All Melbourne did was have their ruckman run into, raise knee, etc, etc on Sandilands in ruck contests. Is this OK under the rules as long as you have your eyes on the ball?

i think sandi should try doing it. his knee would be at peoples throats

They did try and hoof Sandilands, wasn't this raised some time ago against Melbourne.

Surely the opposing ruckman has to have his eyes on the ball

How would 211 go when he is being held by the other ruckman - instead of joining the love hold - just raise his arms. Surely he is big enough not to have to engage in those tactics?

And if they play a one legged Cox instead of 211 on Saturday... the game will be a joke!

I think we have to get back to a more convential type of Ruck set up. Meaning Sandilands and Warnock.
Sandilands Ruck work is becomming predictable and opposition sharking his knockouts.
The same can be said for Gilmore who basically just tries to drop the ball in front of him.
All other clubs by now have a stratergy to deal with Sandilands/Gilmore combination. Sandilands/Warnock would be a lot harder.
Also in a throw in from the boundary line in the forward line why Ruckman dont try and knock the ball back over their heads in to a better position for team mates is lacking in Football these days.

Well, I was there on Sunday, and I don't agree that Sandi's ruck knocks were either predictable or all that bad.

He has introduced much more variety into the taps just lately, with a number of Jeff White-esque forward bashes and sideways knocks to advantage (usually Palmer).

What absolutely killed us was the fact that Solomon, Bell and Palmer were working overtime to win the ball - but this would only result in a stoppage. Several bruising stoppages. Eventually, Melbourne would clear from the stoppage and our exhausted midfielders couldn't tackle them.

As for Gilmore - I think the inclinations of our chook are always to grab the ball out of the ruck, not be tackled and quickly kick forward to just inside 50. It does work a reasonable amount of the time, but his tap work is indeed straight down and not terribly helpful.

What I want to know is why he isn't actually in there with Sandi at centre bounces to grab the superior tap and heft it into a non-flooded 50...

Larkin the game is a joke, thank goodness Sandi is not playing. I hope they overlook Luke and let him rest and I that Pav takes it really easy

Uncle Tom
The game these days is played with running backs so a tap backward into the corridor, especially in the forward line, means that a turnover would result in a very rapid entry into your backline.
Thus a team vastly prefers forward taps so that posession can be won near the boundary before moving the ball into the middle. This way if a turn over occurs you can hem the opposition into the boundary.

Stu is right, all the Melbourne ruckmen did on Sunday was just run into Sandi, it didn't seem as though they were that intent on getting the tap. They seemed far more intent on getting the knees into Sandi, Carry would have been jealous.

Bloody umpires

if the ruckmen are just throwing themselves straight at sandi to try to neutralise his height, maybe he could sidestep and just use his reach to fist the ball to advantage? The only reason people are winning taps against him is because they are just pushing him out, if he sidesteps and they end up too far under the ball, the tap out would be easier. probably hard to do, but could be used to stop the dirty tactics that are deemed allowable (against sandi) by the umpires.