesn't help us.

• Losses to Sydney and GWS set the tone early, but the St Kilda loss was infuriating.

Part 2 = Round 3 to Round 14 (8 wins, 2 draws, 1 loss)

• Starts with our first win against the Brisbane Lions up in Queensland.

• We start building momentum and finding our mojo, before injuries start to cruel us.

• Despite the injuries, our system continues to hold up well and we record many victories in this period.

• Two draws were costly. I think we dodged a bullet against Essendon with Langford missing late, but we should have beaten Fremantle given our early last quarter lead and umpire Nicholls taking matters into his own hands with some terrible umpiring.

• Beat North Melbourne with a huge comeback, but it's a foreshadowing of what comes next.

Part 3 = Round 16 to Round 19 (0 Wins, 4 Losses)

• Four losses on the bounce post mid-season bye.

• The Gold Coast loss was somewhat honourable, we were below our best against Essendon and Geelong before Hawthorn destroyed us in Round 19.

• This is effectively the end of our finals hopes, though we weren't mathematically out at this stage.

Part 4 = Round 20 to Round 24 (4 Wins, 1 Loss)

• A respectable finish to a frustrating season.

• Beat Carlton in Pendles' 400th and managed to beat the Brisbane Lions late.

• Sydney loss was very frustrating due to inept umpiring and squandering a 27-point lead that we had early in the last quarter.

• Ended the season on a good note with an easy win over Melbourne.

It was a strange season where we were on the back foot early, but managed to get it together and looked good heading into the mid-season bye. The disastrous 4-week period after the bye is what ultimately cost us, before we gave ourselves one final chance to sneak in.

A frustrating season and a missed opportunity given the evenness of the competition, but I'm pretty upbeat we'll rebound and get back into the top 8 next year. A more favourable fixture, a longer off-season break and hopefully the breakthrough of some youngsters will assist in our rise back up the ladder. It might be akin to what Geelong has been doing this year.

The ageing squad remains a concern, but it looks like most of our veterans will be retained. The club must believe that we can still contend in 2025.

[piffdog]

Well done Jezza - I like that summary. You could potentially put the North victory in the Parth 3 category as for all intents and purposes that should have been a loss. If it were - I wonder what impact that might have had on the remainder of the season?? Thinking about it the North loss (lets call it that given we were 50 points down half way through the game) was an indication of the ass falling out that was to come against Hawthorn...

Anyway.

My thoughts are very similar:

1. Start slow - perhaps thinking it was just gonna happen
2. Get our act together and get on a bit of a roll
3. Injuries start to bite, but we stay in the fight with young guys providing energy
4. Bye disrupts momentum a little, while player availability really hurts and young guys fade (as all young guys do)
5. Hawks game - the dam wall bursts - the players realise they are not going back to back and the belief fades
6. Season 2025 starts early with a reset of player expectations and we finish strong

[thesoretoothsayer]

Interesting article that raises questions about our Premiership defence:
https://www.theroar.com.au/2024/08/29/w ... 24-season/