On 10/05/2013 at 09:19, Rhino Richards said:

Keep fantasising rooster. At least you can get you're rocks off on that.

Your, not you're, which is the contraction, you are.

Just saying.

  On 10/05/2013 at 06:14, pm24 said:

If you listen to yesterdays presser involving Dawes, Neeld is quite clear on why Trenners and Grimes were selected as captains. Because after the internal peer review process, which involved the players, they were ranked the top 2 in leadership ability. Jones was no.3.

It was quite refreshing to see Neeld have a go at one of the Journo's who then followed up by asking why Jones wasn't considered. He basically said, "because Trengove and Grimes were ranked as the top 2 leaders. Jone's was third. Why would the 3rd ranked leader be selected against the top 2 ranked leaders??"

It's pretty obvious that they have a list of attributes that players are measured against when determining leadership. This is why they were selected, despite their age. Because they are the best leaders in the club. Obviously in Neelds view, having the right leadership attributes was more important than the games experience when it comes to leading a team.

As for going backwards as a team, explain to me how a team that started 0-10 last season has gone backwards when we are possibly going to be 2-5 after this week.....Not to mention that this team is less experienced than the one that one we fielded last year. Aside from the first few weeks, I think the team is ahead of where it was last season. The last three weeks have seen the team play with a greater level of competitiveness than we saw for most of last season.

The first two weeks in particluar were atrocious. We then played one good half against West Coast before winning (as expected) against GWS. The game against Brisbane was competitive, and though we lost to a team that isn't all that crash hot, the team never gave up and plugged away until the final siren. In that case, it was the third quarter that killed us.

Then, against carlton last week the intent was there to pressure, the desire to compete, but the execution of skills failed. Given last season, with a more experienced team, we still had a 0-10 start, and failed to show much all season, I think this season we are progressing better than last. Particularly when you factor in that we have only had clark for about 3 weeks, and that we have had only a make shift forward line for most of the season. We haven't seen how this team would be with Dawes and Clark both fit yet, and that is important to our ability to score.

All in all, I think the team is showing an end to the bruise free football it has played in the past, is getting fitter and better as playing as a team, which lays a solid foundation for the rest of the season and beyond.

I thought I warned you about this sort of radical truth-telling.

MODS!!!

Get him outa here before this place starts making sense.

  On 10/05/2013 at 09:20, Roost It said:

So tell me I'm wrong

How old are you?

Are you a lawyer?

C'mon open up RR, Demonland is here to help

Why do posters bother making such [censored] and blind speculation about other posters? It's about as useful as speculating on life on a possible planet 7.2 light years away.

Moonshadow, FFS, is convinced I'm 4 foot 11 and "wafer thin". Just stick to debate and abuse FFS.

  On 10/05/2013 at 09:32, Bitter but optimistic said:

Why do posters bother making such [censored] and blind speculation about other posters? It's about as useful as speculating on life on a possible planet 7.2 light years away.

Moonshadow, FFS, is convinced I'm 4 foot 11 and "wafer thin". Just stick to debate and abuse FFS.

Why get involved

Go back to your inane posting

  On 10/05/2013 at 03:21, jumbo returns said:

Fair enough.

Important though, we talk footy. My response to you was not sprinkled with belittling comments and a sarcastic undertone.

Magner is a rookie and a rookie for a reason - apart from a big body, he offers little else.

Bail is a fleet footed player who's courageous and does all the hard stuff - in time, Strauss will prove to be a very handy backman who breaks lines.

We have a big bodied mid fielder atm in Sylvia, who's improving week by week and has sublime skills.

We have enough ordinary players on our list, we don't need another on the park.

I'm not sure why you keep including Bail & Strauss in these discussions (versus Magner) as i'm referring to players who are capable of being rotated as "inside mids" for significant periods during a game and who can hold their own through their while doing so without getting smashed by bigger bodied inside mids and taken out of the game easily (ie., early in a contest by being moved off the ball easily etc). Wasn't Strauss recruited to become a small defender anyway? And Bail's been on the list since 2009, had 3 more seasons at it than Magner, not really come on and also weighs 4 kilos less than Magner but about the same height.

Regardless, I see neither Bail or Strauss as being capable of playing the role of an inside mid atm. If they build an AFL "inside mid" sized bod (up around the 90kg mark like Magner) within a few years then it's quite possible they could. But as inside mid rotations, at present they wouldn't be considered in this role by any other team within the AFL imo. The same might be said of Magner in terms of class/skill/impact but i can at least see him as being capable and he does have a mid sized bod that can stand up to the heavy hitting as well as dishing it out during rotations. His tank probably wasn't there last year as it was only his first season but this would surely have improved with 1 more pre season under his belt.

I would take Mckenzie as a potential rotation option (inside) before Bail & Strauss at this point. M Jones is still years away as well but more likely to be an outside mid IMO. To me both Bail and Strauss are (at best) potential half back players who might push into the middle occasionally but more as camio outside mids. The only real prospects we have at this point who could call themselves an outside mid and possibly grow into and fill the role on this list on a regular basis now and looking forward 2 to 3 years is M Jones and Evans imo.

And no i don't see Sylvia as being the sublimely skilled inside mid you claim. He has impact at times and can burst break away with power. But his disposal effectiveness and smarts in many cases leave much room for improvement, even after 8 seasons.

This leaves only one solid player who has the all round game of an impact/power game and reasonable disposal skills to play as a true quality inside mid for us at AFL standard IMO. And we all know who that is. And he needs every little bit of help he can get. We are basically running 1.5 inside mid field (AFL standard) rotations at this point. No wonder we're getting smashed after a quarter or 2.

The opposition's "Quality" inside mid field rotations are crueling us pretty much every week so far. Solve this and we go someway towards becoming an AFL "competitive" unit.

I say bring in Magner ASAP until we trade/find additional AFL standard inside mids to plug the gaping hole. Not the savior, not the solution. Just a better option than anything else on offer at present to assist N Jones/Sylvia (and the boys) to stay in the hunt a little longer or possibly pinch a few unexpected victories from the jaws of defeat.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:02, Roost It said:

Why get involved

Go back to your inane posting

Your first line lacked a question mark.

Your second line was as silly as the silly comments I was commenting about!

I find it interesting that the Daniher/Gardner cheersquad always blamed the players for not implementing Daniher's poor game plan but now they blame Neeld, not the players.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:15, Clint Bizkit said:

I find it interesting that the Daniher/Gardner cheersquad always blamed the players for not implementing Daniher's poor game plan but now they blame Neeld, not the players.

Clint as I see it Daniher had some fairly talented players i.e he had a good side with some deficiencies.

We saw Daniher achieve some good success with his team.

I have no idea if Neeld is a good coach or not because he has a very poor group of players.

We honestly have five to six players who would make it onto the list of the top half a dozen sides.

Honestly this is the lowest talent group I can remember at the MFC.

JC could not get this lot up and yet they are paid the same as Geelong and Hawthorn go figure.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:15, Clint Bizkit said:

I find it interesting that the Daniher/Gardner cheersquad always blamed the players for not implementing Daniher's poor game plan but now they blame Neeld, not the players.

Daniher -> prelim in 1998

Neeld -> 3 wins against kids and 1 win vs 6.16 bombers

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:32, old dee said:

Clint as I see it Daniher had some fairly talented players i.e he had a good side with some deficiencies.

We saw Daniher achieve some good success with his team.

I have no idea if Neeld is a good coach or not because he has a very poor group of players.

We honestly have five to six players who would make it onto the list of the top half a dozen sides.

Honestly this is the lowest talent group I can remember at the MFC.

JC could not get this lot up and yet they are paid the same as Geelong and Hawthorn go figure.

Probably only 1 that would be in any other team's 22 - Nathan Jones

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:32, old dee said:

Clint as I see it Daniher had some fairly talented players i.e he had a good side with some deficiencies.

We saw Daniher achieve some good success with his team.

I have no idea if Neeld is a good coach or not because he has a very poor group of players.

We honestly have five to six players who would make it onto the list of the top half a dozen sides.

Honestly this is the lowest talent group I can remember at the MFC.

JC could not get this lot up and yet they are paid the same as Geelong and Hawthorn go figure.

You're missing the point. Even when Melbourne were making the finals many of us questioned Daniher's tactics and coaching as we could see it was flawed and wouldn't achieve the ultimate success (run and carry being the pinnacle of this). At the time the Cheer Squad simply always blamed the players, now they just blame the coach.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:37, PJ_12345 said:

Probably only 1 that would be in any other team's 22 - Nathan Jones

There are a few others PJ from Sundays team

Howe, Garland and Sylvia I am confident would be in the 22 in other teams tomorrow.

After that you start to struggle.

Bloody sad

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:06, Rusty Nails said:

I'm not sure why you keep including Bail & Strauss in these discussions (versus Magner) as i'm referring to players who are capable of being rotated as "inside mids" for significant periods during a game and who can hold their own through their while doing so without getting smashed by bigger bodied inside mids and taken out of the game easily (ie., early in a contest by being moved off the ball easily etc). Wasn't Strauss recruited to become a small defender anyway? And Bail's been on the list since 2009, had 3 more seasons at it than Magner, not really come on and also weighs 4 kilos less than Magner but about the same height.

Regardless, I see neither Bail or Strauss as being capable of playing the role of an inside mid atm. If they build an AFL "inside mid" sized bod (up around the 90kg mark like Magner) within a few years then it's quite possible they could. But as inside mid rotations, at present they wouldn't be considered in this role by any other team within the AFL imo. The same might be said of Magner in terms of class/skill/impact but i can at least see him as being capable and he does have a mid sized bod that can stand up to the heavy hitting as well as dishing it out during rotations. His tank probably wasn't there last year as it was only his first season but this would surely have improved with 1 more pre season under his belt.

I would take Mckenzie as a potential rotation option (inside) before Bail & Strauss at this point. M Jones is still years away as well but more likely to be an outside mid IMO. To me both Bail and Strauss are (at best) potential half back players who might push into the middle occasionally but more as camio outside mids. The only real prospects we have at this point who could call themselves an outside mid and possibly grow into and fill the role on this list on a regular basis now and looking forward 2 to 3 years is M Jones and Evans imo.

And no i don't see Sylvia as being the sublimely skilled inside mid you claim. He has impact at times and can burst break away with power. But his disposal effectiveness and smarts in many cases leave much room for improvement, even after 8 seasons.

This leaves only one solid player who has the all round game of an impact/power game and reasonable disposal skills to play as a true quality inside mid for us at AFL standard IMO. And we all know who that is. And he needs every little bit of help he can get. We are basically running 1.5 inside mid field (AFL standard) rotations at this point. No wonder we're getting smashed after a quarter or 2.

The opposition's "Quality" inside mid field rotations are crueling us pretty much every week so far. Solve this and we go someway towards becoming an AFL "competitive" unit.

I say bring in Magner ASAP until we trade/find additional AFL standard inside mids to plug the gaping hole. Not the savior, not the solution. Just a better option than anything else on offer at present to assist N Jones/Sylvia (and the boys) to stay in the hunt a little longer or possibly pinch a few unexpected victories from the jaws of defeat.

Great discussion.

I suppose if we're stop gapping before the draft, Magner may prove to be the solution, but, to me, I haven't been convinced by his skills or decision making. He reminds me of Shane Valenti, who got leather poisoning for Sandy, but never managed to make the grade.

What's your opinion on Couch?

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:41, Clint Bizkit said:

You're missing the point. Even when Melbourne were making the finals many of us questioned Daniher's tactics and coaching as we could see it was flawed and wouldn't achieve the ultimate success (run and carry being the pinnacle of this). At the time the Cheer Squad simply always blamed the players, now they just blame the coach.

Don't think so Clint I was just giving you another slant. As I said I have no idea how good Neeld is because we have a crap list.

I have not said so far that he is a crap coach but he does worry me with some of comments.

The simple fact is no coach would survive after two years of this teams performances.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:44, old dee said:

There are a few others PJ from Sundays team

Howe, Garland and Sylvia I am confident would be in the 22 in other teams tomorrow.

After that you start to struggle.

Bloody sad

Spot on old dee.

Will be good to see how Dawes goes on Sunday. Might be one to add to the list

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:44, old dee said:

There are a few others PJ from Sundays team

Howe, Garland and Sylvia I am confident would be in the 22 in other teams tomorrow.

After that you start to struggle.

Bloody sad

Clark, Dawes, Frawley, Grimes, Gawn, Evans and Trengove when fit. Blease would also add to a strong side as would McDonald picking up the third forward.

But let's forget them and bag the club instead

There are 2 main camps on here. "Sack Neeld immediately" vs "More time needed to see what happens". It is incumbent upon the former camp to either nominate the Messiah who should replace Neeld now, or justify how replacing him with an interim assistant would be better than waiting. I've not seen anything posted that answers those obvious questions in a convincing way. Just a bunch of (understandably) frustrated fans calling for heads to roll regardless.

Anybody hear Rivers talk about Neeld on SEN prematch. Said it all really

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:09, angrydee said:

Anybody hear Rivers talk about Neeld on SEN prematch. Said it all really

What did he say?

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:07, sue said:

There are 2 main camps on here. "Sack Neeld immediately" vs "More time needed to see what happens". It is incumbent upon the former camp to either nominate the Messiah who should replace Neeld now, or justify how replacing him with an interim assistant would be better than waiting. I've not seen anything posted that answers those obvious questions in a convincing way. Just a bunch of (understandably) frustrated fans calling for heads to roll regardless.

There are more shades in this debate than that:

Not our man, sack him immediately / not our man, give him til the end of the year to prove otherwise / undecided, give him til the end of the year to decide / undecided, give him til the end of his contract to decide / he is our man, keep him til the end of his contract and hopefully beyond

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:11, Clint Bizkit said:

What did he say?

Whatever he said, asking someone who left the club what he thinks of the way it was run is almost never going to elicit a 100% glowing appraisal.

That said, I would also love to hear what Riv said.

  On 10/05/2013 at 10:49, jumbo returns said:

Great discussion.

I suppose if we're stop gapping before the draft, Magner may prove to be the solution, but, to me, I haven't been convinced by his skills or decision making. He reminds me of Shane Valenti, who got leather poisoning for Sandy, but never managed to make the grade.

What's your opinion on Couch?

Neither have i Jumbo. I'm just going on the form he's been showing at Casey and some flashes of form he showed last year, plus the extra pre season tank wise. Just like to see him given a decent run at it while we're so lacking in big bodied numbers rotation wise. If Magner does ok great, but i'm more thinking of what it could do to help Jones & Sylvia rest a little during the first half of games and recoup for the 2nd.

I tried to look at Couch last year but missed him as he was injured in both games i went to.

I'd love to hear from KC or someone who's seen plenty of both Magner & Couch this year to know what they feel about their prospects of holding their own as inside mids if we were to roll them through there right now.

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:05, Roost It said:

Clark, Dawes, Frawley, Grimes, Gawn, Evans and Trengove when fit. Blease would also add to a strong side as would McDonald picking up the third forward.

But let's forget them and bag the club instead

Firstly did you notice this in the first line "from Sundays team"

Clark, Trengove, Grimes and Blease are not out there to start with, after 2011 and 2012 Dawes has yet to show he is any more than an average player in a very good team.

Frawley is an average defender, Mcdonald could not hit the side of a barn with a howitzer and Gawn is half a dozen games into his career.

We have lost five out of six games by an average of 13 goals and we are seldom in a game by the end of the first quarter.

These are not the signs of a wonderful playing list.

If we have such a good list how come we have won 5 of the last 28 games and have beaten only one side above us on the ladder?

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:09, angrydee said:

Anybody hear Rivers talk about Neeld on SEN prematch. Said it all really

What he say?

  On 10/05/2013 at 11:28, Chook said:

Whatever he said, asking someone who left the club what he thinks of the way it was run is almost never going to elicit a 100% glowing appraisal.

That said, I would also love to hear what Riv said.

I agree Chook however In Rivers we have someone who has now played under five different coaches.

I think his opinion would give some insight.