- he is in the third year of coaching and the team is still developing

- we cannot expect much progress while the list is so young

- he is an inexpensive and an expendable option if it doesn't work out

- we were on the Board that appointed him so give him an extension to stop

the talk right now

- Melbourne fans have been waiting nearly 50 years for their next flag....what's the rush

- ignore the above.....the real answer is there are no defensible reasons, just as we have no functioning game plan.

Yet another thread to help ponder the same rubbish being served up on around 15 other threads. Do some of us just need to have the first word or can't we be bothered following another thread.

Just Turn up to the Game on Saturday..It is all still a work in Progress.

Yet another thread to help ponder the same rubbish being served up on around 15 other threads. Do some of us just need to have the first word or can't we be bothered following another thread.

The "rubbish being served up" is talking about a future with bright prospects when the man at the helm entrusted with "making it happen" is not delivering. Perhaps this is a message some people do not want to hear.

When things are not going to plan, you normally look to the coach for some answers.....I would suggest we are not getting them and no perceivable improvement, so we should be questioning Bailey's future at the club.....not trotting out predictable excuses.

Yet another thread to help ponder the same rubbish being served up on around 15 other threads. Do some of us just need to have the first word or can't we be bothered following another thread.

incredible isn't it?

"oh hey everyone would you like to hear MY particular sarcastic, exaggerated, completely non-constructive take on how bad everything is going? well here it is!"

Reasons to retain this thread:

There aren't 12 others just like it on the boards at the moment (get it?).

It's full of constructive criticsm and insightful information that can help shape debate.

When we start getting some wins on the board we will easily identify posters who claimed Bailey couldn't cut it and that we have no game plan.

Roost It; you are absolutely spot on with your analysis. Bailey has had a complete clean out, a complete rebuild, this will take time. 2 years and 1 round is nowhere near enough time to expect any sort of improvement especially considering that in 2008 we had a mature list and now we almost only have inexperienced kids.

In 1981 when Barrassi took over he started a similar rebuild. It was long, slow and painful and in 1986 after 5 seasons of rebuild the Barrassi experiment was considered a failure. Melbourne was awful in 1981 winning just one game by 1 point against the second worse team (Bulldogs) with a Robert Flower goal after the siren from 50 meters out on the boundary. Before the 1982 season Melbourne went on a spending spree buying a number of A grade players and became competitive winning between 6 and 9 games for the following 5 seasons. However they also stepped up their youth policy even going as far as Ireland to collect the best 16, 17 & 18 year olds they could get their hands on. It was these kids recruited by Barrassi that went on and made 5 consecutive finals series between 1987 and 1991 including one GF and 3 Preliminary Finals. Melbourne had to wait for their Barrassi kids to reach 21 - 26yo before any meaningful results were seen, however there were signs as early as 1984. Barrassi left a failure but time showed he was in fact the architect of a new period of success that was desperately unlucky not to produce a premiership.

Getting stuck into Bailey at this point is simply wrong and counterproductive. We are all disappointed with last weeks result, we all want to see improvement, but this is what we signed up for when we embarked on a full rebuild and every supporter who has been following what has been going on must know this and lower their expectations accordingly. Its boy’s v men at the moment. Blow outs and inconsistency will occur and are part of the growing process.

We are doing the right thing and the MFC will be rewarded for this in time. But it will take time and we must suck up these hard times and believe in our future, back our coach and understand that this is a 5 year plan. The only way this rebuild is likely to fail is if we get off the course we have already set.

Now stop winging and toughen up! We all need to be in this for the long haul.

Roost It; you are absolutely spot on with your analysis. Bailey has had a complete clean out, a complete rebuild, this will take time. 2 years and 1 round is nowhere near enough time to expect any sort of improvement especially considering that in 2008 we had a mature list and now we almost only have inexperienced kids.

In 1981 when Barrassi took over he started a similar rebuild. It was long, slow and painful and in 1986 after 5 seasons of rebuild the Barrassi experiment was considered a failure. Melbourne was awful in 1981 winning just one game by 1 point against the second worse team (Bulldogs) with a Robert Flower goal after the siren from 50 meters out on the boundary. Before the 1982 season Melbourne went on a spending spree buying a number of A grade players and became competitive winning between 6 and 9 games for the following 5 seasons. However they also stepped up their youth policy even going as far as Ireland to collect the best 16, 17 & 18 year olds they could get their hands on. It was these kids recruited by Barrassi that went on and made 5 consecutive finals series between 1987 and 1991 including one GF and 3 Preliminary Finals. Melbourne had to wait for their Barrassi kids to reach 21 - 26yo before any meaningful results were seen, however there were signs as early as 1984. Barrassi left a failure but time showed he was in fact the architect of a new period of success that was desperately unlucky not to produce a premiership.

Getting stuck into Bailey at this point is simply wrong and counterproductive. We are all disappointed with last weeks result, we all want to see improvement, but this is what we signed up for when we embarked on a full rebuild and every supporter who has been following what has been going on must know this and lower their expectations accordingly. Its boy’s v men at the moment. Blow outs and inconsistency will occur and are part of the growing process.

We are doing the right thing and the MFC will be rewarded for this in time. But it will take time and we must suck up these hard times and believe in our future, back our coach and understand that this is a 5 year plan. The only way this rebuild is likely to fail is if we get off the course we have already set.

Now stop winging and toughen up! We all need to be in this for the long haul.

SECONDED

Just Turn up to the Game on Saturday..It is all still a work in Progress.

I will be there on Saturday, but I am also sick of reading that we are still a work in Progress.Of course we are,westill will be till we win a premiership. God knows how long that will be - a ruddy long time after last Saturday.Maybe never--we may be disbanded,if indeed Grand New Flag is correct and we take that long.However I also agree with what he states.However, in the meantime, we need to relook heavily into our football department for next year and no doubt C.C will do this. I have full faith in Chris.

Edited March 30, 201015 yr by jayceebee31

I posted this on Big Footy. I think a lot of people think that because Hawthorn made the finals in 2 years and a flag in 3, everyone can do it:

At the end of the day, the MFC gave Bailey an extension because they didn't want to go into the year with an axe hanging over their coach's head. If you go into a year with no contract, you risk the pressure associated with a possible final tenture as a coach, ala. Terry Wallace at Richmond.

They did this so as to remove any speculation. No matter how bad we go, there's no way Melbourne will sack Bailey this year. No way in hell. That will ultimately backfire if we do go bad, because the media will eat us alive (like they are already)

If you actually set aside some time to listen to the way the guy talks, he is very, very intelligent and knows the game of football very, very well. He doesn't just talk out of his arse. If anything, he has not given in to temptation and pressue like Frawley, Wallace etc., but instead stuck by his guns and implemented a gameplan he has faith in. It might not work now (in fact, it fails miserably), but it's not like we'd be playing finals football with this squad anyway.

If I remember correctly, Al Clarkson didn't start off so flash at Hawthorn and he coped it quite a bit. In saying that, you had a Brownlow medalist and several very good older players to help the younger players grow. We just don't have that because of Daniher and his Christian pacification of the club, keeping around players like Godfrey and Ferguson when they just weren't AFL quality.

We are still paying for Daniher's list management, I don't care what anyone says. We have Bruce, Miller and James McDonald as our main leaders and probably in our top 10 players. What the hell does that say?

Not trying to make excuses, but it's not like Bailey is working with anything good atm. We have no players (excluding 1-3 year players) that have the leadership and star-quality potential to make this a good team. That has nothing to do with Bailey.

Why don't we wait and see how this team performs after three full years of development under Bailey, not including 2008, which was essentially Bailey taking the reigns of Daniher's team before he dumped the likes of Yze and White. Every other coach has gotten that long, and Bailey has essentially only had 1 full year with a list that comes even remotely close to the kind of list he has envisioned.

Bailey got there in 2008 and (thankfully) realised the team was not good enough to win a flag. Daniher should have realised that at the end of 2005. There wasn't much Bailey could do, and the real clean out didn't start until the end of 2008. That season was a complete whitewash in that we didn't really achieve much in terms of player progression. Last year saw the likes of Grimes and Morton coming through, and Jones played his first full year. And this year we'll see even more.

Bailey is and has always been in a very, very tough situation, and I think he's handling it very well. Hawthorn at least had quality senior players like Hay and Lonie that would get them high draft picks. None of our senior players from the Daniher era would have warranted a top 20 pick between 2008-2010.

We haven't had the assets to trade for top 20 picks the Hawks have had. Our only asset was Johnstone, and we got Grimes, who has achieved more in his first 2 years than what Johnstone did in his.

And I'm not sure what the big deal is about a 5 year plan? What other option do we have? We don't have a Hodge, Mitchell, Crawford to lead the team, and how often does a team go from the bottom to the top in 2-3 years? The Saints have taken all of 7 years to reach their full potential, and it took them 3 years from 2001 to make an impact with the squad they wanted. Only now do we have the foundations of a team we want to be successful with. We didn't even come close to that in 2008, and we were a step closer in 2009. 2010 has Scully and Trengove.

It took the Doggies 6 years, including 2 years of Rohde setting the foundations of the squad they have now, to play finals. Now look at them

Roost It; you are absolutely spot on with your analysis. Bailey has had a complete clean out, a complete rebuild, this will take time. 2 years and 1 round is nowhere near enough time to expect any sort of improvement especially considering that in 2008 we had a mature list and now we almost only have inexperienced kids.

In 1981 when Barrassi took over he started a similar rebuild. It was long, slow and painful and in 1986 after 5 seasons of rebuild the Barrassi experiment was considered a failure. Melbourne was awful in 1981 winning just one game by 1 point against the second worse team (Bulldogs) with a Robert Flower goal after the siren from 50 meters out on the boundary. Before the 1982 season Melbourne went on a spending spree buying a number of A grade players and became competitive winning between 6 and 9 games for the following 5 seasons. However they also stepped up their youth policy even going as far as Ireland to collect the best 16, 17 & 18 year olds they could get their hands on. It was these kids recruited by Barrassi that went on and made 5 consecutive finals series between 1987 and 1991 including one GF and 3 Preliminary Finals. Melbourne had to wait for their Barrassi kids to reach 21 - 26yo before any meaningful results were seen, however there were signs as early as 1984. Barrassi left a failure but time showed he was in fact the architect of a new period of success that was desperately unlucky not to produce a premiership.

Getting stuck into Bailey at this point is simply wrong and counterproductive. We are all disappointed with last weeks result, we all want to see improvement, but this is what we signed up for when we embarked on a full rebuild and every supporter who has been following what has been going on must know this and lower their expectations accordingly. Its boy’s v men at the moment. Blow outs and inconsistency will occur and are part of the growing process.

We are doing the right thing and the MFC will be rewarded for this in time. But it will take time and we must suck up these hard times and believe in our future, back our coach and understand that this is a 5 year plan. The only way this rebuild is likely to fail is if we get off the course we have already set.

Now stop winging and toughen up! We all need to be in this for the long haul.

I started following demons in 1967 and had to wait 20 years for my first final.

Thanks for reminding me that we made finals only two years after Barassi left.

I am not saying to current members to wait 20 years but I think you can wait a bit longer

before demanding Bailey gets the sack

The "rubbish being served up" is talking about a future with bright prospects when the man at the helm entrusted with "making it happen" is not delivering. Perhaps this is a message some people do not want to hear.

When things are not going to plan, you normally look to the coach for some answers.....I would suggest we are not getting them and no perceivable improvement, so we should be questioning Bailey's future at the club.....not trotting out predictable excuses.

Predictable impatient ill-considered response.

Roost It; you are absolutely spot on with your analysis. Bailey has had a complete clean out, a complete rebuild, this will take time. 2 years and 1 round is nowhere near enough time to expect any sort of improvement especially considering that in 2008 we had a mature list and now we almost only have inexperienced kids.

In 1981 when Barrassi took over he started a similar rebuild. It was long, slow and painful and in 1986 after 5 seasons of rebuild the Barrassi experiment was considered a failure. Melbourne was awful in 1981 winning just one game by 1 point against the second worse team (Bulldogs) with a Robert Flower goal after the siren from 50 meters out on the boundary. Before the 1982 season Melbourne went on a spending spree buying a number of A grade players and became competitive winning between 6 and 9 games for the following 5 seasons. However they also stepped up their youth policy even going as far as Ireland to collect the best 16, 17 & 18 year olds they could get their hands on. It was these kids recruited by Barrassi that went on and made 5 consecutive finals series between 1987 and 1991 including one GF and 3 Preliminary Finals. Melbourne had to wait for their Barrassi kids to reach 21 - 26yo before any meaningful results were seen, however there were signs as early as 1984. Barrassi left a failure but time showed he was in fact the architect of a new period of success that was desperately unlucky not to produce a premiership.

Getting stuck into Bailey at this point is simply wrong and counterproductive. We are all disappointed with last weeks result, we all want to see improvement, but this is what we signed up for when we embarked on a full rebuild and every supporter who has been following what has been going on must know this and lower their expectations accordingly. Its boy’s v men at the moment. Blow outs and inconsistency will occur and are part of the growing process.

We are doing the right thing and the MFC will be rewarded for this in time. But it will take time and we must suck up these hard times and believe in our future, back our coach and understand that this is a 5 year plan. The only way this rebuild is likely to fail is if we get off the course we have already set.

Now stop winging and toughen up! We all need to be in this for the long haul.

Excellent post GNF.

Roost It; you are absolutely spot on with your analysis. Bailey has had a complete clean out, a complete rebuild, this will take time. 2 years and 1 round is nowhere near enough time to expect any sort of improvement especially considering that in 2008 we had a mature list and now we almost only have inexperienced kids.

In 1981 when Barrassi took over he started a similar rebuild. It was long, slow and painful and in 1986 after 5 seasons of rebuild the Barrassi experiment was considered a failure. Melbourne was awful in 1981 winning just one game by 1 point against the second worse team (Bulldogs) with a Robert Flower goal after the siren from 50 meters out on the boundary. Before the 1982 season Melbourne went on a spending spree buying a number of A grade players and became competitive winning between 6 and 9 games for the following 5 seasons. However they also stepped up their youth policy even going as far as Ireland to collect the best 16, 17 & 18 year olds they could get their hands on. It was these kids recruited by Barrassi that went on and made 5 consecutive finals series between 1987 and 1991 including one GF and 3 Preliminary Finals. Melbourne had to wait for their Barrassi kids to reach 21 - 26yo before any meaningful results were seen, however there were signs as early as 1984. Barrassi left a failure but time showed he was in fact the architect of a new period of success that was desperately unlucky not to produce a premiership.

Getting stuck into Bailey at this point is simply wrong and counterproductive. We are all disappointed with last weeks result, we all want to see improvement, but this is what we signed up for when we embarked on a full rebuild and every supporter who has been following what has been going on must know this and lower their expectations accordingly. Its boy’s v men at the moment. Blow outs and inconsistency will occur and are part of the growing process.

We are doing the right thing and the MFC will be rewarded for this in time. But it will take time and we must suck up these hard times and believe in our future, back our coach and understand that this is a 5 year plan. The only way this rebuild is likely to fail is if we get off the course we have already set.

Now stop winging and toughen up! We all need to be in this for the long haul.

How many times did Ron Barrassi's team get thrashed. How many times were they insipid and pathetic?

Not many

What exactly is the point of ANOTHER bag Bailey thread?

What does it achieve?

Satyricon and Calabrese boy are on the money. I signed up to Demonland only yesterday, having supported since I was born or as long as I can remember, whichever comes first! So whilst we as Melbourne supporters are used to disappointment, frustration and the never-ending cycle of expectation, we should also be practised at patience. Having spent an hour reading posts yesterday, and trying to be as dispassionate as possible, it is frankly staggering to read the array of sometimes irrational responses to a 9 goal beating by a team with a beautifully embedded game-day method. Even with their injuries and suspensions, the extent to which Hawthorn are successfully marshalled by Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis, Brown, is infective. Their new boys shine because the confidence is palpable and the method reliable, and the rest is history.

None of this diminishes the failings of the Dees, which are palpable and hard to watch, but perspective is what we require. As is so often seen in teams developing a 'core' playing group, where 18 of the 22 pick themselves week in, week out, confidence is the key factor. This is so clearly seen with both Geelong, Hawthorn and the Doggies over the last few years. Dean Bailey is indisputably right when he says these guys need time on the ground, and time together, and that just hasn't been the case for the last 2 years. The turnover rate of players at the club in the last 2 years has been dizzying, and it is mad to expect a unified, slick machine as a result. Even desperation, commitment and 'do or die' effort are a product of unification and confidence. Let them become "A TEAM", and view each week with that in mind. The pain gives the pleasure meaning (apologies to C.S.Lewis), and in an odd way I enjoy experiencing the process, because I know that first future victory against Collingwood (it won't be this week)will be sweeter than pineapple marinated in honey.

Lastly, for some of you to start bagging Cameron Bruce (no game time for the previous 3 weeks) and James McDonald (in the context of the need for senior stability) is just jaw-dropping. All I could think whilst reading this, is that if Brad Green had been the one to have an 'off-day', he'd be on the recieving end as well. Time to step back and see the bigger picture.

How many times did Ron Barrassi's team get thrashed. How many times were they insipid and pathetic?

Not many

You can't be serious

Barrassi's Melbourne from 81 - 86 was thumped by 10 - 15 goals on regular occasions.

- ignore the above.....the real answer is there are no defensible reasons, just as we have no functioning game plan.

The real answer is he has a two year contract.

Agree with the likes of Roost It and Co.

How many times did Ron Barrassi's team get thrashed. How many times were they insipid and pathetic?

Not many

In RDB's first year MFC won 1 out of 22 games with a % of 63. They were only insipid and pathetic once....for the whole year.

Interestingly Barrassi led the Sydney Swans complete rebuild in the 90s. The Swans were absolutely pathetic during this period. Barrassi started in 1992 and only won 8 games in his first 3 seasons. Barrassi left at the end of the 1995 season and Eade then took the now grown up Barrassi kids to the GF in 1996.

1990 - 5 wins

1991 - 7 wins

1992 - 3 wins

1993 - 1 win

1994 - 4 wins

1995 - 8 wins

1996 - 16 wins in regular season and then went on to GF.

The point is these rebuilds are long and painful, but if you stay on the road and don't succumb to the temptation of a quick fix and supporter and media pressure (like Richmond) you will be rewarded.

On my way out of the ground after the game, I bumped into two aggressive Hawthorn supporters I know. Just as I was about to head off in the opposite direction, they displayed some rare understanding - "Don't worry about that. You're just like we were 4 years ago. People forget just how bad we were when Clarkson started teaching his game plan. You've just got to be patient with those kids"

There is no point sacking Bailey. The players who consistently struggle - Miller, Dunn, Bate etc - struggled under Daniher and they'd struggle under anyone else you care to name . Sylvia, Jamar and Frawley have all improved significantly under Bailey's teaching even though he has laboured under the worst facilities in the AFL. Several of the players who would be making us more competitive this year - Morton,Jurrah, Garland - are out injured.Our top two picks from 2008 haven't been able to get on to the park - Watts and Blease.

Next year may see Bailey out. Time will tell. But it is unhelpful to point the bone at him now. Let's be realistic - it is long tough road.

Our best players on Saturday were Grimes, Trengove, Scully and McKenzie ( with help from Junior and inspiration from Green) There is still reason to be optimistic..............

I posted this on Big Footy. I think a lot of people think that because Hawthorn made the finals in 2 years and a flag in 3, everyone can do it:

At the end of the day, the MFC gave Bailey an extension because they didn't want to go into the year with an axe hanging over their coach's head. If you go into a year with no contract, you risk the pressure associated with a possible final tenture as a coach, ala. Terry Wallace at Richmond.

They did this so as to remove any speculation. No matter how bad we go, there's no way Melbourne will sack Bailey this year. No way in hell. That will ultimately backfire if we do go bad, because the media will eat us alive (like they are already)

If you actually set aside some time to listen to the way the guy talks, he is very, very intelligent and knows the game of football very, very well. He doesn't just talk out of his arse. If anything, he has not given in to temptation and pressue like Frawley, Wallace etc., but instead stuck by his guns and implemented a gameplan he has faith in. It might not work now (in fact, it fails miserably), but it's not like we'd be playing finals football with this squad anyway.

If I remember correctly, Al Clarkson didn't start off so flash at Hawthorn and he coped it quite a bit. In saying that, you had a Brownlow medalist and several very good older players to help the younger players grow. We just don't have that because of Daniher and his Christian pacification of the club, keeping around players like Godfrey and Ferguson when they just weren't AFL quality.

We are still paying for Daniher's list management, I don't care what anyone says. We have Bruce, Miller and James McDonald as our main leaders and probably in our top 10 players. What the hell does that say?

Not trying to make excuses, but it's not like Bailey is working with anything good atm. We have no players (excluding 1-3 year players) that have the leadership and star-quality potential to make this a good team. That has nothing to do with Bailey.

Why don't we wait and see how this team performs after three full years of development under Bailey, not including 2008, which was essentially Bailey taking the reigns of Daniher's team before he dumped the likes of Yze and White. Every other coach has gotten that long, and Bailey has essentially only had 1 full year with a list that comes even remotely close to the kind of list he has envisioned.

Bailey got there in 2008 and (thankfully) realised the team was not good enough to win a flag. Daniher should have realised that at the end of 2005. There wasn't much Bailey could do, and the real clean out didn't start until the end of 2008. That season was a complete whitewash in that we didn't really achieve much in terms of player progression. Last year saw the likes of Grimes and Morton coming through, and Jones played his first full year. And this year we'll see even more.

Bailey is and has always been in a very, very tough situation, and I think he's handling it very well. Hawthorn at least had quality senior players like Hay and Lonie that would get them high draft picks. None of our senior players from the Daniher era would have warranted a top 20 pick between 2008-2010.

We haven't had the assets to trade for top 20 picks the Hawks have had. Our only asset was Johnstone, and we got Grimes, who has achieved more in his first 2 years than what Johnstone did in his.

And I'm not sure what the big deal is about a 5 year plan? What other option do we have? We don't have a Hodge, Mitchell, Crawford to lead the team, and how often does a team go from the bottom to the top in 2-3 years? The Saints have taken all of 7 years to reach their full potential, and it took them 3 years from 2001 to make an impact with the squad they wanted. Only now do we have the foundations of a team we want to be successful with. We didn't even come close to that in 2008, and we were a step closer in 2009. 2010 has Scully and Trengove.

It took the Doggies 6 years, including 2 years of Rohde setting the foundations of the squad they have now, to play finals. Now look at them

Not a bad post at all, just confused why you wasted it on BigFooty...

Satyricon and Calabrese boy are on the money. I signed up to Demonland only yesterday, having supported since I was born or as long as I can remember, whichever comes first! So whilst we as Melbourne supporters are used to disappointment, frustration and the never-ending cycle of expectation, we should also be practised at patience. Having spent an hour reading posts yesterday, and trying to be as dispassionate as possible, it is frankly staggering to read the array of sometimes irrational responses to a 9 goal beating by a team with a beautifully embedded game-day method. Even with their injuries and suspensions, the extent to which Hawthorn are successfully marshalled by Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis, Brown, is infective. Their new boys shine because the confidence is palpable and the method reliable, and the rest is history.

None of this diminishes the failings of the Dees, which are palpable and hard to watch, but perspective is what we require. As is so often seen in teams developing a 'core' playing group, where 18 of the 22 pick themselves week in, week out, confidence is the key factor. This is so clearly seen with both Geelong, Hawthorn and the Doggies over the last few years. Dean Bailey is indisputably right when he says these guys need time on the ground, and time together, and that just hasn't been the case for the last 2 years. The turnover rate of players at the club in the last 2 years has been dizzying, and it is mad to expect a unified, slick machine as a result. Even desperation, commitment and 'do or die' effort are a product of unification and confidence. Let them become "A TEAM", and view each week with that in mind. The pain gives the pleasure meaning (apologies to C.S.Lewis), and in an odd way I enjoy experiencing the process, because I know that first future victory against Collingwood (it won't be this week)will be sweeter than pineapple marinated in honey.

Lastly, for some of you to start bagging Cameron Bruce (no game time for the previous 3 weeks) and James McDonald (in the context of the need for senior stability) is just jaw-dropping. All I could think whilst reading this, is that if Brad Green had been the one to have an 'off-day', he'd be on the recieving end as well. Time to step back and see the bigger picture.

Very nice first post.

Satyricon and Calabrese boy are on the money. I signed up to Demonland only yesterday, having supported since I was born or as long as I can remember, whichever comes first! So whilst we as Melbourne supporters are used to disappointment, frustration and the never-ending cycle of expectation, we should also be practised at patience. Having spent an hour reading posts yesterday, and trying to be as dispassionate as possible, it is frankly staggering to read the array of sometimes irrational responses to a 9 goal beating by a team with a beautifully embedded game-day method. Even with their injuries and suspensions, the extent to which Hawthorn are successfully marshalled by Hodge, Mitchell, Lewis, Brown, is infective. Their new boys shine because the confidence is palpable and the method reliable, and the rest is history.

None of this diminishes the failings of the Dees, which are palpable and hard to watch, but perspective is what we require. As is so often seen in teams developing a 'core' playing group, where 18 of the 22 pick themselves week in, week out, confidence is the key factor. This is so clearly seen with both Geelong, Hawthorn and the Doggies over the last few years. Dean Bailey is indisputably right when he says these guys need time on the ground, and time together, and that just hasn't been the case for the last 2 years. The turnover rate of players at the club in the last 2 years has been dizzying, and it is mad to expect a unified, slick machine as a result. Even desperation, commitment and 'do or die' effort are a product of unification and confidence. Let them become "A TEAM", and view each week with that in mind. The pain gives the pleasure meaning (apologies to C.S.Lewis), and in an odd way I enjoy experiencing the process, because I know that first future victory against Collingwood (it won't be this week)will be sweeter than pineapple marinated in honey.

Lastly, for some of you to start bagging Cameron Bruce (no game time for the previous 3 weeks) and James McDonald (in the context of the need for senior stability) is just jaw-dropping. All I could think whilst reading this, is that if Brad Green had been the one to have an 'off-day', he'd be on the recieving end as well. Time to step back and see the bigger picture.

I like your work, Well said.