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So with the big Spencil coming in for our 12 week Maxless challenge. I thought I'd look into his 11 assignments (11?! yes 11, there is a bye in there). I'm interested to see how he goes against some of the more "battler" type ruckmen. Although, going though this makes me realise, If there had to be any time of year for max to go down, this was the one you would say is the best for us. Particularly when you look at the run home, but we'll get to that later. For now, here's Spencil's fixture: Freo (H) - Sandilands So, straight in the deep end for Jake. Sandilands is as big as the come and has been one of the best for years. As good as Max is we wouldnt even be sure that we would get any advantage with him playing. The best we can hope for is Jake nullifying Sandy much the same as the likes of Hickey were able to nullifying Max last year. Rich (A) - Nankervis I'm pretty big on Nankervis, I think he will one day be a star ruckman. That said, he isnt one yet. For now he is a solid competitor who shows glimpses of talent. Spencil should have nankervis covered 8/9 times out of 10 but if he has a day out Nankervis could quickly become a handfull. Ess (A) - Leuenberger/McKernan/Bellchambers? Mckernan has been showing some good signs this year, particulary around the ground so Jake would have his hands full after the initial contest. However I think in the ruck itself Spencer should be fine to draw even against any of these guys. Haw (H) - McEvoy/Vickery Well I think we can agree Jake has Vickery covered. McEvoy is a bigger challenge. Hitouts I think Spence can get himself his fair share, but I don't know if he will be able to get many that are particularly meaningful. Much like the Essendon guys i think Spencer will draw even. Adel (A) - Jacobs Jacobs is a huge challenge. Probably beyond what Spencil will be able to handle. I'd love to be wrong but the lack of max plus it being at adelaide oval against what could still be an undefeated Adelaide (their fixture is easier than ours)... it could be a really tough day for us. North (H) - Goldy/Pruess Strange things going on at North. Pruess is playing as the Nr 1 ruck.. and doing well. Who knows how long it will last but once again Spencer will have his hands full here.. could be another tough day but we should be good enough to get over the line even without control in the ruck. Suns (H) - Witts Witts is an interesting one, Spencer's story could be similar to his in 12 months time, He has been in the shadows of Grundy for some time and has instantly become a solid Nr 1 ruckman at another club. No easy task for Spencil but at the same time he should be plenty good enough to match it against a fellow VFL ruckman. Coll (H) - Grundy With Gawn out of his way, I think Grundy is a super chance of taking the AA spot this year. Hope spencer can limit him as much as possible but it will be the hardest task of this run. Dogs (A) - Campbell/Roughead/Boyd Battlers and nothing more. Spencer should be just fine against whoever he comes up against. The dogs are well known as a bigger threat at ground level. WCE (A) - Vardy/Peitre/Giles/Basically anyone over 190cm Vardy keeps treatening to be a good player but then either underperforms or gets injured. Spencer should be good enough against these guys. They share his "Temp guy" label so wouldnt expect them to be capable of dominating. Syd (H) - Naismith/Tippett/Sinclair All decent without being great ruckmen. Tough day in the office but by no means unbeatable. Like most on this list he should be able to draw even. So coming to the end of the 11 weeks I have to say: It's not by any means looking like a disaster. No doubt we will miss a few opportunities for Max to be completely dominant, but Spencer is a capable guy, he should be able to keep us in most games. Freo, Adelaide, North and Collingwood shape up as the 4 toughest asks. Of which 2I would say we should still win, Adelaide and Collingwood (Dependent on from) may not be so simple. Other than that I wouldnt think Spencer would kill off any of our chances in the other games. Their ruckman are far from dominant enough to give us too many issues. For media personel to suggest our finals hopes are done is foolish. I believe in what the Spencil can do for us! Now, with all of that being said... I couldnt leave out the worst case scenario even if it was just a footnote: If Max's rehab is delayed, the final 8 matches of the season are Carlton, Adelaide, Port, North, GWS, St Kilda, Brisbane, Collingwood. Those 8 games contain most of the best ruckman going around, If we dont have Max back then, it could be a really tough run home. And on the otherside of that. Max wont have anything in the way of a warmup when he is back, he will be straight in against Kreuzer and it aint getting any easier. But let's think positive for now! Will be great to see how we as a team track through these big 3 months. Spencer himself could do anything in this time. I hope he earns himself a big contract, whether it is with us or elsewhere, it doesnt matter. Because if he does that, we will be playing in September

If anyone doubts just how young and inexperienced we are, consider the fact that Jayden Hunt went and saw the Batman movie this week - dressed as Batman.

Bump. Mystery over? Solid HBF with excellent attacking tendencies and a desire to get us moving in a forward direction? 700+ metres gained on the weekend against the Cats.

A 21 year old with less than 20 games to his name has to stop making errors to keep playing in the first team? ... You know, I think we are currently spoilt with our current performance of young players (Oliver, Stretch, Viney, Petracca) that in comparison - the completely normal development of O Mac, Brayshaw, Neal-Bullen, et al is minimised by association...

No-one is more anti-smoking than me. I smoked for 14 years. In the last 10 years that I smoked I smoked 60 a day. I gave up cold turkey February 23, 1993 and have never had one since. The date is poignant to me due to my incredible addiction to nicotine. I had an ashtray on the tiled ledge outside my shower, because I smoked in the shower. I smoked in bed before sleep and it was the first thing I did when I woke up. The tut-tutting over Hogan having a dart, when he's obviously not a smoker, but a young guy at a concert trying to be a 22 year old for a mere moment is beyond a joke. Going home and escaping for a couple of days as he conteplates his Father's illness sheds light on the situation. Does anyone here seriously think he's a regular, or problem smoker ? The outrage industry is alive and well and ready to judge or condemn at the drop of a hat.

Its posts like these that make you relieved that I'm not your employee

I was ment to say ''Look like a Pro" Nothing to do with you mate. Unlike you i am always happy to eat humble pie when proven wrong. Its good for your health. You could learn a thing or two of me.

He's going to kill it. The way some carry on around here... I think the problem is that Gawn has been part and parcel of the only semi-decent Melbourne team in a decade so now that he's injured we're a rabble again. Spencer exists for this very reason and is most definitely up to the task. He's a different kind of player but I can't way to see him help us win on Saturday.

One thing we know about Spencer is that he wont go quietly. Based on the pre-season reports and last year's VFL efforts, I think we can be pretty confident that the Spencer we'll see for the next few months will be better than we've ever seen him at AFL level before. I'm strangely excited by the prospect, it is always good to see an unrewarded, unlucky stalwart get a run at it. Remembering he is also one of our last half-dozen players left from the Bailey era - the guy has had a tough AFL life.

38,912

So don't smoke then. But stop acting like a self righteous [censored]. Do you drink alcohol? I hope not. That's bad bad bad. Kills people, breaks up families, causes cancer. Nasty stuff. What about soft drinks? May as well just eat a bowl of sugar. I'm not comfortable paying taxes for your diabetes, so I'm glad you don't. Processed food? Hot dogs, dim sims, pies, maybe some KFC? Nasty again. Heart attack waiting to happen. I hope you've given that up. Wouldn't want to lose you young. And how about BBQ's? Carcinogenic, and what it does to your bowels isn't worth mentioning... except for the bit about how bowel cancer is a major killer... coz we eat so much crap. Not you. I mean other people. Probably the most important thing is that you don't drive a car or use electricity, because that would be really bad. Not only would you be creating pollution to breath yourself, but (even worse!) you'd be making others breath your second hand muck (and some of them are kids. Won't somebody think of the children!) I'm not having a dig at you. I'm sure you live in the dark, ride a bike to your work every day, recycle your own farts to power you computer, and only eat organically grown lettuce and sunflower seeds fertilised with your own poop. I'd hate to think my admiration of you would lessen if I found out you were unmasked as a hypocrite, but I have faith in you, Picket.

Exactly. (edit: redacted) The fact that Mahoney, Jones and Gawn have now all now been asked and all said "we're right behind him" says to me that Jesse is in a tough place and is being cut a considerable amount of slack. I expect he'll be back because he's a competitor who will want to compete, and surely the club's supportive attitude will only help.

He'll play round 5, but obviously Jones doesn't want to discuss the health of his Father, which is obviously a concern to Jesse. That's the extent that needs to be read into it.

Hogan and Lewis are hardly injuries... Self inflicted stupidity list: round four Jesse Hogan (suspension) – 1 week Jordan Lewis (suspension) – 2 weeks

A fav moment Ball comes clumsily out of defence. Hunt takes it cleanly and off about 2 running steps slots it back through sticks fron just beyond 50!! Bang Thank your mum for the rabbits !!!

Last week was a false dawn for Freo ....... an aberration. This week Goody will put Plan B into full operation (we saw some cameos in the JLT series), we'll recover our goal kicking mojo (losing it last week was another aberration), and we'll have a comfortable 7 goal win. Simply speaking, we have too much talent, we'll be too strong around the contest, too disciplined, too resilient, and we have a much better game plan. Further, we won't go in with big heads like the Bullies did against Freo last Sunday. Well this is what I've been telling myself all week, so I'll stick with it until at least 10 5 minutes into the first quarter.

Far be it from me to defend a bloke who I was against picking in the first place... But he was not the first to do this kick during the game. Infact it has been done quite a number of times through the year. It's not the most attacking move but thats not what we needed at the time, given the cats were coming hard, we needed control. We have kicked backwards in that style to get an uncontested mark to then launch a number of times this year. So far we have 1 instance of it failing and countless of it working... I have no problem with his decision, had it been a well executed kick we wouldnt even be talking about it.

Reading some of those early posts reminds me that my toothache has gone and so has stuie, don't miss either.

If they all kicked a few goals we'd kick 66 goals in a match, so I really hope that happens.

Nothing heard of him since his Leider Kleinere Liedkompositionen written in 1880

As others have pointed out, Nathan Jones has actually taken another step. The likes of Oliver have taken the heat off Jones and freed him up to be more damaging on the outside. He must be loving footy in 2017.

And his daughter might become a great footballer.

And now that that curly question has been resolved, Spencer can fully concentrate on his game without any further existential distractions.

Clint Bizkit's Unavailable List: Colin Garland (knee) – season Max Gawn (knee) – 12 weeks Joel Smith (shoulder) – 10-12 weeks Aaron vandenBerg (heel) – 6-8 weeks Pat McKenna (hamstring) – 6 weeks Josh Wagner (thumb) – 4 weeks Jordan Lewis (suspension) – 2 weeks Jesse Hogan (suspension) – 1 week Liam Hulett (hip) – 1 week Mitch King (knee) – 1 week

Smith stays ( it was his fist game he deserves another ) Weidman has had 6 games in a row in 2017, 3 in the pre season and 3 following. He was poor in the pre season and I was surprised he got picked for the first game. He was ok for half of the first game , Poor against Carlton and non existent against the Cats. IMO he goes back to Casey this week.

This thread further emphasises we've got a footy department that are on the money with talent identification and nurturing. #raisedwell

Gawn is match winner and I don't think we can get around the fact that he was possibly our most important player. But we're lucky to have a player like Spencer to replace him. I believe he will suprise a lot of people here and will hold his own in the ruck duels as well as be a real presence when the ball hits the deck. Gawn isnt dead either... hopefully he will be back later in the year if we were contenders. So its winning enough games in his absence to get us into the 8 that matters. Its the first test of a Gawnless team on Saturday. One thing Im starting to feel we can count on with this team is that they will come out aggressive , in the physical stuff as well as the way they take on the game. IF they kick straight dees by 40 after a close first half. If they dont...and lose, then I might end up a padded cell somewhere.

Given the time, I assume Demonlanders were caught up in the events of 11 May 2015. I'm sure everyone remembers that it was the 1,685th anniversary of Constantinople becoming the capital of the Roman Empire in 330 AD.

ROB Jackson has spent enough time around top-drawer athletes to recognise the exceptional at first glance. Strength and conditioning coach at Melbourne, Jackson’s journey has pitched him into contact with a gamut of professional sportsmen — some more gifted than others. It was during a stint with the Melbourne Storm that Jackson came to appreciate the unmatched athleticism of Greg Inglis and the unparalleled completeness of Cameron Smith. Both are matchwinners, both hewed from contrasting material. Fast forward almost a decade and Jackson draws ready comparison between Inglis and Smith and Demon talents Joel Smith and Clayton Oliver. “Greg Inglis was a freak, an amazing athlete and to watch his ability to turn it on or off was incredible,” Jackson, an IsoWhey Sports ambassador, said. “He could look very relaxed and then be told ‘lift this now’ and there was a huge power switch and then he would look as if he’s back to sleep again.

Brayshaw will be a far better player than Bugg, but right now i think Bugg might offer a bit more. I'm happy for Brayshaw to build up some real form and force his way back into the team. The next time Brayshaw gets in I don't want him coming out again.

Pay-wall. Care to summarise?

I've said it before, but Ricciuto is the one he really reminds me of over the past 20 years.

does all the little things well. has continued to improve, which is all you can ask really.

WHEN YOU'VE GOT NOTHING, YOU'VE GOT NOTHING TO LOSE by Whispering Jack The Demons are making it very hard for anyone to tip them to win with any confidence these days. Key players are falling over injured, getting themselves reported and horror of horrors being photographed at music festivals puffing away at cigarettes. On the field, they continually miss easy shots at goal while their opponents never miss their targets. Meanwhile, Fremantle, their opponent this week in the big game at the G, just shrugged off the easy beat tag by giving last year's premiers a right royal touch up in Perth. Before the game against the Bulldogs, Ross Lyon re-assessed his position and decided that as a coach he was basically in the position that when you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose. So he ditched half a dozen passengers from his team and brought in players who were determined to have a dip. The rest is history and the Dockers are on the road to revival. Who would have thought only a week ago, that Melbourne would be going into this week's game as the underdog? Well, not actually THE underdog but possibly, the hunter rather than the hunted? All of a sudden the weather's turned cold for the Red and Blue while the Purple Haze has sprung to life again - returned from the dead in one of the AFL's greatest reincarnations ever witnessed (at least until the Gold Coast performed an even greater one less than 24 hours later on the other side of the country). That's the trouble with football these days. One day, you're motoring along with an All Australian ruckman hitting your midfielders on the chest, a tall forward prodigy running everywhere kicking and setting up goals and a hard nosed midfielder with four AFL premierships under his belt. Next thing you know, you've got nothing. Worse still, you're coming up against the AFL's tallest ruckman Aaron Sandilands and he's in full flight with a resurgent Nat Fyfe back to his brilliant best picking up 33 disposals and the likes of Lachie Neale, Stephen Hill and Michael Walters awaking from a long slumber causing havoc to opposition defenders. Meanwhile, it's Melbourne that's on the horns of a dilemma. Who will shoulder the ruck duties? Does the back half need stiffening up? Is it time to bring some more experience and strength into the forward line set up? Are we at the point where we have nothing to lose? The more I look at it, the more concerned I become that the unthinkable might happen on the club's own territory. Round 3 has turned the entire AFL competition on its head and one wonders how one can find a way to select Melbourne to win this week. After team selection on Thursday night, I'll come up with a way. THE GAME Melbourne v Fremantle at the MCG Saturday 15 April 2017 at 1.45pm HEAD TO HEAD Overall: Melbourne 14 wins Fremantle 21 wins At MCG: Melbourne 7 wins Fremantle 6 wins Last five meetings: Melbourne 1 win Fremantle 4 wins The Coaches: Goodwin 0 wins Lyon 0 wins MEDIA TV - Fox Footy at 1.30pm live Radio - THE BETTING Melbourne $1.32 to win Fremantle $3.45 to win LAST TIME THEY MET Melbourne 12.15.87 defeated Fremantle 8.7.55 at TIO Stadium, Round 16, 2016 The Demons dominated against a dispirited Dockers outfit which only twelve months earlier was threatening to win the flag. These things happen when you lose your ruckman, a champion midfielder and a bevy of other important players. THE TEAMS MELBOURNE B: Jake Melksham, Tom McDonald, Jayden Hunt HB: Neville Jetta, Sam Frost, Nathan Jones C: Bernie Vince, Clayton Oliver, Billy Stretch HF: Dean Kent, Sam Weideman, James Harmes F: Jeff Garlett, Jack Watts, Christian Petracca FOLL: Jake Spencer, Dom Tyson, Jack Viney I/C: Tomas Bugg, Mitch Hannan, Alex Neal-Bullen, Christian Salem EMG: Oscar McDonald, Tim Smith, Jack Trengove IN: Tomas Bugg, Sam Frost, Jake Spencer OUT: Max Gawn (hamstring), Oscar McDonald (omitted), Tim Smith FREMANTLE B: Ethan Hughes, Joel Hamling, Lee Spurr HB: Garrick Ibbotson, Michael Johnson, Connor Blakely C: Stephen Hill, Lachie Neale, Bradley Hill HF: Lachie Weller, Cam McCarthy, Ed Langdon F: Michael Walters, Shane Kersten, Brady Grey FOLL: Aaron Sandilands, Nat Fyfe, David Mundy I/C: Harley Balic, Hayden Crozier, Griffin Logue, Tommy Sheridan EMG: Jonathon Griffin, Danyle Pearce, Matt Taberner NO CHANGE THE YEAR OF THE SNAKE The world's worst kept secret was exposed on Thursday morning when Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin confirmed that ruckman Jake Spencer would play in place of the injured Max Gawn, who will miss at least 12 weeks with a hamstring injury. The loss of Gawn, coupled with the suspensions of Jesse Hogan and Jordan Lewis from the Carlton game have left gaping holes in the Demon line up, already hampered by a number of injuries especially to players like Michael Hibbberd, Josh Wagner and rookie Joel who would otherwise be expected to hold down are at least be in contention for defensive positions in the team. Cometh the hour ... cometh the men. The minute that Max hit the Etihad turf and then later as he hobbled off the ground clearly in distress, Melbourne fans knew that a call was about to go out for the man affectionately known as "Jake the Snake" The man has been around the club for what seems forever. He was 35th selection in the 2008 Rookie Draft and spent his first season playing with the club's then VFL affiliate club Sandringham where he played seven games at reserves level and 10 in the seniors. He made his NAB Cup debut on 21 February 2009 to encouraging reviews and played his first AFL game in Round 1 2009. Jake managed six games for the season and was finally upgraded from the rookie list at the start of 2010. Never the epitome of the classic modern ruckman, the ungainly Spencer has been a battler throughout his time at the club, spending much of his time as understudy to the All Australian ruckmen of his time at Melbourne - Mark Jamar and more lately Max Gawn. He's also had long stints on the sidelines with injury - missing more than a whole year through a ruptured ACL suffered in 2011 while playing with the Casey Scorpions. Entering his 10th season at the club, Jake had only 36 games for six goals to his name, his last match being in Round 22, 2015 – ironically against Fremantle at Domain Stadium. The good news is that this is precisely what he's been working diligently for in the interim - an opportunity to take the main stage and shoulder the club's ruck burden in the event of Gawn’s absence and what better first up assignment than Aaron Sandilands? Not only has he been waiting for this - Jake's fully prepared, having played well in all three JLT Community Series matches and continued in dominating form playing for Casey in VFL practice matches. Now, the Snake is about to turn into the Viper - Gawn himself is telling all and sundry that, when he's ready to return from that injury, he will find it hard to regain his place and he's not kidding! The inclusion of a deadly reptile is not all the selectors have done to change the mix following the final quarter breakdown against Geelong. They've introduced pure speed into the backline with the return of Sam Frost into defence in the place of Oscar McDonald and hardness in the guise of in-your-face pest Tom Bugg. Meanwhile, the rejuvenated Dockers have gone into the game with an unchanged line up to the one that beat the reigning premiers on their home turf last week. They are however, still a young side that has had difficulty in traveling over the Nullarbor in recent times and will struggle to contend with the Demons who, despite the missing faces, still have the structures in place to give them the winning edge at their own snake pit in this game. Melbourne by 35 points.

Shame we didn't get to see more of Joel Smith this year. But it bodes well for the future!

Just type 'Herald Sun' and the exact words of the headline into the Google search field and it will give you the article sans the pay wall. Well, I qualify that - 60% of the time, it works every time.

I love the G' as well but I'm not sure that secures my spot in the team.

Btw - cheers for your responses. Demonland after Dark can be a rewarding place on occasion.

Anti-smoking is political correctness? Nah.

He's still playing too much hero footy for mine. He doesn't have the same sharp footy brain that tells him when to give off instinctively like Oliver does (players rarely do - Clarry is a special talent). Jack reminds me more of a young Jones. But we've gotta be better than that hero footy stuff - Moloney was another terrible proponent of it. I've noticed Jack get caught a lot with the ball this season (as was the case pre-2016). Whereas, I felt last year he was keeping things simpler. The other thing about Viney is he's seen as potentially damaging by opposition teams, so they're putting more work into him this year. I can't imagine there's an instruction for Viney to hold back from the contest and having a designated primary extractor seems to go against Goody's philosophy too, which is back in our guys. I'd say we'd be all for Viney seeing ball and getting ball, although there may well be an increased focus on defensive efforts either during the contest or once the stoppage is completed. It might be this process that is leaving Viney second-guessing? The dominance of Oliver and Jones this year is enough to put our midfield on top most weeks. If Viney can find some early 2016 form this year, we'd be pushing for the top 4. He averaged 26 disposals last year as a 21-22 year old. The difference between Oliver and Jones is that unlike Viney and Tyson, their disposal is fantastic. Jones continues to improve his disposal. His kicking on either side is terrific as of late. So there may well be an increased focus for Jack on purity of disposal too, which might lead him to second-guess his instincts. If Jack can continue to improve his disposal and keep it simple, much like his co-captain has learnt over the journey, he'll be a much better player for it. And if we have a midfield that rarely makes mistakes by hand or foot and is brilliant has gaining possession regularly, we'll be sitting pretty near the top of the ladder.

I apologise if this is not allowed or derailing, but for game stats I always go here: http://afltables.com/afl/stats/alltime/melbourne.html my true purpose on this page is switching to goals and watching hogan and Garlett leapfrog up the all time 'best' the club has produced. Not very high so far, (waiting for hogan to surpass the likes of brad miller is taking far longer than I hoped) dreams of hogan reaching the top of the list one day

Gerard Whatley on 360: "the grossest overreaction I think I've ever seen in football". That's it, Close the thread.

Yay, politics.

In: Spencer, Pedersen, Bugg Out: Gawn, Weideman, Hannan Weideman will be a player, but he finds it hard without Hogan. A week at Casey won't do him any harm. I like Hannan, but a couple of games at Casey won't harm him either.

There is a hell of a lot of preemptive negativity going on here. I do realize that there have been reasons for this over much of the past half century, but I sure hope that all supporters get behind Jake Spencer and not bag him for every error (that all players make). He now has his first real opportunity to show his stuff off a rare full preseason. Go Jake -- show these sceptics.

my dog was offended

He might not be physically quick, but he's mentally very quick. One of those players who finds time and space, and also has superb awareness around the contest. Much like Watts, their basketball background gives them great spacial awareness which makes them able to almost "slow down" the play around them. On an unrelated note, I think people are judging Brayshaw harshly. He was superb in his 1st year and had a rotten run with injuries last season. He is a very talented player and a wonderful ball winner. I think he'll become a mainstay in our best 22 in the very near future. Not every player can do an Oliver. It's completely normal for a young mid to take 3-4 years to really hit their straps, especially when injury has curtailed their development. Just look at Salem, finally injury free and nicely hitting his straps.

28 disposals against the Cats after 35 in the first two rounds. It's early days, but it's clear that consistency is a massive concern for Clarry.

And why wait for a revolution?