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McDevitt from ASADA was angered by Hird’s repeated debasing of the joint ASADA and AFL investigation into the program that ran at Windy Hill in 2012. He said the departed coach needed to accept responsibility. “He has repeatedly referred to this as the ASADA scandal and did again today. Don’t blame ASADA for doing its job. Blame him and others for not doing theirs,” McDevitt said. “This is not the ASADA scandal. It is the Essendon scandal and will go down in history as such.” Snap

Gotta get it to use it. I'm an unashamed McDonald fan. I've got to confess I left Etihad at half time on Sunday as I was the guest of a Bulldogs supporter who was giving me the shytes with his sanctimonious editorial of the game. Better to miss a half than lose a friend. On the train on the way home I read the game day thread on DL where McDonald was being derided. I thought to myself "what about the backline players that weren't getting the ball, weren't in the contest and weren't contributing at all". Not much comment on them. McDonald turns it over at times but the net benefit of him getting the ball far outweigh his turnovers. We are a poor team because we don't have a lot of natural ball magnets. Getting the ball is the best trick in footy. And from the AFL site: One percenters: Tom McDonald (139) AFL rank (second): McDonald's concentration and effort is never questioned. Apart from a flat patch in the middle of the season, he has been very good at putting constant pressure on opponents. - See more at: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-08-19/team-first-gems#sthash.iHFNZbN7.dpuf

Paul Roos is perfect for our club because he doesn't panic. He isn't in a position where he needs to. He knows that he isn't going to be our next premiership coach and is, instead, trying to instill in this club that requirements that will one day get us there. So much of the club was rotten in the past and now Roos has, generally, changed much of that and we are in a far better position than we were 2,3,4,5 years ago. Imagine if we had missed out on Roos and gotten an unproven coach who couldn't turn us around? Imagine if we hadn't been able to lure guys like Vince and Cross to the club and had instead merely invested in youth and only won 2-3 games again? I don't think we would be able to survive all of that. The losses on the weekend hurt now because we KNOW we are capable of better. But this team is still going through the learning phase and thankfully Roos isn't straying from the course he has set us on. By the time Goodwin takes over he will inherit a team and a club that is truly beginning to thrive again in the industry. Roos will have well and truly done his job.

Lynch is 4th on the Adelaide goalkicking with 25 behind Betts, Walker and Jenkins. He also has 25 goal assists. Vince and Dawes are equal 3rd our goalkicking list with a grand total of 10 each. Yeah, your right. Lynch is superfluous to our needs.

I'm of the view that if we trade players with AFL first 22 qualifications we should use them as garnish with early picks for very good players. Otherwise they stay. IMO we are now past trying to pick players like Michie, Riley and Newton as we have enough depth to back our own. If we are going to trade Watts and Howe they should be bundled with our first round pick for someone like Prestia. Trading Watts for (say) pick 25 would be just so dumb. We don't need youth, we need players who can play and we don't need species like those above.

At some point those that have said; "if Watts doesn't show anything then he should be traded/delisted," should surely accept that he has shown that he can produce football worthy of his spot in a good team? We have had all these projects in the past that have never delivered and here we are with one that might finally do so and we want to go back to square one. We are not going to trade Watts for his worth to us in our 22. We just won't find a partner will to part with anything worth our while.

To point out the obvious, 'questions do not need to be asked' because unlike 99% of coaching arrangements, this one already has a use-by date that is set in stone. There is no question of 'should we or should we not keep Roos?' he is already going to be replaced b Goodwin in just over a year. Unless you are an absolute moron that is campaigning for him to be replaced now, this whole discussion is moot. Even at the end of 2016 we won't really know the Roos effect, it will be revealed years later.

To quote Pavarotti: " I'm sitting on the toilet reading your article - it will soon be behind me."

That's the first Robbo article I've read in its entirety for years. Holy hell, primary school children have a stronger grasp of prose. There's no cohesion nor structure to anything he writes, just an inexhaustible mess of thought bubbles pervaded by his subservient bias. His wailing and woe is more reminiscent of a petulant child demanding ice-cream than a professional journalist demanding respect. This makes him a perfect fit for the glorified toilet paper known as the Herald Sun.

Hypothetical: A large European club, lets say Bayern Munich, decides it needs an edge on its competition. The coach organises people to run the program. Those people bring in all the drugs on the quiet and run them through a chemist so it looks legit. They ask the players to sign consent forms. The club has heaps of money so it can just lawyer up if anyone tries to investigate. How do the lawmakers get around this? To make the individual players responsible for what goes into their body. Obviously the club and players should be punished in this scenario. It is the exact reason the laws were written this way. Essendon has obviously done exactly this and all and sundry should be given maximum penalties

Coming in he was compared mainly to Colin Sylvia. The prosecution rests.

Oh Stuie... that's just embarrassing. Try, please, to be something more than just smugly superior all the bloody time.

Saw him on 360 last night he said much the same as that article. At times he was almost incoherent. My impression ( hardly new ) is that he is hopelessly conflicted on the subject of Hird. He is simply a fan boy who cannot see the forest for the trees. Whatever credit I thought he may have left disappeared for me. MM treated him with disdain years ago. He was correct.

"Since this wretched affair began in February 2013" For God's sake Robbo the "wretched affair" began when the Dank was hired and the supplement regime began.

Which means he copped an 18 week hamstring. Only at Melbourne.

Pure comedy gold. I assume the irony is unintentional but if not well played. Oh and you have no clue where I sit on the political spectrum. Though it is clearly important for you to be able to pigeon hole people. Perhaps it helps you to understand the world. If its all the same to you, when I feel like commenting on one of your posts i will. Don't feel the need to reply though. That would feel too much like a conversation

Yyyyaaaaaawwwwwwnnnnnnnnn......

Perhaps we don't all see the world in a binary left - right paradigm. A paradigm that completely fails to take into account the modern political reality of centrist labor and Democratic governments. But by all means carry on with an out dated world view.

Still cant believe Hird said in his presser that David Zaharaskis is soft at the contest. Sure he was attempting to be lighthearted, but the bottom line is that he has shown terrible judgement at every turn. Incredible thing to say at any time, never mind at the press conference announcing you've been sacked in disgrace.

I'd happily trade Watts. He's the poster boy for this clubs years of ineptitude. It would almost provide "clean air" as we move forward. Will it happen ? No. Supporters carry on about his skill and decision making etc, but it's vastly overrated. His total package is "ordinary".

I could well be wrong, but Matt Suckling strikes me as a player who looks much better in a good side that can get him the ball. I'm not sure a player of his type would fit at a lower club right now. His kicking is excellent but he needs to have a system that not only gets him the ball but gives him time to use it.

Surprisingly, Demonland is a great (oxymoron) bastion of leftism.

Very popular with the player group and coaching fraternity like his skill set! And Yep, count me as a fan! Although I must say he does frustrate on occasion! Has shown definite improvement this year ,without a doubt!

Why does there even need to be 15 pages of discussion about a player we have discussed for 1000 pages since he was drafted? I'm surprised there is anything left to discuss.

Nothing.

The only Essendon player I'd go near is Zaharakis- clean from the drug saga and quick Plus one less player to have destroy us every single time we play Essendon

Had to laugh at Slobbo's article today where he said James was going to be sacked after the EFC B&F.... He and others from the club pilloried Caroline Wilson over her article that said the same thing.... Their head is so far up the club they can't see the sunshine....

Deluded to the end: HS byline "I'm a good coach and proud of my record". On that basis he will surely recommend Neald to follow him. And.....to my family etc I am truly sorry for (expecting from anyone other than psychopath 'what I have put you through') what you have had to endure. No word of contrition - all said with absolute absence of insight, like the true psychopath he has shown himself to be

Guilty as charged.

So this just means Cafe owners, Restaurants and Butchers IN THE SUBURBS & COUNTRY will have a great day whilst the City Business' have a 4 day week And me as a punter pays $5 for a coffee rather than $4 What's the big deal?

Bad idea. As a teacher, I'm already on holidays.

The Hand of Murdoch is already at work. Hands up anyone who thinks he hasn't loaded this deal with restrictive, one-sided and punitive conditions. Think of it as the AFL's "free trade agreement" with News. The NRL fans are glad to see the back of him. He did no favours to them while he was in bed with NRL. We may come to rue the 18th of August.

To campaign for his removal is essentially to campaign for the death of the club. The destabilization of the club this would cause would be insurmountable, We knew this (or should have) when he was signed and the plan was put in place. We only had one more chance to get it right, whoever we chose we had to go the long haul with, there is no changing our minds now.

McDevitt is a legend

It's of no advantage to hard working schoolteachers who deserve an extra day or three off.

I find at times he is almost coherent.

Absolutely! I mean look at how few people head into Melbourne on Labor Day, Queens Birthday, Cup Day. I swear i've seen tumble weeds down Bourke Street....I'm convinced after only two men and a dog turn up to the parade the Victorian Government will resign out of shame and never compete an election again.....

Wow. You can't polish a hird but you can certainly cover it in lots of sticky vanilla icing.

Whenever he decides he wants more cashola.

"Smart labour..."That's your oxymoron right there Pro.

Which only shows that you're biassed and don't recognise how deplorable your side of politics has been. They are the greatest wasters of public money in history. Be proud.

replacing crap, with poo. Isn't that how we got into this goddamn mess?

Would be disappointed recruiting Melksham as it would feel like treading water, but he must be a tiny step ahead of having to select Bail or Matt Jones.

You just don't get. You probably get 4 weeks paid annual leave and paid sick days, and you want additional days off. Small Business Owners are lucky to get a week off a year, and casual workers can't afford to lose shifts, like I will because of this inane holiday. BTW, our business isn't price based, so your theory is redundant.

Why rest Gus now? He's got plenty of time to have a break.....in 3 weeks' time.

Below is an e-mail I sent a St Kilda supporting colleague of mine who's been having a go at me for several weeks now about Melbourne's lack of improvement under Roos. This is my response to those claims and anyothers out there: Alright so you've been stirring the pot for the best part of the second half of this season now Nixon, Every time there's a bad loss, which admittedly, there's been more then I'd like, all I hear is how big a fraud Paul Roos is and the lack of improvement or slow progress of that has been shown since he came in at the end of the 2013 season. So it got me thinking to myself if there has been enough improvement when taking into account what he took over and how far back the team is coming from compared to any other team we've seen in the competition. So I decided to do some research last night to get an idea on how the team is tracking compared to other teams. First I haven't included Gold Coast or GWS for obvious reasons, and comparing them to Fitzroy also isn't a proper indication, given what went on in their final years. So my first task outside those three teams was to find the last team to have a 2-20 or worse season with a percentage of 54.07% or worse. Last team to go 2-20 in a year was Fremantle in 2001, however they had a much more respectable and competitive percentage of 72.02%, so they weren't coming back from as far as the rabble that was Melbourne 2013. I then noticed that a team I'm not taking into consideration, Fitzroy had a more competitive 2nd last season (1995) then Melbourne did in 2013. The Lions went 2-20 with a percentage of 58.17%, so again this helps get an idea of where the Demons were at. But finally my search came to an end when I came to the 1993 season that saw the Sydney Swans (mind you only a 20 game season) go 1-19. They had a more healthy percentage still of 63.32%, but given they had less wins, I decided this was the best team to compare Melbourne of 2013 to. Now the man who was responsible for the Swans rebuild was the great Ron Barassi, arguably one of the 5 greatest coaches the game has ever known, so there were some interesting comparisons to make. SYDNEY 1993, Barassi's 1st year go 1-19 @ 63.32% 1994, Barassi's 2nd year go 4-18 @ 78.07 (Percentage jump of about 15) 1995, Barssi's 3rd & final year go 8-14 @ 100.65% (Arrival of Plugger, percentage jump of about 22, doubled wins) MELBOURNE 2013 Year before Roos comes in go 2-20 @ 54.07% 2014 Roos 1st year go 4-18 @ 68.37% (Percentage jump of about 14) 2015 Roos 2nd year currently 6-13 @ 76.40% - Games v Carlton & GWS in Melbourne to come. (Arrival of Hogan, current percentage jump of about 8, potential double wins.) Now I'm not saying that Roos will have Melbourne playing in a Grand Final next year to mirror Sydney of 1996, but the fact is no coach has tried to bring a team back from as far behind as Roos is with Melbourne for 20 years. And when you compare how Melbourne is tracking with Sydney of 20 years ago, they're going along reasonably well. The percentage jumps haven't been as high, but Melbourne's percentage was further back then Sydney's to begin with. The main point being that to say another coach would be doing just as well as Roos is flawed, given the last coach to do something similar was Barassi. Sure it would be nice to be at a stage where we could coast along and underachieve like some other clubs have over the last 10 years when they should have been winning Grand Finals, but we're still getting back to a position to where we can even underachieve. The administration during the Bailey era and then the appointment of Neeld has cost this club a good 5 years +. We're only just getting back to where we were positioned probably about the end of the 2009, 2010 season. While the win column keeps ticking up and the percentage keeps ticking up I'm satisfied with the improvement, despite the odd horror performance post the Darwin game as happens every year. But with a young midfield (Viney, Brayshaw, Petracca, Salem, Tyson, Neal-Bullen, Stretch) and spine (Hogan, Gawn, McDonald) at our disposal, I'm as optimistic as I've been since about 2004 that the future's looking alright . Just need some outside run! Anyway that's where it's at for me. Everyone entitled to their opinion. But while the wins and percentage tick upwards, then the improvement's there. The goal for 2016 should be for finals. 10 wins as a minimum.

I've just gone through some of his highlights this year. 39 goals (with three games to go) from a key forward in his first year is an incredible feat. I love that after he kicks a goal in most cases, he acknowledges the player who delivered it to him.

Watts was the number one pick of virtually every club in the draft that year. Ironically, not West Coast who would've taken Nik Nat at number one. Gubby Allan told me that. To my face. Not to some sister's best friend's cousin's pet guinea pig.