THE WRITING ON THE WALL

[tonatopia 278]

2 years ago, many informed commentators were saying we had the best young list in the land. Now, apparently we have the worst. Neeld has destroyed us. Can only hardnut see this? I hope our board members are seriously asking question.

[Axis of Bob 10,431]

Read my qualifications of 'as being as good as any in the league'

I read the qualificatiosn you made.

So, including your qualifications, name me our best 8 midfielders and tell me why you think they are "as good as any in the league".

[P-man 13,285]

A good coach would have taken our positive attacking attributes and incorporated some solid defensive attributes. What neeld has done is akin to chemotherapy. He killed everything off, the good and the bad, so he could implement his own style. At this point of time, his strategy is failing miserably. I have seen enough to realize he will not be coaching next year. I think only the most compassionate of hearts will support him. He tried and failed. No excuses. Let's get a premiership coach or at least a premiership player.

This is an embarassing post.

Fact of the matter is our team was gutted before the first bounce and at this stage we simply don't have the personnel to cover such crucial losses. The team was making notable progress up until this week and I think most supporters acknowledge that as well as the size of the task Neeld has ahead of him.

I'll be watching the rest of this season with one eye open as I'm expecting a few more days like today. A clean out will be occurring at year's end and it is then we will begin to see Neeld's rebuild start in earnest.

[tonatopia 278]

Tell that to west coast who were decimated with injury. How about Adelaide who have gone from rags to riches. While we have Petered, Morton, Gysberts, bennell and tynan at Casey, I wouldn't say that injuries are our problem. Our problem is that neeld can't get the best out of his team.

[Axis of Bob 10,431]

Generally, I thought our application was quite good, but we had a few major problems that killed us:

1- We were poor going inside 50 without Clark and were inconsistent with our defensive pressure when it hit the deck.

2- We ran poorly from contests in the midfield. We didn't spread well from contests and we didn't shut them down well enough when they spread from contests.

The biggest problem we have is in the midfield. We are winning our fair share inside the packs, but we really lack the power runners outside that can do damage. Jones does this well and it's no co-incidence that we were a bit toothless without him. We need to look at fixing this at the end of the year with our early picks. We need players with speed and strength that can power away from stoppages after the inital possession.

[snomed1964 9]

I can't believe what I'm hearing, firstly from neeld declaring he is relatively pleased with the game, but more astonished with demonland posters who accept this crap. Never have I witnessed a coach destroy a team as quick as neeld has done to our boys in 2012. Yet, he is pleased. And most of you brain dead followers swallow the bait hook line and sinker. Neeld is a terrible coach who is destroying most of our players. Never have I felt this kind of dissapointment about the club and it's supporters. Most of you sound like you are born losers. Wake up. Neeld is not our man. We are a laughing stock. There is only 1 solution. Get a proven successful premiership coach, that has the brains and spiritual strength to unite the club and win games of footy. We need to get malthouse or Roos before Carlton does.

This is the worst year of footy I have ever seen.

Wrong about Neeld - he deserves more time in the job to see if you are right or wrong.

This theory about getting a premiership coach is crap. How many premierships had Bomber Thopmson coached before he went to Geelong?

Plus it too him eight years to get their first one.

[P-man 13,285]

Tell that to west coast who were decimated with injury. How about Adelaide who have gone from rags to riches. While we have Petered, Morton, Gysberts, bennell and tynan at Casey, I wouldn't say that injuries are our problem. Our problem is that neeld can't get the best out of his team.

I don't see how this post is backing you up in any way. Yes, West Coast have better depth than we do. And? Petterd is out of form, Morton has consistently failed to deliver, Bennell hot and cold, Gys coming back from injury, Tynan a first year player.

I'd say that Jones, Watts, Clark, Magner, McKenzie, McDonald and Grimes have all performed consistently and continued to develop since Neeld took over.

Not dignifying this anymore. The fact is there is a general consensus that we're onto a good thing in terms of our head coach. If you think Neeld is an abject failure after half a season, go chat to David King about it.

[old dee 23,110]

I Came up here on Saturday morning to see the big match ( brother lives here )

Saturday night discovered Jamar was out for Spenser

And Jones would be out.

Add those to the ones we knew about I felt like driving back to the airport.

Then we lose Mcdonald mid first quarter

and it was really a case of half a dozen good players trying to carry a bunch of either players who are not good enough for AFL level football

or has beens who cannot cut it anymore at AFL level.

We simply had no Forwards today

we started 2012 with almost all the same bunch who produced the "day at Geelong"

Then we have lurched from one disaster to the next as player after player has gone down with injury.

We are now a shell of the players that started 2012.

The only positives I could see from today were martin and the fact that we actually did not toss in the game at any point.

The future looks very grim I think the MFC need the addition of 8 good classplayers for 2013.

Of course we will not get them you just cannot replace 8 players in one season.

If we do not get Jamar, Davey, Jones, McDonald back next week it is going to be a sad belting by Richmond.

If 2012 is not the worse year I have watched the dees it will do till 2013 comes around.

PS At least I cannot blame No.7

[snomed1964 9]

A good coach would have taken our positive attacking attributes and incorporated some solid defensive attributes. What neeld has done is akin to chemotherapy. He killed everything off, the good and the bad, so he could implement his own style. At this point of time, his strategy is failing miserably. I have seen enough to realize he will not be coaching next year. I think only the most compassionate of hearts will support him. He tried and failed. No excuses. Let's get a premiership coach or at least a premiership player.

Are you actually TGR?

[tonatopia 278]

Who

[binman 39,194]

I worked out the ignore function. Excellent feature. Goodbye tonotopia. Enjoy the next 10 years of Neeld as our coach.

Edited July 1, 2012 by binman

[JT9 104]

Hahaah this is hilarious. Talk over the last month about how much weve improved, how things are finally moving in the right direction, and then a loss interstate without Jones Clark Jamar and Tmac and all of a sudden its going backward and time to sack Neeld. Talk about knee jerk

[binman 39,194]

Hahaah this is hilarious. Talk over the last month about how much weve improved, how things are finally moving in the right direction, and then a loss interstate without Jones Clark Jamar and Tmac and all of a sudden its going backward and time to sack Neeld. Talk about knee jerk

Or simply jerk

[monoccular 16,511]

I didn't think we were that bad today.

I thought we had a crack for most of the game and didn't give up.

Did anyone expect us to win with the players we had out?

Throw Clark and Jurrah into that forward line, Jamar and Jones into the middle and I reckon that's already a 6 goal difference.

We were even in the clearances, won the contested footy and even won the inside 50s (an area we were extremely poor at in the first 7 or 8 games).

The difference today was the Lions ability to move the ball really quickly and accurately from half back to the forward line (our defensive pressure was not good enough in this respect) and the flip side being our slow ball movement out of our backline. This meant that Brisbane were able to get it in quick to an open forward line whereas our entries were slow and laborious allowing the Lions time to get players back to crowd our forward line.

To me all this highlighted is what we already know - we lack crumbing forwards who can apply defensive pressure to opposition defenders and we lack class and pace in the midfield which greatly affects our ability to move the ball forward with pace and precision.

Midfield class and pace is what we've talked about all year so it's no surprise. We obviously need to address this through the draft.

But I was happy that we matched them inside the contests and got the ball forward enough times to kick a winning score. I'm not at all worried about that result as we were well below full strength and it will be a different team when we play them next time.

Without being too pessimistic, it IS possible that we will never see those two in R&B again.

We need to do our best without them and hope they will return.

[H_T 2,941]

Nice to see a couple of familiar posters after a big loss...

[bandicoot 1,395]

I really wasnt going to bother...but hey..

worst year youve ever seen. Dont watch much footy I take it.

You also have no real comprehension of the fabric of a successful club either it seems. It takes time for the redressing of a decade of inadequate action to see fruition. but you want overnight.

Enjoy your delusion

If it wasn't for a 1st and 2nd year team in the league we would be stone cold last, without a win and absolutely no prospect of winning for the remaining of the year.

I'm not sure how it can get worse than that???

I am convinced Melbourne supporters have accepted mediocraty

[bandicoot 1,395]

A good coach would have taken our positive attacking attributes and incorporated some solid defensive attributes. What neeld has done is akin to chemotherapy. He killed everything off, the good and the bad, so he could implement his own style. At this point of time, his strategy is failing miserably. I have seen enough to realize he will not be coaching next year. I think only the most compassionate of hearts will support him. He tried and failed. No excuses. Let's get a premiership coach or at least a premiership player.

Tottally agree with this. Neeld killed off anything bailey had to do with. Coaches, players, game style... The works.

No wonder the players have no idea what they are doing. They have been told to forget whatever they have learnt over the last 4 years.

A more reasonable coach would have taken the best aspects of the previous administration and added what was missing.

Adelaide kept their defensive structure but added a run and carry approach.

Lucky we only committed to 2 years with neeld as this will give us an option of finding a coach that is far more competant

[Akum 2,660]

Brisbane had a very effective play at kick-ins. We did a good job o covering all their defenders & mids, but then the kicker would just wait until another player came from the forward line or even straight off the interchange bench, without his opponent following him, and created the overlap and they were away. Very simple play, but allowed them to run it through the middle a number of times.

We had by far the best of the first quarter, but it was the 3.8 to 6.1 that killed off the game. We're simply not good enough that we can waste gettable goals and not get punished for it.

It did bother me that Garland and Watts looked lost today in their respective positions, and nothing whatsoever was gained by not switching them. Garland & Rivers forward and Watts & Dunn back are just experiments, and while I have no problem starting with it, we need to have a low threshold for switching back if it's having a negative effect on the team.

[bing181 8,301]

Why put Watts onto Brown at the start

Watts wasn't on Brown at the start. Tommy Mc was.

[bing181 8,301]

Our problem is that neeld can't get the best out of his team.

On the contrary, Neeld IS getting the best out of the team.

[Guest KingDingAling]

No surprise we have a fair few posters not content to cop hidings from Brisbane.

I thought we'd be better by now aswell..

Neeld would be a bit stiff not to get 2013 in, at least give him next year I reckon,

if things arent on the up then - he'd be happy to get the sack.

Doesnt look good if we sack coaches after a year, then who would want to coach us

if they see we treat coaches like that!!

Pretty dissapointed with the side atm though, like many say, we should be a lot better.

[The heart beats true 16,541]

It did bother me that Garland and Watts looked lost today in their respective positions, and nothing whatsoever was gained by not switching them. Garland & Rivers forward and Watts & Dunn back are just experiments, and while I have no problem starting with it, we need to have a low threshold for switching back if it's having a negative effect on the team.

It was Neeld's desire to stick to the plan that actually gives me confidence in him. He's not just reacting, he's watching to see how the players respond in unfamiliar circumstances so he can learn more about their strengths. This is tha mark of a good manager in my opinion. He's virtually not acknowledging the scoreboard and is instead focused on development and teaching. If we had him as a coach with that attitude 3 years ago you can bet we would have won yesterday by 10 goals. It's easy to want a win, but I think you have to acknowledge he had 7-8 of his best players out and a lot of our guys are still very new to his more defensive game plan.

Hang in there. I think it'll be worth it.

[beelzebub 22,531]

It was Neeld's desire to stick to the plan that actually gives me confidence in him. He's not just reacting, he's watching to see how the players respond in unfamiliar circumstances so he can learn more about their strengths. This is tha mark of a good manager in my opinion. He's virtually not acknowledging the scoreboard and is instead focused on development and teaching. If we had him as a coach with that attitude 3 years ago you can bet we would have won yesterday by 10 goals. It's easy to want a win, but I think you have to acknowledge he had 7-8 of his best players out and a lot of our guys are still very new to his more defensive game plan.

Hang in there. I think it'll be worth it.

Actually a well reasoned and considered view. A pleasant change from much of the knee jerking that goes on here.

So many cant see the forrest for the trees.

[Dinosaur Rover 197]

I think thats just his style, looked the same last year. So was he supposed to go last year? Cos its what your statement leans towards.....

Check his response after the win against Essendon - its his style.

[bandicoot 1,395]

Actually a well reasoned and considered view. A pleasant change from much of the knee jerking that goes on here.

So many cant see the forrest for the trees.

At the moment I can't even see the trees let alone the forest.

What I'm looking at is a empty barren wasteland that needs to be ploughed and reseeded