THE DEVIL IN THE DETAIL by Whispering Jack

Wednesday 20th May Tonight I'll be fronting up as usual to the Devil's Advocates Dinner for members of the legal fraternity who support the Melbourne Football Club. They include judges and their associates, solicitors, barristers, paralegal people and their staff all with that one thing in common - the fact that red and blue blood courses through their veins. That, and the fact that they have suffered greatly through the sport over time (except of course, for those who managed to get a professional involvement in the Essendon drug saga)

It's almost becoming a tradition that on the weekend before this function, Melbourne suffers a hiding of gigantic proportions meaning that the mood of the evening is usually sombre if not funereal. As a reminder of how poorly the Demons performed in their game against the Hawks, I give you this report from Footy Almanac.

As a result, I pity for instance, Phil Kingston, the auctioneer who has to flog various Demon related products during the course of the evening, like an afternoon in the coaches box, when the enthusiasm among the crowd leaves a lot to be desired. I might even be tempted to put in a bid for the coaches box gig but only on a non match day.

Still, I always look forward to the event and trust that there will be some special revelation that might reveal a light at the end of that very long tunnel that seems to extend itself whenever we get a third of the way into a season.

THE GAME Melbourne v Western Bulldogs at The MCG Sunday 24 May 2015 at 3.20pm

HEAD TO HEAD

Overall: Melbourne 84 Western Bulldogs 74 wins wins 1 draw

At MCG: Melbourne 44 wins Western Bulldogs 27 wins

Last Five Meetings: Melbourne 1 win Western Bulldogs 4 wins

The Coaches: Roos 0 wins Beveridge 0 wins

MEDIA

TV - Fox Sports Channel 3

Radio - SEN ABC ABC Grandstand

THE BETTING

Melbourne $3.05 to win Western Bulldogs $1.38 to win

LAST TIME THEY MET Western Bulldogs 14.7.91 defeated Melbourne 13.7.85 at Etihad Stadium in Round 15, 2014.

The Demons had a slow start but recovered from way back to lead late in the game until a few defensive mistakes and some brilliance from Marcus Bontempelli saw the Dogs home by a goal.

TEAMS

MELBOURNE

B: Colin Garland, Tom McDonald, Jack Grimes

HB: Jeremy Howe, Lynden Dunn, Heritier Lumumba

C: Daniel Cross, Aaron vandenBerg, Matt Jones

HF: Angus Brayshaw, Cameron Pedersen, Jack Watts

F: Jeff Garlett, Jesse Hogan, Jack Fitzpatrick

FOLL: Jake Spencer, Nathan Jones, Bernie Vince

I/C: Rohan Bail, Ben Newton, Aidan Riley, Jimmy Toumpas

EMG: Max Gawn, Viv Michie, Billy Stretch

IN: Jack Fitzpatrick, Jesse Hogan, Ben Newton, Aidan Riley, Jack Watts

OUT: Chris Dawes (calf), Viv Michie, Christian Salem (hamstring), Billy Stretch, Dom Tyson (knee)

WESTERN BULLDOGS

B: Matthew Boyd, Jordan Roughead, Easton Wood

HB: Robert Murphy, Fletcher Roberts, Jason Johannisen

C: Tory Dickson, Liam Picken, Koby Stevens

HF: Bailey Dale, Jake Stringer, Mitch Wallis

F: Stewart Crameri, Tom Boyd, Luke Dahlhaus

FOLL: Ayce Cordy, Lin Jong, Marcus Bontempelli

I/C: Shane Biggs, Brett Goodes, Lachie Hunter, Michael Talia

EMG: Jarrad Grant Nathan Hrovath Jack Macrae

IN: Shane Biggs

OUT: Mitch Honeychurch (general soreness)

NEW: Shane Biggs

Thursday 21st May I sat opposite Heritier Lumumba for part of the Devil's Advocates function (they rotate the club guests during the evening) and found him to be a revelation in terms of his ability to articulate his views on life and football with such intelligence, passion and humour. He is a major asset to the club not only as a player but as a mentor for our young team. When asked by compere Doctor Turf what his initial thoughts were of the three way trade involving Mitch Clark (to Geelong), Travis Varcoe (to Collingwood) and him to Melbourne, it was that the Demons had won. Perhaps he was jesting but I think he might be right. He also added that he felt at home at this function because his stepfather was a Solicitor which meant he understood why so many there were wearing mismatched ties. His story of how his parents were both dancers who met in Brazil (his father was from the undemocratic Republic of Congo). This probably explains the graceful way he moves around the field at times and he was the big hit of the night from my perspective.

Josh Mahoney spoke of his experiences as a twice rejected AFL player (Collingwood and Bulldogs) who spent three seasons in the VFL before getting a chance to be a premiership player at Port Adelaide. Josh has had a role change at Melbourne, moving from the coaching to the business side of football which he says suits him just fine. He did mention that Neville Jetta and Jack Viney would miss another week before returning but that Jesse Hogan was good to go this week.

The final speaker was Simon Goodwin who spoke of his experiences as coach in waiting and how he was enjoying the learning experience under Paul Roos and how he is being mentored as a future coach by Neale Daniher. It was something that most of the audience knew little about and there a great deal of interest in Neales experiences as he fights his debilitating illness. Goodwin remains very confident that the club is on the right trajectory despite the difficult three week period it has just experienced against three of the competitions strongest sides. He expects us to be a finals prospect within the next two to three years.

Congratulations to Devils Advocates convener Ralph Glezer with who I first went with to the footy in our university days which started not long after our golden era ended. There were many times in the barren years of the 70s and 80s that our only joy was the sight of Robbie Flower running on the wings of the MCG and the suburban football grounds of Melbourne. Kudos to Ralph for bringing in poet and Demon fan Greg Shalless to open the night by delivering his tribute to Robbie - https://soundcloud.com/sen1116/ode-to-robbie-flower/

Phil Kingston of Garry Peer & Associates estate agents was brilliant as the auctioneer of various bits and pieces of Melbourne related goodies.

Dr. Turf was the compere and ran the show well with his wit and wisdom. He brought the house down with his story about how Prime Minister Bob Hawke gave him his private telephone number so that he could deliver his horse racing tips on a Saturday morning. Turfie asked the PM what would happen if the phone was engaged, to which Hawke answered, then were all f---ed because the only person who has the number is George Bush and if hes on the line it means hes gotten us involved in another bloody war!"

I'm wondering if he has the phone number for Paul Roos because I would dearly like to know what hes thinking as Melbourne takes on the Western Bulldogs with a side that it somewhat depleted from the games of early in the season when the team showed significant advances over last year.

Despite the fact that the Western Bulldogs have dominated recent meetings between the teams (they have won nine of 10 matches since 2008), the games have been reasonably close affairs with the Demons in the contests until close to the end. The past four contests have been decided by an average margin of 11 points and on most such occasions, it was the overall experience of the Doggies that made the difference but this time around, things promise to be different.

The Western Bulldogs jettisoned a fair bit of experience at the end of 2014 and many of the pundits expected them to struggle with the extra reliance upon youth but instead, their youngsters have risen to the occasion and given their fans some joy after the gloom and doom of the off season.

Whilst Melbourne has some promising young players on its list, some of the best of its youth have been sidelined with injury lately and therefore, team selection has become something of a mish mash with several not quite right players getting games and a number of selections going against the flow of logic for an outsider. The end result is that I don't have the same feeling of confidence in the team's short to medium term prospects that I held a month ago.

Western Bulldogs by 27 points