Leaderboard

Jay Clark just reported on triple m that he will sign a new 2 year deal and will be announced this week. Personally i am wrapped that the club will continue to show faith in him. I still see him as an important member for our future going forward. I know for a fact Goodwin is a big wrap for the kid and hopefully he will be able to turn him into the player we all hope to be.

I cringed when he said Hogan "hadn't been signed by Melbourne yet." Yes he [censored] has, you moron.

Dwayne Russell has serious issues with MFC. His article in The Sunday Mail was over critical of MFC culture and recent history and he went as far as suggesting that Roos is wasting his time. Whilst our long term on field mediocrity may support his opinon, he failed to acknowledge that at least MFC is taking positive action by engaging the best credentialed and available coach along with the best available administration. His commentary today was B grade at best. He was over critical of Melb players and credited good moments for the Melb players to Freo taking it easy. His opinions are very rich for a guy who was part of a team who earned the label of "The Handbags" and for a bloke who was as soft as butter in 1984 SANFL GF when he was playing for a team that was supposed to be invincible only to be beaten by a team which came from 5th. Russell is an absolute [censored] with no credentials!

Pleased the club has backed him. I'll admit that a small to medium part of the reason I want him to make it is just to spite all the "supporters" who have pilloried him endlessly.

Was renamed as 'Southern cross'

I'd much rather have Jimmy on the list then someone like RO bail, if Jimmy plays anything like he did in the game against the saints consistently, look out. he has it in him

Criticizes OP for only listing one out. Only lists one out.

ANGRY by The Oracle Spring is just around the corner and it's rather inspirational that the Demons have the opportunity this year to contest a game in September. It won't be a final but next week's "home" game at Etihad Stadium against the Giants will provide them with the opportunity to prove that the events of the month since their last win against Collingwood hasn't been an aberration. Against Fremantle at Domain Stadium in Perth, the recurring nightmare of the month duly eventuated after the team which was instructed to play angry managed to make its supporters (who are the cause of all their problems after all) really angry by conceding the first 10 goals of the game to lead by 60 points when the second quarter was a little more than ten minutes old. Jeff Garlett kicked their first goal at the mid point in that term and Melbourne came back a little to have four goals on the board by half time. By then, it had lost skipper Nathan Jones to an ankle injury which soured his 200th game and second ruckman Jake Spencer had followed him when a head knock caused him concussion leaving the team one short for the remainder of proceedings. In the normal course that would be a major issue in a game of football but, in this instance, it was offset by the circumstance that Fremantle was assured of top position going into the finals (meaning they're unlikely to have to front up to Hawthorn in a fortnight's time) and they let the intensity drop off dramatically. As a result, the Demons were able to stumble and fumble their way to an even par finish for the rest of a game that had long been rendered meaningless. Indeed, had they managed to hold on in the final ten minutes and avoided conceding the last three goals when the fatigue had really set in, they might have even won the second half and added a false aura of respectability to the outcome. As it was, the 54 point defeat was a positively better result than some of the hidings handed out to the competition's other lesser lights and when you consider that there a difference of 1352 in games played between the two sides and Melbourne had 10 players on the ground who had played less than 50 games including promising Oscar McDonald in his first, you have your answer - it's not not negativity but rather, a lack of experience and know how, particularly when you're another 200 games down when your skipper gets subbed out. More so, when you consider that the club rested two of its promising youngsters in Angus Brayshaw and James Harmes and there's a fair whack of other good players missing from the mix. In those circumstances, the Demons would be encouraged that some of their better players were their youth. You couldn't go past the 30 possession game of Jack Viney (with 12 tackles and six clearances) and the hard work in the ruck of Max Gawn agains one of the AFL's maestros or the run of Christian Salem. Daniel Cross had a standout 39 touches and worked his butt off belying his age. Unfortunately, the depth just wasn't there and the bottom half dozen weren't good or interested enough for this standard and consequently might be angry at themselves in a month or two's time when they're told their truth that their AFL careers are over. Melbourne 0.1.1 4.2.26 6.5.41 8.6.54 Fremantle 5.1.31 11.3.69 14.5.89 17.6.108 Goals Melbourne Garlett Hogan 2 Gawn Grimes Vince Watts Fremantle Pavlich Pearce 3 De Boer Neale 2 Barlow Hill Ibbotson Mayne Mzungu Sandilands Sheridan Best MelbourneCross Viney Salem Dunn Gawn Vince Fremantle Mundy Neale Barlow Hill Suban D Pearce Changes Melbourne Nil Fremantle , M Walters (calf) replaced in selected side by P Duffield Injuries Melbourne N Jones (ankle) J Spencer (head) Fremantle C Sutcliffe (shoulder) Substitutions Melbourne N Jones (ankle) replaced by J Grimes in the second quarter Fremantle M Pavlich replaced by P Duffield in the third quarter Reports Melbourne Nil Fremantle Nil Umpires Dean Margetts Luke Farmer Nick Brown Official Crowd 33,529 at Domain Stadium s ...

He got kneed majorly in the head and incredulously got a free kick against. I'm still shaking my head in disbelief.

Sadly, Michie and Newton can't run. Big ground exacerbated the issue. Riley has always been my favourite of the three but his engine is also a concern. I'm a little confused by the Footy Dept thinking here. ANB, Stretch and Brayshaw, however, know how to cover the ground and will all make it. They all crack in, all use it pretty well and have superior engines to the recycled trio above. We've been burnt before but I'd be putting my faith in the draft again as opposed to looking for recycled second and third year mids who are currently outside the best 22 of their respective teams.

Gawn was excellent. 30 hitouts against Sandi, 10 marks and a heap of the ball and most importantly looked like he ran the game out well in the last quarter without Spencer to help him out in hot conditions. Max is going to be a huge asset going forward.

I like it. Roos and Goodwin backing him in. Stick it up the haters Toump!

Who cares, the man's a champion.

Im on the opposite end of the spectrum here. I believe the club has given him adequate time to show something, anything... and he has yet to do that. Not good enough for mine. A costly draft pick and now even costlier hanging onto him hoping that he will become something.

I genuinely believe this was the smartest and most logical thing for us to do with a player like the Toump. Firstly, we'll be getting rid of 5-6 genuine battlers. Players who literally do not possess the required fundemental skills to play the game. Toumpas actually possesses the fundemental skills of the game. He is a great kick with great vision and decision making skills. What he's not great at yet is having a sense of confidence in himself or in the way that he plays which effects things like his decision making etc. If we were to put him on the trade table, we'd be getting not much back obviously because he hasn't shown what he's capable of. Another second/third-round draft pick is not what we need. We need to cull the genuine dirt and crap. We need to bring in some ready made talent as well as some experience through trades and we need to nail the drafts again. Both national and rookie. Toumpas is still a [censored] kid. Getting rid of him now actually doesn't make any sense from an MFC list standpoint. I'm not saying that he will definitely make it. But I believe he has more hope of making it than a host of others who are just down-right below the grade. Let's see what another pre-season with Macca does for him. He has the skills. He needs the mind for it. That's all.

That's a scary thought.

Could have been worse

Jack Viney is a 21 year old midfielder who is getting better every week. His disposal is improving and he was fantastic (again) today: 30 disposals and 13 tackles. It is a joy watching him play.

I just had the displeasure of reading his article, I really wish I hadn't. "The tanking affair killed off much goodwill and destroyed the reputations of many, and the MCG statue of icon turned president Jim Stynes stands as another subliminal reminder of how uneasy that ended." What a disgusting human being. I'm angry now.

Take away the first quarter and we were less raped by umpires and Fremantle didn't try.

Take away the first qtr and i thought we had a genuine crack. Especially considering we had only 2 on the bench after half time. Its our simple skill errors that continue to kill us..

Remember when watching footy was enjoyable?

That means 19 have touched the ball! POSITIVITY!

Roos doesn't understand the sub. Pointless having Grimes as the sub.

Im backing Brendan Mcartney to take him under his wing this summer and develop him into a great player.

But how will Fremantle go?

Don't want Kent back. No point even risking him, just get him cherry ripe for pre-season.

a bit disappointed in the criticism of Viney the guy is usually at the bottom of a pack shovelling the ball out TOWARDS our goals as best he can without a lot of support and usually under a lot of pressure from opposition players. His attack on the ball and tackling of opposition players is first class, he will get better with time.

I don't have the energy anymore to respond to the Grimes haters. Grimes has 9 of the 10 qualities required to be universally accepted as a legend of the club. Those that continually criticise his inclusion are not capable of helpful analysis.

Geez, cannot believe some of you are satisfied with that loss! We were putrid and Freo weren't much better. If they had of been on their game and actually tried after quarter time it would've been a real belting. Accepting mediocrity is something I don't do, we just have to keep turning over the list until we get what we want. One of the worst games I've watched all year, by both sides. We chase the man and never hunt the ball every week, skills are deplorable.

NQR? He's played 10 games!

Correct, Fremantle could have put the foot down.

"That was almost holding the ball.." Dwayne Russell, you're an idiot.

50-1, with our only score coming from a rushed behind. So this performance, giving Carltank a 10 goal start, getting thumped by the Dogs, putting in a 2 quarter effort against the Kangas, and Roos has the gall to call the supporters negative. FMD. I wonder why we are negative a lot of the time you [censored] muppet! Maybe if your coaching strategy gave us something to be positive about we might change our view. "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results" - Albert Einstein. Might want to look in to that Roosy, you narcissistic egomaniac.

Had it on a string mate.

I'll make a massive call here, Jesse Hogan is the most important person to the MFC in terms of retaining that I've seen in my time, we want out of the nightmare, it starts with locking him up long term, Brayshaw, Salem, Petracca and co will develop into a good midfield but Hogan is the type of player that wins you premierships.

I like this. It'll be on low cash so hopefully people don't start sooking about it. The kid has talent but has had a horror run with luck (injuries. sickness, terrible coaching first up), and I really believe he could be a slow burner for us. It's also recognition of how important development is and that the club is backing itself to get it right.

He showed glimpses this year that, when he runs hard and makes space, he can be an effective midfielder. If this report is true, I'll admit I'm a little surprised that those glimpses have been enough to get not just one year, but two. However, I like the move, I like that we're showing faith in someone who needs the confidence, and I like that it's happening before the end of the year. Sew it up, move on, deal with whoever is next to deal with. I know there will be plenty who disagree, plenty who either are hanging onto a grudge, or who see Stringer/Wines/Macrae/anyone else from that draft and get upset, so for their sake I really do hope something clicks and we see the kind of form he displayed against the Dogs, Collingwood and St Kilda in the middle of the year become the norm for him.

Getting a deal done before the new TV deal landscape changes is the perfect time to do it because a huge pay day will be immediately alleviated when the cap goes up. It will move from $10.2 to at least $13m or $14m over one or two years I think, especially if the AFLPA get a percentage share that they gag for. So suddenly Hogan at $1m a year over 5 years goes from 10% of the cap to nearly half that as the cap progressively increases. One thing to note - I think that the TV money will mean that all players get more money but the largest increases will be for the ~50 best and most important players.

For a rebuilding club which has deemed it necessary to apologise for its poor treatment of older players (James McDonald), and is trying to put those bad old years where they belong, this should not even be a subject for debate. Jamar has earned the right to be treated with respect, and we need to show him that.

I'm inspired by the ministrations of Positive Peter and his preview of the penultimate game of the season. I just hope the players follow suit and take note of how the supporters of the club have rallied with enough auras of positivity to stretch across the Nullarbor following coach Paul Roos' comments about how we were causing the players to drop marks, miskick the footy and handball poorly. Never again. I'm confident of a big day today.

So you'd sell the house for a midfielder, of which there are many in the league and are far easier to develop and mould into stars, but you wouldn't for a once-in-a-generation forward that already has the awareness and competitiveness of a 10-year player?

It's going to be greasy conditions with the odd shower of rain passing through. Can't see it being completely dried out before this arvo. Expect a scrappy, low scoring game.

Freo will play in second gear and win hy 80-90 points.

We've got this one. Recently we haven't remembered to start playing till about 4pm in Melbourne. But that is 2pm in WA so we'll be ready to go when the match starts today.

Doubt it will be a thrashing partly because of our collective positive thoughts and partly because Freo want no injuries. They will get a big lead, put the cue in the rack and preserve older/key players on the bench. Effort, respect for the Captain's 200 and play it out to the end are not negotiable today.

We simply don't have the cattle. But, I'd like to see an effort akin to Essendon's last night....make Freo work hard for their impending win.

Hasn't hurt Hawthorn I agree that Carey is not the answer. He's far too old

It's just a stupid thing to say - why would you question his future level of effort based on absolutely nothing, and even if your point has some merit, what are you actually suggesting we do? Sit him down for some sort of psychological analysis or make him pinky swear..or what? Obviosuly the bloke is in a position to command a huge pay packet and if we want to keep him we will have to match it - I just don't get why you are inventing some sort of concern about him not putting in after he signs, just a thing you made up to throw in the mix for some reason

Will go on to be our second 300 gamer and a club great.