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http://www.melbournefc.com.au/news/2016-09-02/iselect-join-as-major-sponsor-of-womens-team Great news for the Club generally and the women's team in particular. Their logo will be on front and back of jumper. Peter Jackson: "It’s a great endorsement of the Melbourne Football Club and our pioneering efforts in helping to establish women’s football at the elite level. It also shows great foresight by iSelect, who in their own field are a pioneering company, to see the value and future potential of the National Women’s League." Great for the club to be the first (I think) to have a sponsor for the Women's Team. While previous administrations talked about our history as pioneers of the game PJ is creating a whole new pioneering history. He never fails to amaze and deliver. Thank God, we have him.

Flogging a dead horse here don't you think

never seen someone make so much money for not playing footy

By a mile. I think we laughed off the Varcoe offer. He'd be pretty valuable for us.

why not? there is still 14 clubs he hasn't burnt

No.

This is a pretty [censored] poor thread. I was not a Mark Neeld fan but to start a thread purely to [censored] kick him is [censored] weak. Mark Neeld has moved on and so have we. Paul Roos was right all along with the negative veil that supporters still carry.

A 28 year old Liam Jurrah wouldn't hurt either...

Pre injury he was an absolute gun. We forget how good he was for us before everything went to [censored]. Another one in a long list of epic list failures for us.

Agree, Collingwood winners by a mile - Varcoe would be very good for us.

Would prefer Sanderson as he has had a successful working relationship with McCartney in the past....

Lots of us! And, all the players who are unlikely or are 50/50 to be re-contracted by MFC, would be keen to impress our coaches and other club recruiters to get a chance at a contract elsewhere.

Seriously? Petracca has freakish talent with his vision and can spear the ball and kick with great penetration, but he's far from a good kick and no where close to Watts or someone like Hartlett. Petracca drops the ball from too high and thumps it using his burly frame, it doesn't compare to someone like Hartlett (or Watts or Salem) who have pure kicking actions. He needs a big preseason working on his kicking technique and composure to improve his disposal. And his set shot kicking is atrocious, his action doesn't stand up under pressure.

Stab you in the other eye for putting this post up....lol

Yep, at the time it was great a move. And he delivered on more than what we thought he was capable of when he actually did play. I loved watching him play in the red and blue, even if it was only a handful of games. Really disappointing end to story though unfortunately.

After an elongated period he failed to measure up.

Freo dodged a bullet. Geelong gave up Varcoe who wanted out anyway. We gave up pick 12 for a bloke getting mega money and only playing 15 games in 3 seasons. Pretty sure we were hit by the bullet

Hopefully that helps them out with getting health insurance...

They haven't done a lot of losing this year, I doubt they're interested in starting now. I don't think the woes of dropping games we've seen in the Melbourne team applies to Casey. This is a solid team full of players who excel at this level, who will be choc full of confidence, have momentum, and will be hungry. It's only a danger game in the sense that every final is a danger game.

Might be able to help here, it won't be Pedo.

Just a class act. Of all the current coaches and folks involved in AFL footy, I can't think of anyone that comes close. We were fortunate that he spent 3 years of his life at the Demons. His gave us everything that we did not have. And I have no doubt sustained success is to come. Thanks Paul for everything.

Martin and Clark only played together in round 1 in 2012. Martin did not get another game until round 15 after Clark got his bad foot injury in round 14 and missed the rest of the season. Martin played 7 games after Clark got injured. Martin was traded out at end of season whilst Clark remained. And we all know the rumours.

Really, some of the pick positioning and players gained have been a success. Oliver/Weiderman, Tyson/Salem on top of Brayshaw/Petracca, plus Vince, Cross and Frost, I think Roos and co have fished pretty well over the past three years.

They'd need to give something else up. Harlett is not worth Pick 6, he's worth a mid to late 1st Rounder. That's why I said if we were to trade our 2017 1st Round Pick for a 2016 Pick it would need to be for a 1st Rounder plus something else. For example our 2017 1st Round Pick goes to GWS for Pick 17 (they currently have from Geelong) & Hoskin-Elliott. We then trade 17 & Nibbler to Port for Harlett.

Hindsight is easy for everyone, but you can't help think that Clark's demise at Geelong was fairly predicable, given his track record. Nice to see the cosy sanctimonious cats get it wrong. Second hand players are so often a liability and fail to produce anything more than their past records suggest. That's why I am always dubious about these guys particularly those that come with injury or behavioural problems. You can sometimes get lucky (Vince) but more often than not they do not bring much to a new club (Dawes/H).

No, ANB has close to no value. He was a pick in the 40s and has not shown much in 2 years in the system.

Seriously? Watts is arguably the best kick in the league.

Could we try and get inventive and do something like trade our 2017 is Round Pick to Gold Coast or GWS for one of their many 1st Round Picks this year? That could then allow us to on-trade it to Port of Hartlett selects us.

I've heard it all now. So I'm expecting to see in the team selections on Thursday night Out: Hogan (Broken Heart). Football clubs have all the support mechanisms to assist a player in this situation. Most footballers would seek solace by playing football or being around their football mates.

Choco was "development coach" at Richmond. How did that work out?

Didn't they win three on the trot a dozen or so years ago?? Sheeit how long since we have been successful?? Give me a break!! NO HANDOUTS BRISVEGAS!

One reason Clarko is a genius is because he's trained up a fleet of flexible players whilst also creating a lot of set roles and patterns of play that disguise limitations of players. Puopolo, Breust, McEvoy, Frawley, there's plenty who have simple jobs and excel at parts of the game plan. Vickery is 26 so he's young enough to find a bit of improvement, young enough to find a bit in the body whilst old enough to have AFL fitness under his belt. He's 200cm so he can pinch hit in the ruck. He's big and strong enough to attack the ball as a deep forward. He'll do all of that and with better training, fitness, standards etc he'll probably do it well. Most importantly he's a free agent so if the compo is right and Richmond don't match he'll be free! That means the Hawks can spend big on Mitchell or O'Meara and don't have to worry about replacing Roughy or Ceglar for the year. The Hawks since about 2010 have been the masters of spending big on blue chip prospects and finding what they need elsewhere for budget price. That's where Vickery fits.

I don't see the point in being petty over this. Give them Pick 1 if need be. Any club is more deserving of it than Essendon.

Just got word that Declan Keilty has been invited to the VFL Best & Fairest vote count night

14 marks (5 contested) in round 22 seems to account to nothing. Prior to this weekend Riewoldt's record was 18 marks. But at least Schwarz is saying Hogan should take a leaf out of Hawkin's book. It only took Hawkins 6 seasons to have a breakout year and 69 games to reach Hogan's tally of 85.

Would be a good get. Very experienced and well respected assistant coach. We do need someone to replace Simon Goodwin as an assistant coach so hopefully he's in the mix.

didn't we get burnt before by one of these internet-based service brokering pop-ups? presume pj did his due diligence

He has been shifted around and used in a variety of roles but he is a natural midfielder/half-forward. He is gun. Just incredibly injury prone. What is your definition of one-sided? From what I've seen he is very dual-sided. Can kick very well on both sides.

Noticed thisin the sliding doors comments re: Port. Something very, very strange going on with Hamish Hartlett. http://www.afl.com.au/news/2016-09-02/sliding-doors-bye-week-2016-afl We should go for him IMO. 2017 1st Round Pick with something else coming back. Outside mid with pace who can kick a mile. I remember there was rumor we were close to getting him last year. Exactly the type of player we need. Just turned 26 and a good outside mid who's avereaged over 20 touches the last 4 years till this year. Thoughts?

Is this the same AFL who granted us the same compensation for Tom Scully that Geelong got for Gary Ablett as well as pick 3 for James Frawley (who most here didn't rate anyway and most in the industry saw as gross overcompensation)? The same AFL that rid our club of incompetent administrators and football department personnel, paid out their contracts some of which had been recently extended despite the outcome from a tanking investigation still to be handed down, who put in a first class CEO, oversaw the appointment of a vastly improved Board and didn't impose draft penalties despite being found guilty of bringing the game into disrepute? The same AFL who guaranteed our overdraft and gave our club funds in 2003 to help pay a tax bill (amongst other things) that had been hidden in the bottom draw of a desk when we were one step from insolvency? Is this the same AFL who has negotiated massive media rights deals that has subsequently provided poorer clubs with enough money to compete? And you criticise them for not ridding us of Essendon which would most likely put the media rights deal at risk and as a result the survival of poorer clubs through lack of funding. Fancy the AFL wanting to help Brisbane become a competitive team which would do nothing but help the entire competition by giving them a priority pick which would grant them one player and push us from pick 40 something to 40 something plus 1 (assuming Hibbert costs our second round pick). Gosh, what incompetence. Yep, we've been screwed, we deserve more because as a club over the last 10+ years we've been such a beacon of competence and success. You should be careful what you wish for Sue because heaven help us if we got it.

Heard many here say she's soft on Richmond stories. I don't think so.

WCE fans are not nervous when he is about to dispose of the ball

I think that sums him up very well. Like it or not he's got Melbourne in his heart along side Fitzroy and Sydney (understandably Sydney probably occupies more space). When he was asked about the last round it did upset me because you can tell it hurt him, but I think what upset me the most is he's annoyed with himself about it, that he failed. Definitely didn't deserve to bow out after his worst ever loss. But a very good interview from Mike, Roos was pretty honest and measured with his responses (wouldn't expect anything less from him). For me the most interesting part was him talking about his time as captain at Fitzroy and how he was put in a difficult position with players and match payments. I get the feeling that a few Melbourne captains have lived through that as well.

MAXY GAAAAWWWWNNNNN!!!!! All Australian ruckman!

I understand exactly what you're saying but fortunately the decisions at MFC these days aren't being made by group-think. The cards-close-to-chest secret inner workings of modern day MFC is exactly the way it should be. As for Mitchell I rate him highly- he's an absolute gun and the list would automatically be better having him on it. But to pry him from Sydney and also outbid all the other interested clubs would certainly cost big. Very very big. Unless he's in love with the club or Goodwin or something else MFC related, I struggle to see how an equitable deal can be done to get him here.

I love the bloke.

Looks like most are playing. Pederson not

Melbourne's 2013 season: 2 wins, 20 losses, percentage 54.1%..... PRIORITY PICK REJECTED Brisbane's 2016 season: 3 wins, 19 losses, percentage 61.1%..... PRIORITY PICK ??