Former Essendon legend Tim Watson believes the hype surrounding Melbourne is unnecessary and it's time for fans to pump the breaks just for the moment.
The Demons are experiencing some of their best success in recent memory this season, winning five-straight games, pushing their season record to 7-3 and securing third position on the ladder after 10 rounds.
Watson understands they have had an impressive month and a half of football but he thinks the discussions surrounding the Demons' finals expectations need to take a break.
“Last time I looked it is Round 10 and we are declaring Melbourne a certainty to win the flag,” Watson told SEN Breakfast on Tuesday morning.
“When you actually analyse this, Melbourne has beaten North Melbourne, a very undermanned Adelaide, Brisbane, Essendon, St Kilda, Gold Coast and Carlton.
“Their losses have been against Richmond, Hawthorn, who have now dropped out of the eight and Geelong, who aren’t the great team many thought that they were going to be."
Watson said the group of players and staff at the Demons aren't the ones that are talking this way about their team and have commended their ability to keep a level head with all this extremely high praise they're getting from the media.
“I don’t think the coaching staff at Melbourne are buying into this, Simon Goodwin is a very balanced and measured sort of a man,” Watson explained.
“They’re going to have to try and suppress a lot of this excitement that is building around Melbourne.
“You have Hassa Mann saying it’s the best [Melbourne] team he has ever seen, John Northey saying it’s the best list of players he has seen there.
“They have got a very strong group of players, but the last two flags have come from teams at the halfway mark of the season, who we wouldn’t even have considered they were the premiership team.
“Just cool your jets about Melbourne."