all bailey wants is kids kids and more kids! and if anyone notice bruse was our oldest player today at 28 years old.

aussie, martin, bate, dunn, bartram, buckley, pj, cj, garland, warnock oh the list goes on and on!! just these kids are our future and i have neva been sooo excited!! even back in 2003 when we were that low i neva got that excitement that i have now!

but yes today we watched the future and its full potential!

GO DEES!

The development in the players over the course of the season is amazing!! Quite hard to believe it is the same team that got thrashed in the first two games by Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs...... Bailey and the assistant coaches must be doing something right.... When I watching the press conference, it just made me wonder how good it is to have bails at the helm. He did not exclude too much emotion, but you could tell he was pleased with their performances BUT IT IS ONLY THE START!! Bailey knows this and knows it is a long hard road!!!! I believe in him and the players!!!

all bailey wants is kids kids and more kids! and if anyone notice bruse was our oldest player today at 28 years old.

aussie, martin, bate, dunn, bartram, buckley, pj, cj, garland, warnock oh the list goes on and on!! just these kids are our future and i have neva been sooo excited!! even back in 2003 when we were that low i neva got that excitement that i have now!

but yes today we watched the future and its full potential!

GO DEES!

It was really nice to watch.

To see our young guys actually put it all together for the best part of 4 qtrs... there is defintely a future there.

And its good for all us long suffering fans who have to put up with crap from opposition fans every week. The number people i know who don't know a thing in depth about Melbourne or our list, and just bad mouth our kids as complete hacks is amazing. A lot of my mates do it! And these very same people Hawthorn are all over now... I know we've been crap this year, but people have short memories, and in terms of progress in our 'Clarkson/Hawthorn style rebuild', we are progressing very nicely to date. At least on par.

I am impressed with the young guys standing up and show what they can do if our season was better.

Welcome to the future is what i say

It is exciting to think there will be a couple of awesome kids drafted at years end. Jack Grimes will be ready next year and Marric might get a run this year if we are lucky just to give him a sniff. We are going to go from the second oldest list to possibly the youngest next year! bailey is only going to become a better coach along the way. Proud of our club after being kicked in the guts by Demitrou and the media. We have bottomed out and are on our way back folks. We will lose plenty more this year but we have a great future appearing before our eyes right now!

Yes and no...

At the start of the third quarter, the top 5 possession winners were as follows:

CJ, Green, Wheatley, Bruce and Whelan...

Now, of those only Cj is what you would call "youth."

That said, how often does a young side play like that and have the top 5 possession winners UNDER 25? If we were doing that we'd be the Eagles circa 2005.

What I loved were the small things... Jamar getting more and more solid, PJs improvement and chasedown, Sylvia looking genuinely imposing, Buckley and CJ making our backline look like one to fear (Buckey is ENORMOUS), And Miller is still only 24...

I counted almost no losers among our 22.

Yeah it difficult to single out any player today after most players really had a great game, but the difference between Buckley round 1 and 14 is incredible!!!! Twice he tackled from behind and earnt the free kick.... We all know he can run and carry but the coaching stuff and Bucks have to be congratulated for developing a defensive side to his game!!!

When I saw Connoly take the team to the middle after the game, I was thinking that the point he wanted to make. maybe something along the lines of "Boys you are the future and this is your ground". It was a great effort from such a young green side.

I counted almost no losers among our 22.

Same. Maybe Warnock lost to Brown. Bradshaw was lucky to get 4 goals so Garland took the points in that match up for mine. All others won their positions IMO.

FWIW I really rate the Lions, and gave us no hope pre-game. I said to my mate before the match when we made our predictions: "i'll be happy if we lose by less than 40 points".

The fact that we not only went with them and stayed 'competitive' all day, but had winners all over the ground is a very very encouraging sign.

What a brilliant day...

Cant win huh??

As i said, i had a feeling all week, if we played physical, and took the initiative, we'd be a show, who listened??

CJ, what can I say, its so great to finally see a game like that, esp backing up from last week!!

Colin, well a great game, much needed, lets see more of it.. Surely he has now found his true calling as an attacking midfielder!

The youth, well how great!!

So what our older players had the most possies, that means jack my friend!

It takes a whole team effort to win a game like that, and all our kids stood up, and deserve the credit.. this is the youngest MFC side to win a game in a long long time, get excited, not bloody cynical!! jeez..

Well done Bailey, I like whats happening, always knew you were in control..

Were our the Bailey bashers??

Great game!!

People are forgetting petterd too who i regard as the best youngster at our club. cant wait to see him back in the red and blue. And Newton is unfairly criticised on these boards. i still regard him as someone to play 200 games.

Our under 23 team:

Bartram, Garland, Martin

Pettard, Frawley, C.Johnson

Morton, Mclean, Moloney

Sylvia, ??Newton??, Buckley

Bate, ????, Wonaeamirri

P.Johnson, Pettard, Jones

Int: Valenti, Frawley, Grimes, Maric, Cheney, Bode

Enough said really...

add a top 3 pick at years end + pick18and 20 and we'v got some bloody great young talent.

Miller, Bell, Rivers, Davey, Warnock, who are all under 25, and you have a good young team.

sure, we need a serious injection of talent. and we'll do that at years end... but i can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

we haven't yet even seen what Grimes, Maric (and Pettard) can really do so exciting times ahead