Leaderboard

Where to start on this.... We have a coach who is very clear on gameplan and this will either make or break him or the club. One thing for sure he wont change it and or tolerate players not showing the discipline to stay the course. Stuie...on the face of it of course you are correct. Our current list played flashy football that occasionally got us good wins against teams that were susceptible to a loss interstate. On top of that our better performances generally included players through the midfield who haven't really made it on the field this year. (Think Scully, Sylvia, Moloney not to mention Jurrah up forward) However as stated by others the trending of this gameplan was not obvious to anyone (just review threads on DB and lack of gameplan last year) including people at the club. Our team although seemingly showing improvement was not really on track to do anything long term in terms of matching it with the good teams. This year we are almost 5 games in and now we see this new gameplan and edge being implemented by a coach who by the way also lives in Northcote. This coach Mark Neeld will stay the course and clearly needs time to adjust the list to the way he believes this team needs to play long term to win. To give you an idea according to GPS data the players are running 30% further this year during games than last year. The gameplan pushes them right to the edges of the boundary and then asks for counter attacks to be made by getting the entire team to switch to the other side of the ground at pace. This asks alot of the players in terms of fitness. That is why they make really poor decisions and have been generally fading after halftime. When Mark arrived he knew straight away the list wasn't where it needed to be in terms of fitness to go with a gameplan that could challenge for the ultimate success. But he is determined to change this. People percieved us with all the investment in coaching and a new fitness regime that we would automatically be better. Reality is that was never going to happen. There is understandably a lack of patience from many...we have all been through a lot of pain and with loss after loss doubt creeps in. But let me tell you this. Mark Neeld has belief that what he is doing will generate long term success and he will not bend from that. People point to his media appearances being a distraction and that perhaps he shouldn't have said 'the hardest team' comment. But reality is that is his aspiration and he totally believes in it. Further to that, leaders at the club have expressed to me that they totally understand and believe in the gameplan and what is occurring. More than one has confided that under DB they really struggled to know the gameplan. With Neeldy they know what it is and agree totally with the direction. So people get ready for a season of more pain. I expect people will now jump on me for trying to impart what I know. Some will try to discredit me. Some will continue to pull apart Mark and his gameplan. They will continue to pot the 4 game coach expecting him to have turned us into a powerhouse by now. I wish everyone had the privilege and benefit I have had to spend time with Mark and other leaders of the club. When you actually see what is happening inside it is far more tangible to understand the facts as opposed to the many opinions sprouted about the club. I'll give you another example. When Mark started the club didn't even have the IT programs all other clubs had and he had to convince the club to purchase it and implement it. There are many more embarrassing examples that Mark has had to address that were big gaps in terms of getting the foundations right for the football department. It kills me to see our own people on this site make uninformed comments based purely on what they see on gameday. Although it is entirely understandable. (Believe me it kills me too) I wanted to write to try and provide some sort of solace to those that may wish to believe what I say. I see in many the passion and heart and pain that to have in my heart. All I can ask each of you is be realistic with expectations. Please don't blame Mark who is a brand new senior coach trying to change the club and set it up for success. Some senior players have a lot to answer for but I know you all know that. It is not accepting mediocrity just realistic based on where we have come from. In my job I am fortunate to have a lot to do with a number of clubs and I must confess MFC has been the club by far who are always behind trying to catch up. Mark is leading the way with fixing this disparity but it doesn't all happen and click overnight. The comment from Mick Malthouse about things other than football was an articulation of the fact the club has been paving the foundations and multiple levels to finally put everything into the Football team. Believe it or not good times are ahead but not without a lot of pain first. Stick with the Dees the light at the end of the tunnel will come!

Can't agree with this. He smashed Sam Fisher. Subbing Dunn let Fisher off the hook and Sylvia gave us nothing in return. Stupid move. Should have been Watts wearing red tonight.

Not fit enough. Another preseason away. Start to get a glimpse of how ferocious neeld wants us to play.

Forget these suggestions of Clark for captain... should be Jones... if anyone leads by example, he's the man.

trengove n watts need to do something

Jesus... he's having a pretty good game and you have to grab one incident in an effort to bag him!!!

Your argument is blown out of the water by the fact that in one summer Hird and Bomber got them close to a NAB cup final and winning the first 4 games of the year. They ran out of gas half way through the year but this crud about changing game plan takes 3 or 4 years was disproven then and there. We were shiite when Bailey came in and when he left but we have gone backwards since DB left. Its scary and the players are dicing with the life of a football cub. If they don't want to commit then get rid of em.Turn em over I say. The latest Roos article says 19 of the players from the 2010 smashing of the Swans are still on our list, the 186 game says our players are running the asylum. They are clearly responsible for dishing out insipid weak performances week in week out. ABout time they wore some heat from long suffering fans.

Two things happened. Firstly, we changed our tactics and let them have an extra man in defense. For the first three quarters we refused to give on this and kept sending people into our forward line to man them up and it worked. For some reason in the 4th we stopped and let them get away with it. Secondly, we subbed Dunn out of the game. He'd been doing a good job of sitting on Fisher. This combination meant that not only did they have a spare man in defense, but that the spare man was Fisher and he proceeded to rip our forwards to shreds and rebound at will. The only real hope we had at this point was a running 50m goal from the midfield.

Trenners has been struggling, niggle or captaincy do you think? Tappy needs some more fitness after an interrupted preseason, Watts in and out of the game needs to work on that, Tommy Mac I thought really progressed as the game went on, horrible at first but really stuck at it and would have learned a lot. Tough day for the youngens, but i thought blokes like Bate, McKenzie, Jones, Moloney all showed something that we've been trying to find all year, even Davey has started to show some signs I think.

I loved McKenzie's work on Goddard; he really got under his skin. Watts and Trengove both need to lift, but I loved the effort from just about everyone else. Subbing Dunn out was the right call because he barely touched the ball until he kicked that long goal.

Better definitely. Showed some mettle. But what's up with Watts and Trengove? No.1 Draft Picks FFS! Trenners looks little better than an honest plodder.

I unreservedly take back the crap I said about Tom McDonald. Showed me a thing or two, that's for sure.

Last year I had a personal running joke of calling Jones 'twinkle toes' because all of a sudden he had taken up the habit of doing little side-steps and swerves. Took him a little while to get the hang of it, but now it is a part of his game. Fact is, Nathan Jones is disciplined enough to target deficiencies in his game and make improvements, which is a damn big deal. As for this season, the running joke (and I know I'm not alone in this one) is asking 'so who is on the bottom of that pack?'. Nathan Jones every time. If the 'problem' in our midfield is that playersaren't going hard enough, are you saying that it is Jones' fault because everyone else is just 'letting' him have a go at it so he looks good? I really thought the Jones bashing would stop once he was a clear front runner for our Best and Fairest and contributing consistently in our most deficient area.

And going relatively unnoticed by all of us here... Bartram is having a very good game.

Worth a bump

Torture - definition. Long suffering melbourne members being seeingly compelled to go to each home game knowing full well they will walk away angry, frustrated and confused

I want to see them show some fight and not get belted. I don't expect them to win, but for f*cks sake fight it out until the end at least. We all throw our hard earned money at you every year, we come sit there in the cold and wet to watch you play, all we want in return is for you try your asses off. You are professional footballers, you get paid to do this, so leave nothing in the tank by the end and have some pride. Winning would be great, but it seems beyond this group at the moment. Just please please PLEASE fight.

Will people please understand that it is an entire ethos of a football club that Neeld is trying to change? Forget the 'pretty' victories over visiting interstate teams of the Bailey era. It was a period of soft, unaccountable football which would have seen us annihilated in finals (if we'd kept him on and somehow managed to limp in to the eight). The last time this club had a genuine fighting spirit was during the Northey era and that is what Neeld, along with modern tactical strategies, is now bringing to the club. If you think it's all going to magically click after 4 rounds of footy you're dee-luded. There were some encouraging signs against the Dogs, from some players. This will be the story of the season as Neeld works through the list to see who's got the necessary temperament and hunger to play the new "Demons" footy. Do yourselves a favour and don't get too hung up on the results this season. You'll be in for a lot more anguish if you do.

I want to see beer and lots of it.

I thought "niggling OP" was a reference to olisik, the Original Poster on this thread.

I want to see less silly errors. If we play with the hardness we showed last week and more skill and composure with the ball it will be enough to push them and keep things close. If I see that I'll be thrilled with the progress we've made.

Good post DL - I've raised this issue before when talking about our culture. In the history of our club we have been a "successful team" for one brief period - 1939-1964. This was under the leadership of Checker Hughes who as you said came from the Tigers and had to beat the Fuschias out of us to get us playing like Demons. This was carried on by Norm Smith who was tutored under Hughes and came from "the other side of the river" in Northcote. We sacked Smith for political reasons and immediately went back to our Fuschia ways. The only other period since we have had any semblance of "toughness" about us was during the Northey years, another import from Richmond who was tutored by Tommy Hafey. Other than this period (which saw us win 10 of our 12 flags) we have been quite rubbish. Compare that to most other teams except Footscray and St. Kilda (who by the way have only won one flag each) and you can see that our culture is seriously sick. Compare us to even teams like the Pies who have only won 2 flags since 1958. Even though they didn't achieve the ultimate success they did make many GF's during this period (hence the Colliwobbles) and won more than their fair share of H&A games. Do you think when Eddie says things publicly like "this isn't Melbourne where you can just walk in and take our players" it is just an off-the-cuff remark? Understanding how we are perceived by the wider football community is key to understanding how we might be able to fix our "culture". It's like addiction, the first step is admitting you have a problem. You can't choose your relatives or your football team. Like most of us we are born into this for better or worse. I will never regret barracking for the Demons but sometimes I just wish they didn't break my heart on such a consistent basis.

Whinger.

I want to see a win. Sorry for bringing the thread down with my unrealistic deluded expectations.

Kill me.

Bailey's only apparent stratagem was to 'get games into players'. At least under Neeld obvious direction can be seen. I for one would rather this than just winning a handful of games every year and hoping for players to become guns.

Ask a kid, when did the Rot set in? A: The kid thinks back, his whole life is just 19 years. Oh, the rot set in last year in Geelong. The truth as I see it is, the Rot never left us. We were the Fuscias Until Checker Hughes came from the Tigers to Coach, & said to himself, how do I get this mob to play Hard??? first step, get rid of 'Fuscias', & Bring in Demons... 2nd step, tell them to go out and play like real men,,, don't play them if they play like sooks. Harden them up. bring in some tough bastards. MY point is the Culture of 'Cushy' is inbred, into the walls of the MCC/G. We had to import toughness, but when we sack the 'King Tough Bastard', the impotence Ekes out of the walls yet again. The Rot has been going for well over a hundred years, Except for spells where we bought in some Special Hardness to Lead Us. We got Flags in a few quick spells of success, punctuated by long stints of Failure.

Perfect opportunity for Watts to play down back. Neeld hinted as much the other day too.

i've given up reading the papers and listening to footy on the radio. with so many ex-players and journalists looking for a story, the amount of pointless articles is incredible. do you think neeld and the coaching team dont know about the problems that we have? yes we have gone backwards since the sydney game, but there is a reason for it. essendon went through the same thing after they got rid of matthew knights. they were a team of downhill skiers who won very well some weeks, and got smashed others. that was the path i think we were going down. while it is incredibly frustrating at times (most of the time) watching the demons, im confident that neeld is going down the right path. our defensive side was terrible, and he has made that a focus, and it is something that will take time. fitness will play a big part in it, as will a bit of time. coming from a basketball background myself, i understand that zone defence and the structures they are trying to implement take time to learn. we have looked stupid at times this year when the opposition has a free man, and one of our guys leaves his man to to go him, only for him to kick the ball over his head to his man, and so on. this is something that will improve once our structures are better, and when players know exactly what their role is, and when to go. its not something you can put into practice overnight, so unfortunately we just have to be patient. as for people questioning trengove and grimes being appointed captains, it is 4 games into the season, give them some time. there was obviously an issue with our senior group, which neeld identified straight away. we could have gone down the same old track, and left one of them in charge, or we can make the bold decision to give it to a young guy. time will tell whether we made the right decision. i think we did, because i didnt see too much leadership from the older guys last year. and if they cant handle being overlooked for the leadership, which in part was decided by the players, then they should move on and give someone else a go.

They're not wrong. Two years ago we were beating the Swans by 100 points. Last year, slamming teams, albeit crap ones, by 10-15 goals. Now we're losing to Brisbane by 7 goals, Bulldogs by 4 goals (probably 10 if not for the "Jimmy" factor), Tigers by 10 goals. I think a certain level of accountability should certainly go onto Neeld, even if you think he doesn't deserve it. We're a pretty awful side. I think the discrepancies between uncontested possessions, tackles, inside 50s is certainly indicative of that.

I would like to see Neeld trying a few different things such as the mooted move of Watts in defence on Reiwoldt. Also want to see them holding marks and not standing off their opponents giving them free disposal...I want to see them attacking relentlessly and the forwards leading to the ball rather than just having it bombed up to them; that simply won't work with no Clark on the receiving end. The last thing I would like to see is Howe learning to lead for a mark rather than coming from behind in an effort to take a flyer every time.

We've gotta be tanking...

Although Robbo is rubbish, I hate the notion that you have to have played the game at the highest level to know anything about the game. A lot of guys who have played shitloads of games are still complete airheads.

Go Flyers!

i heard he did 3 knee reco's at once...

A more likely outcome is that it'll send a handful of Demonland members in to an absolute fit and they'll use it as a reason to pot the club, complain about us not doing our homework, tell us all about what's gone wrong for the last 40-whatever years, then start abusing other members of the forum when they are made to look stupid.

Yeah, I think that's kind of the point !!!

I thought Neeld was making big statements (Mark admitted this himself) and doing alot of the tough talk before Christmas. I was worried at the time for a few reasons. What im seeing now is coach who understanding of the club and his players. He is still a tough character and i like that he is, but i was sick of hearing about it. Maybe this is what Hells Gate was referring too? I understand that Mark is still in his 'Honeymoon' period with supporters and many will disagree and take offense to this (not sure why as its only an opinion), but in the words of Forrest Gump, Thats all i got to say bout that!!!!

Can someone correct me, i cant remember a membership launch this year. I know the slogan was put up (cant remember what it is) maybe that was the club launching it membership drive. Its sad coz i can remember the media talking about StKilda's launch with their advertisement with Siant supporters lining up on the beach. Maybe it was on Foxtel which i dont have.

Yeah I wonder if we would ever consider opening the lines of negotiations with GWS? I wonder if GWS would ever consider opening the lines of negotiations with MFC? Its all in the time-lines.

With our current membership at 34,000. I have no doubt when this team gets its act together and starts winning games, we can pull good crowds. People like the MCG. I believe the MFC has more support out there than figures suggest. 34,000+ is outstanding considering how the last 4 years have played out. And people still think we do not "buy in" Rubbish. Demons are Tough.

You're, uh... optimistic.

Its out of MFC's control. Other teams know we are committed to him so would be negligent not to make us pay for him as they are under no risk by bidding for him. I would be very surprised if we don't use one of two first round picks on an existing player. Eg Dangerfield, that would help set off the time lost in losing the development put into Scully.

Imagine Todd making the call not to take Jack with pick three. Or more to the point, being put in that position by the club. Messy. Fortunately it doesn't matter, because there's no way known we'll renege on our commitment to take Viney the younger if we ever want to be seen as a club to do business with ever again.

Thanks HG between you and Stuie we know you are among the Neeld haters. Our coach who has coached 4 games but hasn't yet turned around a culture and list that has been dishonest and underachieving for years. He is doing his bit for the club in all facets media included. I don't post alot but do read alot. Jose has recently provided a voice of reason and has rightly challenged the doubters. Its easy to sit outside and snipe at our 4 game coach from behind a keyboard. Harder to have the courage to back up and stay positive as Jose has repeatedly done. Do you really know what is going on inside the club? Just because Neeld does media that means his coaching is rubbish?

I would be blown away if we don't take midfielders with at least 3 of our first 4 picks. Absolutely we have invested too many draft choices trying to find the CHF of the century, but It's our mid field that is a shambles with holes everywhere.

Mids

Once again, every f*ing thread gets taken over by this mindless rear-view-mirror wisdom. It's the nature of drafting 17 and 18 year olds - some turn out great, some don't, some surprise, some don't, some come on quickly, some don't, some rise to the challenge, some don't, some adapt to the rigours of AFL, some don't, some get injured and never quite recover, some don't, some deal OK with leaving home, some don't, some come off the rookie list to captain clubs and be champions, some don't etc. etc., blah blah blah. Get over it. We took who we took. in any case, these guys need at least 5-6 years before any kind of assessment, and I for one don't have any problem with Cook over Darling, which was a sensible, logical choice ... AT THE TIME.

Cook is 86kg and has put on 10kg since arriving at the club.