And you still haven't got it, Agent. Well done.

Keep venting... I am sure it helps you in the long run.

You probably need to shout a few of them to a couple of people.

Nothing to do with me getting it. If the players can't after all this time, either the message is too hard or Bailey cannot communicate with his players.

Edited June 27, 201015 yr by agent_orange

So we lost a game. Did we lose anything else?

Games in the kids- it is part of the plan.

Kids are up and down, today they were down and we lost.

When these kids become hardened players- they will be much harder to beat. This time will come.

Nothing to do with me getting it. If the players can't after all this time, either the message is too hard or Bailey cannot communicate with his players.

Sadly it is.

The message is not the hard part.

Many of the players you whinge about over the past 2.5 years have not been on the list for that period or have been delisted or have question marks on them if they have been here the full distance.

Sadly it is.

The message is not the hard part.

Many of the players you whinge about over the past 2.5 years have not been on the list for that period or have been delisted or have question marks on them if they have been here the full distance.

Jones, Morton, Bate, Bartram, Davey, Rivers, Dunn, Warnock, Garland ect have all been there long enough

Still can't play Bailey's game plan. You only need to consider how many turnovers Jones Davey and Morton made today to realise the message isn't getting in. So we need to be more competitive. Surely players who have been on our list for five years have worked it out by now.

Nothing to do with me getting it. If the players can't after all this time, either the message is too hard or Bailey cannot communicate with his players.

What do you mean "after all this time"? 2 and a half years isn't a lot of time. Especially because 2 of the players out there today were in their first season and another handful were in their second season.

Just because a team loses does not mean a coach "cannot communicate with his players" or "the message is too hard".

Geelong lost on Friday night. They didn't score a goal in the second half. I wouldn't dare suggest that Bomber Thompson "cannot communicate with his players". Last night, Paul Roos, who some consider to be one of the best coaches, was absolutely annimated at quarter time and admitted that it was because the message was to "go long at the kick-ins" and twice in the first quarter, they went short and completely ignored orders.

And before you jump down my gun and suggest that those two coaches have had succesful tenures, look at the first few years of Mark Thompson's coaching career and the list changes that he made. If you look at the change that has occurred over the past two years at Melbourne you can see that it is going to take "all this time" and a lot more for us to build a strong, goal scoring, competitive and consistent team. We have seen glimpses almost every week of the good ball movement and the good teamwork, however, young players like Scully, Watts, Garlan, Mckenzie and even Trengove are getting pushed off the ball against bigger bodies.

I would blame the poor start today, from an observational point of view, more on the senior players than anything. Not that I have the right to blame anyone, but Moloney's influeunce was down early (only the 3 disposals in the first quarter), Miller was not particularly influential, Warnock was not having his strongest day and even Jamar wasn't being his usual dominant self early on.

I believe that we are in no right to judge the coach yet. He has made some decisions, more often than not, in terms of a list management point of view, that I agree with. I think we won out of the Johnstone trade and McLean trade. I think it was caragrous to drop Jeff White, Adem Yze and Russell Robertson and cut them at seasons end.

I think that he has revolutionised Aaron Davey and developed Warnock, Jamar, Garland, Frawley, Grimes and many others into promising players. He has changed our game plan. If you look at us in 2006, we made the finals playing a more defensive game, with less playing on and a more traditional structure. During 2007, it was believed that Neale Daniher tried to change our game plan over the pre-season to compete with the West Coasts and the Sydneys. Unfortunately for him, we had a horror run with injuries and simply did not have the cattle to execute ending in our horrid fall to the bottom.

Bailey inherited an aging list, not suited to the modern game and had what some described as "the most difficult job in football". He has put us, even without a lot of wins, in a position to give us the best possible chance of winning a premiership (in my opinion). Most experts rate our young list as the most promising in the country.

And that is what we have, a young promising list. It is not going to come togethor every week. My stance on this does not change after every result, each round. If there is not improvement in terms of results and on an individual level year by year however, then it is worth looking at.

Being young is by no means an excuse for lack of effort, but I don't think that was the case. It is, however, a reason for inexperiance in difficult situations, being easily pushed off the ball, lacking condidence and struggling with the pace of the game. If your Greens, Moloneys, Millers and Rivers can't put it togethor early on (four members of the leadership team) and your captain is on the sidelines, it is still a big ask for the young players to pull out a competitive start even against Adelaide.

That is why it is good to look at the big picture. Communication works both ways and if the players don't do what they are a told, the coach is not neccisarily the man to blame.

That is why it is good to look at the big picture. Communication works both ways and if the players don't do what they are a told, the coach is not neccisarily the man to blame.

Great post!

the only picture that players and coaching staff should look at this week is a replay of the crap they served up in adelaide, and see how hurtful it was to watch.I no I'm hurting, but hey there's next week's game to come.Move on QUICKLY.

Look, we're all just going around in circles, I think the thing we can all agree on is:

We have often seemed to lack any heart or determination this year.

Our future can be a bright one, but it's not going to just fall in our laps.

We have the tools in place to achieve our goals, but for mine, something is still missing...

It's pretty simple really.

There are too many potatoes still in the team and the senior players are B graders.