11 minutes ago, layzie said:

If we're talking about him being knocked back then Macca is 100% correct and I've heard it from Robbie himself. When he first got to the club to try out for the 4ths they flat out told him "You're skinny, you wear glasses, you've got no hope".

Didn't tear the house down on day 1.

100% accurate!

19 minutes ago, layzie said:

If we're talking about him being knocked back then Macca is 100% correct and I've heard it from Robbie himself. When he first got to the club to try out for the 4ths they flat out told him "You're skinny, you wear glasses, you've got no hope".

Didn't tear the house down on day 1.

Chalk & cheese.

The conversation was that having an effective 2nd tier competition encourages players who miss out on the draft to play VFL & then have another crack at the big time.

Flower's situation was completely different. He was 16 years old & wanted to train with our 4ths (under 17). He was knocked back a few times then invited to train with the under 17's. The rest is history.

The Podsiadly story is more relevant or even Jai Culley.

12 hours ago, rjay said:

The VFA was dead in the water, the AFL then using its bones to create the re branded VFL kept a lot of those clubs going.

If the AFL go to a proper reserves comp then there will be no VFL.

It wouldn't survive. The non aligned clubs barely scrape through now.

The VFL was dead in the water, a lot of clubs in massive debt, Adelaide crows and west coast Eagles paying big money to join the vfl now AFL saved a lot of clubs.

12 hours ago, rjay said:

I tend to agree with you 'picket'...the current system is broken.

Neglected to highlight that 22 teams is too many teams for one comp. Just guessing, but the way it is set up might mean that certain teams may not meet each other

1 hour ago, drdrake said:

The VFL was dead in the water, a lot of clubs in massive debt, Adelaide crows and west coast Eagles paying big money to join the vfl now AFL saved a lot of clubs.

Kind of but different...the local VFA teams had a core supporter base not much more than an average local team. A lot of people aligned to a VFA club when it was on tele, but they were never hardcore supporters as was seen when the broadcast disappeared.

The VFL clubs were poorly run but the supporter base meant it was always an attractive proposition for sponsors and broadcasters. The big money that came in from interstate saved a lot of embarrassment. The timing couldn't have been much better.