Yes. Should be a cracker of a game if both teams are injury free for the most part.

I still say Hawthorn, Geelong are the leaders but Essendon looks like an irresistible and hungry team at the moment, so on their day they could beat anyone.

In terms of consistency though it's still hawks, cats, swans and magpies for my money.

Yes, amazing finish hey. Still, Leigh Matthews I think was saying its in the rules. Block by umpire = ball still in play.

Let's hope Luis Suarez doesn't jump codes when he visits.

Sadly, goal umpires are eunuchs.

Was at Tool but heard later.  Never been a fan of Worsfold, strikes me as a sour petulant man despite his rep, so not bothered about their dip.

Hinkley in the process of proving wrong anyone who knocked him back for a senior coaching role.

Poor Richmond.

I'll +1 the Hinkley kudos.

I'll not do the same for woosha hate. Fantastic coach and player.

Good melee at Nth v Hawks, by the looks.

I like my coaches grumpy with the press.

Must look and see if there's a Greg Popovich compilation on youtube. San Antonio Spurs coach, grumpy as a mofo with dumb questions, but his players love him and the Spurs have one more games than anyone in the last 14 years.

Malthouse entertains on occasion, but I'm not terribly keen on his brand of post match patter either.  Might come as a shock but I do enjoy C. Scott's straight shooting.  He's very aware of his role as a conduit to the members so seems to give what he can and not hold back too much.  Easy when you're winning though.

So, big game this friday eh.

I can't see Geelong losing it though. No doubt Stevie J will pull off some bullshit goals in the 3rd to break the game open as per usual.

I expect Essendon to win.  No-one has adequately exploited our flat spots yet, but Dons are better equipped than anyone to do so.

Not going to do running commentary, but the opening goals of the 2nd qtr from Myers and Hawkins were both crackers.

Ha, I said the exact opposite all night, Bombers got most bounces.  That's how we roll though.

Game was rather predictable actually; even start, Bombers got a run on, looked a million dollars.  At that point I declared we'd be in front at half time as there was half a quarter to go and that's when we do our best work.  Lo and behold...

Then, the battle of the third quarters which we have dominated for the year to date and so it proved, though Essendon did their best to kick themselves out of it.  A late flurry from the Dons in the last and we steadied.  Carbon copy of the Richmond game.

Considering we had one guy playing his first game, another playing his second, Blicavs playing his 7th and a bunch of others under 50 games, I'm quite happy.

Bombers will go deep in September from what I saw tonight.

On our scoring from defense, that's our game.  We got murdered in clearances, but we set you up to take the ball off you and when we did, bang bang bang.

Collingwood will beat us next week though, they always appear during our big winning sequences to knock us off.

Well, I was wrong.

That would be all three of us.

No, Hawks will win.  FUCK OFF TAB

Regarding Geelong, they changed their plan midway through the second quarter, or rather, they nutted out Essendons plan and dealt with it. Essendon players were continually under the pump for the rest of the match.

That said, I think it's a more valuable learning experience as a loss than a win, which might give false confidence early in the season like last year.

Essendon now have a better idea of where they need to improve, and Geelong are by far the yardstick of the league. They can easily win more flags in the next three years at least.

Quite scary to be honest. I think they might be approaching 1980s Hawthorn levels soon.