Give me a bottom-half top eight finish any time in preference to this (even if it kills me during finals time).

How can I rationally argue with someone that I diametrically oppose ?

It's a flag or bust for me. Nothing else matters. Finals mean absolutely jack [censored].

I agree...but you do realise that thats a different thing from a team that slides in and out of finals !!!

yes, I see your point - plays finals but no real chance of the premiership.

I think one only sees this after the event (or time frame).

Nobody has built a team from ground zero in modern history like people are saying should be/is being done at Melbourne. Even Brisbane and Sydney in their worst times were not as bad as this lot.

How can I rationally argue with someone that I diametrically oppose ?

It's a flag or bust for me. Nothing else matters. Finals mean absolutely jack [censored].

We must agree to differ. Hope you don't buy lotto tickets! (I don't!)

yes, I see your point - plays finals but no real chance of the premiership.

I think one only sees this after the event (or time frame).

Nobody has built a team from ground zero in modern history like people are saying should be/is being done at Melbourne. Even Brisbane and Sydney in their worst times were not as bad as this lot.

Rubbish. Sydney were terrible in their Buckenara/Barrassi period. Not of Barrassi's doing, btw.

It doesn't matter what the view on Bailey is. No one can defend him because our performances have been disgraceful, but at the same time it's ridiculous to make outlandish statements about his coaching ability.

The main thing is this: we need superstars. We have none, haven't had one for a while and bloody hell we need a few. The things is they lift others around them. Commentators go on and on about the strength of Geelong and blokes like Stokes and Mackie. How many goals would Stokes kick in the Dees forward line? But put him in a team with Ablett and Bartel and Chapman etc. and he looks a great player. It's the old Chris Heffernan syndrome - looks a fine player in a good team, but what did he do at Melbourne? Stuff all.

We have blokes on our list who are struggling, but I genuinely believe that with stars around them, they'd be valuable players. There's just so many players at sides like Adelaide, Hawthorn and Sydney who wouldn't be half as good if they were at Melbourne. Stars not only impact the game themselves but they make ordinary players good players.

We are going nowhere until we get some stars. It can be turned around quicker than you think - but you must get stars into the club. A few years at the bottom with astute drafting could have us pushing back up the ladder within a few years.

But please...recruit some damn stars!

yes, I see your point - plays finals but no real chance of the premiership.

I think one only sees this after the event (or time frame).

Nobody has built a team from ground zero in modern history like people are saying should be/is being done at Melbourne. Even Brisbane and Sydney in their worst times were not as bad as this lot.

Thank god Dean Bailey doesn't have your shortsighted vision.

We are not building a team from ground zero. Had you actually bothered reading some of the replies to this topic you would realise that we are trying to build a team around our kids. The same thing was done by a lot of successful teams.

Who gives a flying fudge about what you want to see when you go to the footy. There is no such thing as sustained success in AFL football. Everyone hits the bottom at some stage, only some teams actually win a premiership along the way.

You can moan and cry that we are the worst team in history, and bla bla bla, but at the end of the day you are thinking about yourself and not about what is best for this team and for our club. Yes we're struggling, yes we've lost 5 in a row. It was harder watching us lose 5 in a row in 2004 and nearly miss the finals after we were on top at Round 18. It was harder watching us get smashed by Geelong in 2005.

Stop thinking about how much it sucks being a Melbourne supporter right now and start thinking about what it will take for us to win a premiership. We need to change the way we play, because the way we have played up until now has not been successful. We need to clear our list of a lot of deadwood, because the list we've had for 10 years hasn't been successful either.

If that means that you have to suffer in the meantime than boo friggidy hoo. Get in line buddy, nobody is enjoying this.

We are going nowhere until we get some stars. It can be turned around quicker than you think - but you must get stars into the club. A few years at the bottom with astute drafting could have us pushing back up the ladder within a few years.

But please...recruit some damn stars!

You sound like me from years ago.

I'm still waiting.

How many goals would Stokes kick in the Dees forward line? But put him in a team with Ablett and Bartel and Chapman etc.

Were Ablett, Bartel and Chapman stars before they won the premiership?

You believe in fools gold. You also believed we had a top 4 midfield inspite of overwhelming evidence. You're as stubborn as an old moll. We teased, but were never going to win a flag with the list we had, or have.

A new coach was always going to bring a diversity of style. It's hard to defend Bailey as there's little light to behold. Is he any good ? I don't know, but there's no point bleating like a stuck pig after every loss. He's going to be given time, as he should. I'm happy to turn the list over and weed out those that have shown they can't produce when needed. Lord knows many have had enough time.

Daniher proved he couldn't deliver with the group he picked. And FFS, stop creaming yourself over playing finals. Yes, they're often a stepping stone to ultimate success, but if you thought our finals appearances over the last 3 years were gradients of success you're more obtuse than I originally thought.

Maybe you could quote where I said we had a top four midfield, I'm yet to see it? I've said repeatedly we have a top eight midfield and a top eight side, and I'll back in the AFL clubs around the league who agree with that assessment. Don't like it? Ask them yourself.

Finals are "often" a stepping stone for success. No. They ARE. End of discussion.

A lot of teams don't play repeat finals, let alone three in a row. When we were going up and down - in the finals one year and bottom four the next, we were overachieving one year and underachieving the next. Where we finished and how we fared from 04-06 was an accurate realisation of our abilities. We were as good as anyone on our day, but we didn't have the maturity, strength and depth to be a consistant top four side. That was what we were developing, what Brisbane had to develop, what Geelong had to develop, what Sydney, West Coast and Port had to develop. We have made a massive mistake in ripping apart what we had been building as far back as 1999, but moreso since 2002 when ND correctly acknowledged that THAT structure was not going to win us a flag.

I want to make one thing perfectly clear, and Scoop touched on it as well, I'm not for a second suggestion that Dean Bailey can't coach or is even a bad coach. What I'm suggesting is that the style of play which he has brought to the club is completely opposed to a style that plays to our strengths, and gives us the greatest chance at success. Dean Bailey himself isn't the problem, his gameplan and the theory that it could be just stamped onto our players is.

We're moving away from a style of footy that was on the path to the way Essendon, Brisbane and Geelong played when they won flags.

The easy option is to blame the players. Franky has it right, any system that requires players to second think their instinct is doomed to failure.

If this puts me at odds with Dean Bailey's vision of Melbourne, then with very sadly with no joy I'll stand at the front of the line and shout it from the rooftops.

This gameplan will not work.

watching todays game has taught me something, the way to beat MFC is just to run cos we dont.

we play bludging football, wont man up, did cloke have aids yesterday no one would go near him.

again can the MFC afford the years in the wilderness with our money problems.

heres a fact casey councillars were at the presidents lunch testerday,my brother in law was one of them thats how i know.

can ANYBODY out there think of any team getting these so bad results whilst restructing,we are so far off the pace we cant even see it

I'd question the validity of the game plan itself. As we understand it Bailey has taken the familiarity option and ported the Power game plan to Melbourne. Sure they won a Premiership but frequently the plan has not stood up when the whips were cracking. Recall the Brisbane years when more often than not the Power were the league leaders but failed in Preliminaries. More recently Port was beaten in a Grand Final by a record 119 points. Too often the Port Plan is demonstrated to be flawed, just have a look at the last two weeks, a 67 point turn-around capitulation to Brisbane from the 22 min mark of the third quarter and yesterday allowing a side to kick the last seven goals of the match to reduce a 68 point margin to 4 goals. Is this what we want?

Bailey could of taken the safe option this yearand keep players like Ward, Godfrey, Ferguson ad co on our list we would of been a little more competitive but we still would of finished bottom four. He has played some kids, Aussie and Morton look good, Frawley was good yesterday and PJ before he was injured was our best big man.

What Bailey is doing is exposing our senior players at the moment. He can't be blamed for basic skill errors, these players have been playing AFL for many years and should be able to kick goals form 15m with no pressure hit targets by hand and foot mark the easy marks an stick tackles. Our players that have been around for 7+ years can't do this. Todays AFL game is high paced and skillfull, Bailey is identifying how can play at this level. It is not our younger players letting Bailey down the amount of times I saw yesterday White, Bruce, Wheatley, Moloney turn the footy over, missing targets by hand and foot or just kick the high hail mary kicks to no win contests was amazing. Frawley yesterday embraced what Bailey is trying to teach, run hard hit the ball at speed recieve take it on and deliver to a target.

Players who can not complete the required skills at AFL level will not be around long under Bailey. Unfortunate for him a tough call was to trade one player that did have the skills to play AFL but the next 3 years will tell on that call.

Exactly.

I don't want to play finals, I want a premiership. It's been a long, LONG time since we've tasted real success and anything in between just won't do. The nature of this competition dictates that if you don't come first, you should come last and benefit from early draft picks. It worked for Hawthorn, and it's going to help Carlton and Richmond enormously. Luckily for Geelong they managed to grab Scarlett, Ablett x 2 and Hawkins under the F/S rules and they still bottomed out in 2003. It took them 4 years to win a flag.

We also bottomed out in 2003 and look at the difference between us and Geelong after 4 seasons.

They recruited to suit their needs (Ottens) and they developed a game plan which they believed would bring them success. In 2006 they struggled, but when things clicked they were unstoppable. If they were stubborn and didn't believe it was time for a change all those years ago, we'd both still be suffering from long premiership droughts.

This notion that it will take us years to be successful again is crazy. Look at the sort of players we have to build around... Rivers, Jones, McLean, Morton, Bartram, Frawley, Maric and the list goes on and on. All of these players suit the game plan that Bailey is trying to implement. They are accountable, but they can also attack a contest. They'll go in hard when it's their turn, but they can also use the footy by hand/foot (those who can't have plenty of time to learn).

Are we crazy that we're going to implement a game plan which suits the likes of Robbo, Junior, Green, Bruce, White, Whelan and Neita when these guys are not going to be around in 2-3 years, let alone when a premiership is on the cards? We have to build around the players who will be there to see us succeed. Our senior players have failed time and time again and we can no longer gear a game plan to their needs.

If some younger players happen to fall down as well because they lack basic accountability and a football brain, than they were never going to make it anyway.

I'm confident that the players I've mentioned above will not struggle (and have not struggled thus far) with Bailey's style. It is our youngest players who have adapted best and have really shown the way. Sadly, they are getting little support at the moment and it cannot be expected of them to win us games when we've played the best sides in the competition thus far. Today was a real opportunity for us to get the four points, but skill errors and kicking in-front of goals killed us.

Replace Robbo/Neita with Fevola and we probably would have won.

I agre with the above, except that you are giving Bailey's game plan all sorts of credit for being suited to our list of the future. I don't think there is anything I have heard from him to demonstrate that contention. I hope it's true, and I have heard from others that he is reputed to have a fantastic footbal brain, but I still think it's a positive stretch to suggest that the game plan will suit Maric.

That's about it. Bailey has removed any sense of understanding the players have, and replaced it with nothing (that's understandable).

I have seen 4 of the 5 games played so far, as well a lamentable NAB Cup effort..there is no game plan ! Furthermore, this ridiculous rotation policy just further confuses everyone - why take Green off the ground immediately after he just kicks a goal to put us IN FRONT with a bit of momentum...or have Sylvia run off the ground with NO-ONE ready to take his place...no wonder we are a shambles..no-one knows who they are playing on or who they are replacing...THIS IS A JOKE AND DEAN BAILEY HAS TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY

I want to make one thing perfectly clear, and Scoop touched on it as well, I'm not for a second suggestion that Dean Bailey can't coach or is even a bad coach. What I'm suggesting is that the style of play which he has brought to the club is completely opposed to a style that plays to our strengths, and gives us the greatest chance at success. Dean Bailey himself isn't the problem, his gameplan and the theory that it could be just stamped onto our players is.

The easy option is to blame the players. Franky has it right, any system that requires players to second think their instinct is doomed to failure.

If this puts me at odds with Dean Bailey's vision of Melbourne, then with very sadly with no joy I'll stand at the front of the line and shout it from the rooftops.

This gameplan will not work.

Good comments. The current style reminds me of Neil Balme's era. Bailey is obviously a football thinker. He's got a theory. He may be the Albert Einstein of football. But it is an experiment and so far we can only have faith that it will work. The results after 5 games suggest that with the players we've got, and will essentially have for the medium term, they are being asked to play a style that goes against their instincts and skills and they can't do it.

Bailey believes and hopes more training will fix it. I hope he is Einstein but I've got my doubts.

A coach I respected greatly, John Northey, got the team playing to their strengths and then introduced the innovations. Get Northey back in some role, imo. He knows and understands a bit about the MFC culture and mentality. And he could coach.

Sadly I don't think the current gameplan will work either.

I have seen 4 of the 5 games played so far, as well a lamentable NAB Cup effort..there is no game plan ! Furthermore, this ridiculous rotation policy just further confuses everyone - why take Green off the ground immediately after he just kicks a goal to put us IN FRONT with a bit of momentum...or have Sylvia run off the ground with NO-ONE ready to take his place...no wonder we are a shambles..no-one knows who they are playing on or who they are replacing...THIS IS A JOKE AND DEAN BAILEY HAS TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY

Yeah I agree it's chaos theory at it's best!

Really all I want to see is improvement - nothing appears to have changed since Round 1 (or the NAB cup for that matter) except for maybe the Geelong game.

I do want wins, but if they don't come, I want to see competative losses.

I got to the Demons games and regularly hear the loyal Melbourne crowds groan when another stupid error or turn-over occurs. We then get excited when we see professional standard of football that may return a goal, but often we then have to suffer through seeing skill errors, poor decison making or, 'clangers' happen. Too often the opposition then make us pay for by slamming on 4 goals - as happened yesterday.

I can accept the losses, the change in game plan and everything else the MFC gives us in trying to win a premiership. Let's all be fair dinkum - there isn't anybody on the senior list who sholdn't be there, no matter what we all think about individuals. They ALL can play football otherwise they wouldn't be there.

I just want to see the basic skill levels that AFL senior list players should possess AND competative losses - success will follow.

Moose

I'd question the validity of the game plan itself. As we understand it Bailey has taken the familiarity option and ported the Power game plan to Melbourne. Sure they won a Premiership but frequently the plan has not stood up when the whips were cracking. Recall the Brisbane years when more often than not the Power were the league leaders but failed in Preliminaries. More recently Port was beaten in a Grand Final by a record 119 points.

No one has really touched on this point yet either, and its a valid one.

Port's style won one Grand Final and by their own admission a major part of that was beating Brisbane at their own game. It failed under Finals pressure repeatedly.

West Coast used the same style to win a flag, but they had three of the best five players in the competition at the time. Their form this year without just two of them shows the styles limitations when it comes to personel.

I don't see how this style of footy is winning finals footy and the style we were building towards, much more in the Brisbane/Geelong mould, was worth chucking away.

I heard an opposing AFL Assistant coach say the other day that we were playing a style three to four years out of date. Sounds pretty spot on to me.

According to Jeff White the new game plan is great; really, really good, exciting and also looks good on Mondays (perhaps during the Powerpoint presentation). I hope I live long enough to enjoy a successful deployment because I've seen no evidence of it yet.

Exciting Game Plan