I never saw him play, but I'll give a leave pass to anyone playing in the Neeld era. How could we possibly determine anyone's individual capability in such a dysfunctional team?

And to the opening poster, having now read the article,  I don't think Tom Gillies was serious when he stated that he could have been a Premiership player. Context is everything and it's quite possible he was reminiscing in good humour.

i had the misfortune to watch him from the pocket against Port .

He stunk.

Didn't even look like a footballer.

And now he is delusional-not in the same stratosphere as Brian lake.

Terrible player, but I think the headline and quote is a little misleading.  His attitude to playing at Casey is terrible and he was never going to survive as an AFL player with that attitude.

His case reminds me of Matthew Bate.  Was in and out of the Melbourne team, the Bulldogs were very keen to sign him, but Neeld insisted he stay with us as he believed he could develop into a midfielder.  One year later - he was cut.

On 09/10/2017 at 5:10 PM, Bring-Back-Powell said:

Yes he was a horrid player, but I can recall there were a few excited Demonlanders to have he and Shannon Byrnes on board.

As for the thread, I'm struggling to work out what it's doing on the Trade & Leverage Board. Infact I'm struggling to work out what it's doing on Demonland full stop.

Byrnes could play, tom could not

13 minutes ago, don't make me angry said:

Byrnes could play, tom could not

Agree. Byrnes was a 100 game AFL player. Was probably past it by the time he got here, but it's very harsh to use his name in the same context as Gillies. 

Byrnes and co were about the best players we were able to attract at the time. That's life when you are as hopeless a club as we  were then.

What an article!

Just so you are all aware, I could have been the next Ron Barassi but due to this and that it didn't happen for me..........(jokes)

Seriously what a load of garbage. He wasn't up to AFL standard, and should be blessed he even got to play at all.

On 10/10/2017 at 3:36 PM, TeamPlayedFine39 said:

His case reminds me of Matthew Bate.  Was in and out of the Melbourne team, the Bulldogs were very keen to sign him, but Neeld insisted he stay with us as he believed he could develop into a midfielder.  One year later - he was cut.

I could understand if Bate was bitter about that - he was playing here and going nowhere but we wouldn't release him to a Club that were keen, and then a year later we cut him and he's on the scrap heap. Brutal industry.