Dermie and Robert Walls on SEN

[Tony Tea 2,792]

Someone up above nailed it. Ever since Bailey was sacked Walls has been brandishing our wins last year as evidence we were heading in the right direction. Either Walls is an imbecile with an utter ignorance of the relative merits of our wins and losses in 2011, or he is wilfilly misrepresenting those results in order to support his case that Melbourne should not have sacked Bailey. Probably a combination of both, but his comments make him look like an idiot or a shill.

[jayceebee31 692]

Wasn't Walls on the selection committee that gave Bails the job in the first place.If so, can understand why he supports him.

[champagne football 27]

I totally agree and applaud the direction that Mark is taking this club. I also had a family member work with Mark at the Western Jets and couldn't praise him enough for his passion and work ethic. This club needs to reach rock bottom before it can rebuild to something solid and something for not only the members, but other clubs to admire and fear.

As for Robert Walls; he is only ever interested in talking about Collingwood in order to keep his popularity and like some many ex players these people have a short shelf life in the media. He would surely know what it is like to rebuild a club? His beloved Carlton have spent considerable time doing this through lots of different means that were appropriate and perhaps questionable?

Keep the faith...

[Guest José Mourinho]

I don't think either are idiots, but they have superficial opinions of our list.

Let's face it - neither of them are going to take the time and energy to do a really in-depth analysis.

They have a quick look at it and once they see something that looks like an answer they run with it.

They aren't paid to spend hours poring over the stats and look through a microscope into the club over the last decade or more - they are paid to quickly give something that sounds like an educated opinion.

[Rhino Richards 1,467]

Good posts Footy nut and DD DDC. Thanks

[jimcor 212]

To give you an idea according to GPS data the players are running 30% further this year during games than last year. The gameplan pushes them right to the edges of the boundary and then asks for counter attacks to be made by getting the entire team to switch to the other side of the ground at pace. This asks alot of the players in terms of fitness. That is why they make really poor decisions and have been generally fading after halftime. When Mark arrived he knew straight away the list wasn't where it needed to be in terms of fitness to go with a gameplan that could challenge for the ultimate success. But he is determined to .....

Really interesting stat. From the boundary, It looked to me that the players were generally trying really hard. I think I might have posted that I thought that they might have been exhausted from 'aimless' pursuit and spreading because they hadn't quite worked out what they needed to be doing. This would also have also left them pretty well worn out as the game progressed. So, maybe as the coaching panel worked out who's confused and why, they're able to work on it.

I was also a bit surprised at how quickly people began to condemn the new regime without giving them opportunity to demonstrate they knew what they were doing. Last year, after four full years of developing payers and a game plan, we were still unable to string together more than one decent game in a row. The law of averages suggests that a pot plant coaching us could probably have achieved a similar result over that period.

For the first time this year in 'proper' footy,, I can genuinely say that last night I enjoyed a game of football that MFC was participating in. May there be a few more over the next 6 weeks.

[leucopogon 1,494]

as for people questioning trengove and grimes being appointed captains, it is 4 games into the season, give them some time. there was obviously an issue with our senior group, which neeld identified straight away. we could have gone down the same old track, and left one of them in charge, or we can make the bold decision to give it to a young guy.

...or we could have given it to Nathan Jones a much more suitable candidate than either of the Jacks.

[Footynut 302]

again trust in those who are leading the club. Neeld had his reasons for going with the 2 Jacks ahead of others. In any case it won't change this season.

[Weedster 174]

Robert is a former coach who got sacked and has a soft spot for other coaches in the same position. But he has got it so so wrong here.

He says we fired Bailey after one poor match (the 186 game). That is not true.

Round 2 - Hawthorn - the Dees were 28 points up just before 1/2 time. By the start of the last quarter we were 40 points down. arguably our worst 3rd Q in memory.

Round 6 - West Coast. Game over at quarter time. arguably our worst 1st Q in memory.

Round 8 - North. MFC 25 points up early in the second. Nearly 40 points down by 3/4 time.

Round 10 - Carlton - Another 6 goal performance from MFC. Carlton doubled our score.

Round 12 - Collingwood. Another 6 goals from the Dees. Collingwood kicked 10 in a row in the last quarter.

Round 15 - The Dogs. We played a middle ranked side and got done by 64 points. They killed us in the last and i believe Bailey was lucky to see out the round.

Round 19 - Geelong - 186.

In every one of these games, the opposition got a run-on and we couldn't deal with it. After 4 years with Bailey we did not have a game plan to cope with adversity.

Robert is very selective with his stats. He says Melbourne won 8 1/2 games in 2010 and because we won 7 1/2 games by round 19 (of 24 rounds) therefore we were improving slightly, but the stat is misleading.

Yes we did have 3 big wins against GC, Freo and Adelaide in 2011, but these teams were struggling with form, injury and inexperience.

It's the same story with the win over Essendon. We caught them during their 5 game losing streak.

Compare the 2011 results with the previous year and we clearly did better in 2010. 2 close games against Collingwood; just falling short against the Dogs and Hawthorn, and thrashing another final 8 side in Sydney. We were going backwards in 2011, and that's why Bailey was fired.

So true.

I have heard Walls crap on about this before. Suggest it has plenty to do with his involvement in selecting DB in the first place & trying to rewrite history.

The simple fact is we made no progress at all in the years under DB, our defense leaked like a sieve and we were unable to ever exert any pressure on opposition sides - "bruise free" still sticks in my gut, as does 186.

For all that though, Neeld's challenge is to turn that around. At least Saturday night showed some desire.

[Weedster 174]

Robert is a former coach who got sacked and has a soft spot for other coaches in the same position. But he has got it so so wrong here.

He says we fired Bailey after one poor match (the 186 game). That is not true.

Round 2 - Hawthorn - the Dees were 28 points up just before 1/2 time. By the start of the last quarter we were 40 points down. arguably our worst 3rd Q in memory.

Round 6 - West Coast. Game over at quarter time. arguably our worst 1st Q in memory.

Round 8 - North. MFC 25 points up early in the second. Nearly 40 points down by 3/4 time.

Round 10 - Carlton - Another 6 goal performance from MFC. Carlton doubled our score.

Round 12 - Collingwood. Another 6 goals from the Dees. Collingwood kicked 10 in a row in the last quarter.

Round 15 - The Dogs. We played a middle ranked side and got done by 64 points. They killed us in the last and i believe Bailey was lucky to see out the round.

Round 19 - Geelong - 186.

In every one of these games, the opposition got a run-on and we couldn't deal with it. After 4 years with Bailey we did not have a game plan to cope with adversity.

Robert is very selective with his stats. He says Melbourne won 8 1/2 games in 2010 and because we won 7 1/2 games by round 19 (of 24 rounds) therefore we were improving slightly, but the stat is misleading.

Yes we did have 3 big wins against GC, Freo and Adelaide in 2011, but these teams were struggling with form, injury and inexperience.

It's the same story with the win over Essendon. We caught them during their 5 game losing streak.

Compare the 2011 results with the previous year and we clearly did better in 2010. 2 close games against Collingwood; just falling short against the Dogs and Hawthorn, and thrashing another final 8 side in Sydney. We were going backwards in 2011, and that's why Bailey was fired.

So true.

I have heard Walls crap on about this before. Suggest it has plenty to do with his involvement in selecting DB in the first place & trying to rewrite history.

The simple fact is we made no progress at all in the years under DB, our defense leaked like a sieve and we were unable to ever exert any pressure on opposition sides - "bruise free" still sticks in my gut, as does 186.

For all that though, Neeld's challenge is to turn that around. At least Saturday night showed some desire.