Smythe on bigfooty has put out his Top 40 picks -

    1    Sid Draper 
    2    Finn O'Sullivan
    3    Jagga Smith
    4    Levi Ashcroft 
    5    Sam Lalor
    6    Luke Trainor
    7    Harvey Langford
    8    Josh Smillie
    9    Murphy Reid
    10    Tobie Travaglia
    11    Joe Berry
    12    Leo Lombard
    13    Jobe Shanahan
    14    Xavier Lindsay
    15    Taj Hotton
    16    Bo Allan 
    17    Alex Dodson
    18    Isaac Kako
    19    Jack Whitlock
    20    Alix Tauru
    21    Harry Armstrong 
    22    Sam Marshall
    23    Harry Oliver
    24    Tom Gross
    25    Matt Whitlock
    26    Hamish David
    27    Lachie Jaques
    28    Jess Dattoli
    29    Cooper Hynes
    30    Harry O'Farrell
    31    Christian Moraes
    32    Ben Camporeale
    33    Angus Clarke 
    34    Kayle Gerreyn
    35    Noah Mraz
    36    Jonty Faull
    37    Tom Simms
    38    Adrian Cole
    39    James Barrat
    40    Tyler Welsh

Meanwhile, another Bigfooty poster PM Bangers has put up his pre Coates Talent League finals rankings:-

On 07/09/2024 at 08:23, dazzledavey36 said:

Dandenong Stingrays play Gippsland power today in the quarter finals at 2pm.

This match will feature a bunch of current Melbourne NGA listed players in Tairon Ah-Mu, Riak Andrew and Marcus Prasad (underage) from the Dandenong Stingray.

Gippsland will have Ricky Mentha running around for the Power.

This will also feature potential top 5 propsect Harvey Langford and Cooper Hynes who's expected to go somewhere inside top 20.

For those who have not seen it yet:

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1217505/inside-trading-key-factor-for-eagles-targets-swan-gets-offer-clubs-meet-for-trade-talks

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

Ah-Mu is a member of the Demons' NGA program but under the AFL's eligibility criteria, he does not qualify for the club to have any priority access over him as a draftee.

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

As per afl dot com

21 minutes ago, wheaters31 said:

For those who have not seen it yet:

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1217505/inside-trading-key-factor-for-eagles-targets-swan-gets-offer-clubs-meet-for-trade-talks

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

Ah-Mu is a member of the Demons' NGA program but under the AFL's eligibility criteria, he does not qualify for the club to have any priority access over him as a draftee.

Furious - on what basis isn’t he eligible?

Edited September 11, 2024Sep 11 by demoncat

Utterly bizarre..

No explanation whatsoever on why he's not eligible.

22 minutes ago, adonski said:

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

As per afl dot com

Wtf!!

42 minutes ago, wheaters31 said:

For those who have not seen it yet:

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1217505/inside-trading-key-factor-for-eagles-targets-swan-gets-offer-clubs-meet-for-trade-talks

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

Ah-Mu is a member of the Demons' NGA program but under the AFL's eligibility criteria, he does not qualify for the club to have any priority access over him as a draftee.

Why??! WTF … afl screwing us again !!! 

i'm shocked but also not shocked

Dees must fight this … 

the NGAs are a joint initiative between the league and the clubs aimed at the attraction, retention and development of all talented players — both male and female — whilst growing participation in the under-represented segments of the community. 

First introduced in 2017, a key objective of the NGAs is to increase the talent pool of Indigenous and multicultural players. 

These groups are significantly under-represented in the AFL comparative to the population, and therefore clubs are incentivised through draft concessions for their role in growing this talent pool.

AFL can get [censored]. Anyone good enough in our NGA gets taken off us? What a [censored] joke.

Would be nice if we knew how the eligibility works. Why is he eligible for the NGA but not the priority access.

Tried to look up the rules. From what I can gather you have to be either...

Indigenous or Torres straight island decent

Of African or Asian decent

Both parents from culturally or linguistically diverse background

On 03/09/2024 at 08:13, BW511 said:

I’m also a little on the fence about him, terrific stats and year, concerned how he fares at AFL level with a lot more congestion and bigger bodies.

A lot of times he would be killing his teammates with handball at AFL level

 

Plays like Salem

Rarely hurts the opposition in my view

3 minutes ago, Nascent said:

Tried to look up the rules. From what I can gather you have to be either...

Indigenous or Torres straight island decent

Of African or Asian decent

Both parents from culturally or linguistically diverse background

I guess being from Samoa doesn’t qualify you under those rules, but a shortage of representation from players with Samoan heritage, this seems like a significant oversight. Especially given he has been part of the Academy to this point, I do wonder how many times we can get shafted by NGA rules.

i would presume the club has been aware for some time that he wasn't eligible to be selected

i imagine it's the eagerness of mfc fans about him as a prospect that has seen the news filter out to the public that he's not eligible to be picked up thru the nga for us

it's a shame, but it doesn't change anything at the end of the day

FFS

Edited September 11, 2024Sep 11 by Roger Mellie
Technical incompetence

19 minutes ago, Kent said:

Plays like Salem

Rarely hurts the opposition in my view

I can agree with that. He’s really neat and tidy but never the one to create the move. His kicking in particular is very safe

Edited September 11, 2024Sep 11 by BW511

Absolutely ironic that the same time it's been announced that Ah-Mu is ineligible, Mac Andrew has now signed a 9 year deal...

What is Asia Pacific? Chopped liver?

consider cal twomey and the tradies podcast dms flooded until i hear a good explanation, i also cannot find any reason why he would be ineligible

26 minutes ago, ChaserJ said:

I guess being from Samoa doesn’t qualify you under those rules, but a shortage of representation from players with Samoan heritage, this seems like a significant oversight. Especially given he has been part of the Academy to this point, I do wonder how many times we can get shafted by NGA rules.

I wonder if we can apply for an exemption or amendment to the rules. He's been part of our NGA anyway so it's not like we haven't invested in him.

Can't believe the amount of bad luck we have had. The 'luck' worm has to turn sooner or later.

Given obvious interest in Ah-Mu from early in the season the AFL should have published their decision much earlier.

This sort of stitches him up as a top 10 in 2025.

Disgrace. 

 

Edited September 11, 2024Sep 11 by manny100

I guess the AFL had to officially notify the Dees as it would materially effect our trading and draft selections. 

If for example we had Ah-Mu in the bag for 2025 we would have likely only picked up mid type players this draft and trading season.

Probably means we will look to pick up a mid with pick 6 and maybe a KPD later in the draft or top 20 if we can move  our future 1st back into this draft.

2 hours ago, wheaters31 said:

For those who have not seen it yet:

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1217505/inside-trading-key-factor-for-eagles-targets-swan-gets-offer-clubs-meet-for-trade-talks

MELBOURNE will not have access to tall forward prospect Tairon Ah-Mu under Next Generation Academy rules when the 17-year-old hits his draft season next year.

Ah-Mu is a member of the Demons' NGA program but under the AFL's eligibility criteria, he does not qualify for the club to have any priority access over him as a draftee.

Not sure why he is part of our NGA program if the rules are clear we don’t get access to him via draft 

Why would we be pumping time and resources into someone with absolutely zero benefit 

Do we not know the rules or do the goal posts always shift for us 

It makes zero sense to have him as an NGA Academy member if he's not eligible, strange