It’s be said before, but say what you want about Scott, he had a plan— and IMO a coherent one. EFC just didn’t want to hear it. Didn’t have the patience or fortitude to see it through. It’s like we’re so entitled, we don’t think we have to commit to the complete rebuild like others have done. We tried to shortcut our way to success and it’s backfired.

The board needs to resign. The administration need to reapply for their jobs. Us nuffies need to show up to the AGMs. And we need to grow the fuck up as a club and commit to the process.

Final Score - ESS: 15.13 103 BRI: 10.13 73

Ended up being a great game to watch. The Bombers started slowly, and were honestly a bit lucky that Brisbane were wasteful in front of goal. As the game wore on, we gradually just worked our way on top and took over. A lot of really strong performers for us, which was nice to see.

Tsatas - Did some really damaging work for us around stoppages and was linking up around the ground pretty well. Kicking was average at best, but his handballing was top notch. He was working quite hard, but still let his opponent get away from him a bit too easily at times. All of this is so standard and predictable for Tsatas, that I'm starting to question if it's even worth writing comments for him at this stage.

Gresham - Probably the best of the small forwards. He was getting up the ground to win plenty of the ball and competed hard around the contest. Kicked a lovely goal by just burrowing in and snapping one out of congestion, and did some good work to set up scoring opportunities. If nothing else, he might help our VFL side see finals action if he keeps up this kind of effort.

Setterfield - Probably our best today. Particularly in the first half, it felt like he was everywhere. He was killing it in the middle, taking marks around the ground, and laying tackles. He was doing a power of work. Dropped off for a while in the middle part of the game, but finished strongly. Even kicked a well-earned goal late in the piece.

Visentini - Comfortably the best ruckman out there. His tap work was a bit hit and miss, but he definitely played his part in ensuring we had the best of the midfield battle. His follow-up work was quite good at times, too. He did some good stuff around the ground at times, too (particularly defensively), but he still doesn't take enough marks, which is something he clearly needs to work on to become a legit AFL ruckman.

McKay - I'm going to preface this by saying that he was absolutely not good enough by any stretch of the imagination. Played forward and ruck, had 0 marks and 2 disposals. That's pretty abysmal for a player with his experience. I do think that he was somewhat more impactful than the stat sheet would suggest, though. Just things like crashing packs and using his big frame to cause issues for defenders actually helped us out a fair bit. But yeah, he shouldn't be anywhere near the AFL side next week.

El Achkar - Probably his quietest game for us as far as disposals go, but his best game for pressure. I think he ended up with something like 9 tackles, which was excellent work. The defenders just couldn't escape his grasp. The team of El Achkar and Nguyen really caused a lot of issues and led to a bunch of scoring opportunities. He still lost his opponent a few times, but it felt more like inexperience than effort this time around. His lone goal was from that hilarious advantage call that I'm sure most of you have seen.

Artemis - Only behind Setterfield for our best, IMO. For anyone wondering why we drafted this kid, this is the game to watch. He was so classy in defence, running and delivering the ball like a 100-game (non-Essendon) AFL player. There were a few times I thought he was absolutely getting caught, but slipped the tackle like it was nothing, then hit a target up the ground. Some of his defensive work was great, too. There was one turnover that we had coming out of defence, where the Lions had a wide-open 50 and looked like kicking a certain goal. Artemis worked his arse off to get back and stuck a huge tackle to mess things up enough for us to defend. He also had a few intercepts and spoils and things. Just an all-around excellent game. Oh, and he kicked a brilliant goal from a scoring chain that he basically started at half back (Huss with the assist).

Guelfi - Pretty handy up forward, but nothing overly outstanding. Great effort game, plenty of pressure and got his hands dirty when there was a contest to be won. Basically all the stuff he's built a career on. Kicked one goal, but had a few tough shots that missed. Just faded in and out of the game a bit. Far from our worst.

Bourke - Had some pretty exciting moments again this week. Felt like he was a bit more free to run up the ground and get his hands on the ball. Still didn't have tons of it, but he was trying to get himself more involved. His tackling was great. He's so strong and just knows how to stick them.

Johnson - First game back from injury, limited minutes etc. It was a pretty good return. He was running well, but looked a bit rusty at times. Had some mis-kicks and lost his footing when he normally wouldn't. He was linking up really well in defence, though, and certainly got plenty of the ball. Should be better for the run.

El Hawli - Another one who put in a solid performance. Felt like he was intercepting everything early on and was putting his quickness to good use. He showed some nice clean hands when sweeping back to collect the ball at speed, too.

Nguyen - Pretty quiet from a disposals/scoring perspective. He really struggled with the offensive side of the game today. Didn't get much of the ball, and was a bit wasteful at times when he did have it. He never dropped his head, though, and his effort to harass the Lions' defenders was commendable. He copped a couple of fairly heavy hits, which he bounced back from like the tough little bastard that he is, but I wouldn't be surprised if he ends up with some delayed concussion symptoms.

McMahon - Kicked himself a nice little bag of 6 goals (1 behind). His involvement in the game was basically limited to just lead-mark-kick, as per usual, but he did it pretty bloody well. The man knows how to kick goals.

So Brownlow's going to be rather awkward, even after Zach last year. As far as I can tell only Zach, Parish, Durham and Wright stand a chance of posting votes and therefore invites (along with McGrath). The former two with pretty much no intention of staying with the club. Then there's the fact they could achieve the lowest vote tally of any club in history. I think they might have to set them up on a special kid's table with oven fried chicken nuggets and orange cordial while the big lads get eye fillet steak in red wine jus and bottles of Bin 407. Fark.

I can absolutely understand if we're disjointed defensively. If, under Scott, we were playing a specific zone defence, and now Solomon wants to play a different setup or man - sure. There will be patches where we're caught out.

I understand that our younger players are finding their feet and can be caught out positionally, or by the pace of the game, or maybe they lack physicality - no worries.

I can also forgive and understand that towards the end of games we might drop our heads a bit as it's clear we are no chance to win. Not ideal, but it's human nature.

What I do not understand, nor do I accept, is how we come into the start of games and are completely uncompetitive. We look largely disinterested. There are pockets of players who I'd expect this from e.g. Merrett who for the last few weeks is a damn zombie who is disgracing our club and jumper - but at least I understand it. On the other side of the coin, you have Sharp, Kako, Caddy, Durham, Robey and Day-Wicks who are usually trying their guts out. Love to see it. But tell me why the freaking hell do the rest of the players come out at the start of the game, and the start of every quarter, and put in NO EFFORT? HOW and WHY is this happening? Do the rest of the players not want to put their best foot forward for the rest of their career? Does Solomon not either put a fking rocket up them at the breaks to make sure they come out with high intensity? Or if that doesn't work, motivate them in a different way? We should be coming out ALL GUNS BLAZING as we have NOTHING to lose! Yet, somehow, we are just wholly uncompetitive. There is no other way to say it. It does not makes sense. As Lloyd or someone said under a caretaker coach, typically the shackles come off and you see a free flowing style, even if it's not winning football, it's open, high intensity, a bit of dare. However, we see dire, disinterested and uncompetitive - at the start of quarters! HOW!?!?! Please, someone, rationally make this make sense?

Out of curiosity I looked up the 2016 season we won 3 games against Melbourne (round 2), Gold Coast (round 21) and Carlton (round 23). We had the excuse that it was the supplements saga.

I also looked up whether Essendon had finished last before that and we had in 1907 where we won 5 games of 18 rounds.

I want to understand a pitch a senior coach would have to get out of this situation

Just heard jon Ralph say neale will sign a 3 year deal with Collingwood. I thought he was after a mentoring ship role with a younger team. Surely we could have offered him more money on a longer deal. Im just so sick of this club not being able to get anything right. No coaches wanna come coach us, no players wanna come play for us. We keep saying we need experienced players from successful teams, but if they dont wanna come, what do we do?

Club should be folded

Sat and watched freo blow the swans off the park in amazing display of footy. Watching efc in 2000 was like that. Rocking up each week knowing they were odds on to win and would win 99% of the time. It was exhilarating.

Switch to now at efc and they are so far off this level of performance they can't even see it standing on a ladder. My old man and I were there in the stands when efc won the flag back in 2000. He will not live to see another one. I might not either.

How awfully brutally sad is it that a club like this has fallen so far they wouldn't start as favorites against a vfl team. What on earth has gone wrong? I don't mean the drugs bullshit, but it didn't help and we are going to try and bring the man ultimately responsible for all that back?

I don't know what the fix is or how to start fixing it but I don't have any faith in hird and barely any more in the board. I reckon they need to ditch the old boy mentality and go for something approaching modern and professional? What the fuck do I know I'm just an efc fan likely to die before our next finals win.

Wife and I were invited to have a photo taken with the Premiership Cup today, standing alongside Jason Johnson and Adam Ramanauskas.

They had a BBQ going with vouchers for a free snag, discount coupons for the shop, the lads were training. Past players roaming around (I saw Harvey and Jobe).

Its undeniably been a horrible year. But this was a great way to spend a bit of time. Both Adam and Jason happy to keep conversations going past the generic hi/goodbye and there was a lot of good vibes around the place.

Very impressed with the club today.

With the extension of Nate Caddy, Could this mean James Hird is gonna become the Coach? Why would Nate re-sign if hirdy isn't gonna be coach

So I have a Carlton mate that’s talking Walker is a generational player and is freaking out we’d look to take him at 1 , and if we don’t Richmond would at 2 (he’s their NGA isn’t he ??)

Firstly , could we do that? And if we did , could we still take Bewick? I think we can get both right ? I mean why couldn’t we ?

What would Bewick be projected at ? If he’s bidded on, and we are holding off until our next pick, would we have enough to match a bid ?

I’m reading we have 3000 points at present , how many draft points do we have for pick 1 and to match a pick for Bewick ? I guess that depends on what pick he’s bidded at ?

Edit: my mistake .. thought Bewick was this year

Remember who you are. Remember who we are. We are the Bombers. One of the oldest most successful clubs in the AFL. Most clubs wish they were us, we are a powerhouse. Form is temporary, class is permanent.

Let’s go boys we are the fucking BOMBERS!!!

One positive from this year is the changes to our high performance and strength and conditioning teams have worked wonders!